Top Ten Tuesday: Top Ten Things I Am Most Thankful For This Year

This feature is hosted by the ladies at The Broke and the Bookish.

1. 

My mom. She’s always in my corner no matter what.Even if I mess up, she’s right there for me. Supporting me. Loving me. I cannot ask for much more from her.

2. 

My health. I have serious health problems. I’ve never been shy about them.This year my health has been pretty good. Not amazing, but pretty good.I’m very thankful for that as I know so many people who don’t have their health.

3. 

My younger half sisters & half brother. Things are still awkward with them as I have chosen to have no contact with our dad. However since they have had kids in the past 3 years, I have really worked on establishing a relationship with them.It’s not their fault that our dad is a total a-hole. So I’m working on things with them.

4. 

My extended family on my mom’s side. It’s small and we do fight on occasion but we have never held a grudge. Even after having a screaming fight with my uncle on Superbowl Sunday about gay rights 2 years ago. We’ve just agreed to disagree with each other when it comes to politics.

5. 

Bloggers. I just started this crazy ride in April and I cannot believe the awesome people that I have met through blogging. I am so thankful for that. I could fill up a full post just talking about those people who I have connected with so I’ll just keep it short. Ashley, Jamie, Meredith, Marie & Molli. All of you have brought something special to my life and I thank you so much for that.

6. 

My cats. It’s no secret that my cats are my family. I would have a very boring life if they were not in it. They have their own personalities and they have made my life even more wonderful.

7. 

I’m thankful that I have everything I need. Clothes on my back, a roof over my head and food in my stomach. As long as I have that, everything else is just gravy. So many people in my city live under bridges, have no idea where their next meal is coming from or even if it’s coming.

8. 

I’m thankful for books. I’ve loved books since I was a 3 year old and I cannot imagine never being able to read another book. The idea is too awful to even consider.

9. 

I’m thankful for authors who treat their readers well. I’ve heard of authors that have treated readers/bloggers horribly and that makes me so sad. I am so grateful that I have yet to encounter anything like that.All the authors that I have interacted with have been wonderful people.I love that authors are interacting more with their readers. Thank you to social media for that!

10. 

J.K.Rowling. For reasons that should be obvious to everyone. She is a goddess and she brought these books that will be classics forever. She taught so many kids about love, sacrifice and how doing the right thing is more important than having a boyfriend/girlfriend.

These are my top ten. It’s a mix of book related things and the usual answers that come around at this time of the year.

So what are you most thankful for this year?

Meet My Furbabies

Hello everyone, nope no review today but after reading Molli’s post about her furbabies as well as Kara and Lynn’s post on their rescue animals, I decided to take some time to talk about my own furbabies. First of all,I want to introduce you to a very special cat who is no longer with us.

Here I am at five years old with a teeny tiny kitten that I named Molly. She was a present given to me by my grandmother’s 2nd husband who was more like a grandfather to me than my actual grandfather. I had just had serious, life-saving surgery and he got me this kitten as a present while I recovered.We lost her to Lymphoma shortly before my 18th birthday. Nine years later, I still miss her.

I have had cats in my home pretty much all of my life. I remember some of their names and what they looked like.

• Tiger-Tiger striped female. She ran away to die at 19.
• Pee-head- Gray fat cat who we found dead under the house.We believe she died of kidney failure.
• Molly- Siamese female who we lost to Lymphoma.
• Angel- All white cat except for a gray spot (or halo) between her ears and with one green eye and one blue eye.She died last October at age 19.
• Eclipse- All black female cat who died 4 years ago due to her being overweight.She was 14.
• Stevie-All gray female who we believe was carried off by a coyote 3.5 years ago.She was 13.
• Fuzzy- Himylan female who died in her sleep.She was 12 years old.

Those are all the cats who have crossed over to the rainbow bridge in my life. They all meant something to me. But enough sadness. Let’s meet the 2 newest additions to my life. Prince and Tiffany.

Prince

Here he is on the very day we got him. Now the circumstances are definitely not ideal but I am so grateful we were able to give him a home. First of all the lady we got him from assured us up and down that she was a rescuer and that she just wanted to find a good home for him. She assured us that he was in perfect health and that he was 11 weeks old.

Now does he look like he’s 11 weeks old?

Yeah…No. However we were worried about what she’d do to him if we didn’t take him and so we did.We made an immediate appointment with the vet and was told that not only was he not 11 weeks old, the vet estimated he was 8 weeks old. The vet tech we had that day said he looked more like six weeks old. Then we were told he had yeast in his ears along with ear mites, worms in his stomach and worst of all,he tested weak positive for Feline Lukemia.

   

I was heartbroken.He was such a sweet baby and I hated the idea of him suffering.We decided to nurse him back to health and then retest him. When we retested him he still was showing a weak positive. The vet then said, we’d test him a 3rd time and if that test was also positive we’d treat him as if he had Feline Lukemia. Well as luck would have it,January 6th, 2012 we got the third and final test results back…

It was negative.

That was the best news we had ever heard.I just remember crying and cuddling him pretty much the entire day.Plans were then made to neuter him.He did wonderfully with that surgery and it really mellowed him out.Before then he would attack us for no reason…a lot.He still did it after he was fixed but it was no where near at the level it used to be.

Oh and one day I was sifting through the stuff that the lady we bought him from, gave us and I found a blue TICA slip which told me that she was not a “Bengal rescuer” but a backyard breeder as she had known EXACTLY who Prince’s parents were.

Right around Christmas of 2012, we started talking about getting another cat.We had gotten the approval from the landlord so we began looking.This time we went through a reputable breeder.I had lost the fight with my mom to get a shelter cat.Shortly after a cardiac procedure I had in February, we found the kitten we wanted.

Tiffany

When she came to live with us, she was pretty shy initially and she still is shy with those she doesn’t know really well. She is such a sweetheart and really the complete opposite of Prince.She is so healthy which is a great thing. She has bonded with me as I was the main person who was with her when she first came to live with us.

Yet she and Prince get along great. I was worried about how Prince would do with a new cat as he is pretty protective of the three of us who live in this house.

Clearly I didn’t need to worry. They get along just fine.

The naming of the cats was tough, both times. We picked names out of a hat for both cats. Prince was named after the musician and Tiffany was named after Jennifer Lawrence’s character in Silver Linings Playbook.

So tell me about your pets!

Stacking The Shelves #15

Hello again everyone. Hope your week was full of lots of good books. Mine definitely was.Which is why I am so glad that it was also a slow book week.Only 3 books this week. 2 from NetGalley and one from a tour host for a book tour that I am participating in. I am behind in reading & reviewing as I decided to read a couple of the early 2014 releases already. Whooopsies. So nothing is really planned for this week on the blog so posts may be infrequent this week.

Be sure to stop by Tynga’s Reviews to link up your book haul posts and vlogs. Be sure to stop by other blogs to see what they added to their shelves this week.

Onto the fun stuff…The books!

Bought

–

Received for Review

The Plague by Lisa Hinley (e-galley from NetGalley)

Let Me Go by L.L. Akers (Received for my participation in a Blog Tour)

Dream Girl (Book #1) by S.J. Lomas (e-galley from NetGalley)

Won

–

Gifted
–

So be sure to let me know if you’ve read these or if you want to.I’ll be interested to see how these turn out.

And because I want to and Christina has inspired me, I’ll be including pics of my adorable cats this week. I’ve been meaning to do it for weeks but I just never found a good part to put them in.

Here’s Prince. He’s a 2 year old Bengal.

This is Tiffany. This was taken shortly after she came to live with us at the beginning on May.She is a 8 month old Snow Bengal. 

This was them only a few days after they had met. Given Prince’s personality, we weren’t sure how he’d do with a new kitten in the house.He surprised us big time.

Well I will see you all next week for yet another edition of Stacking the Shelves. Until then, have an awesome week.

Review: Catalyst (Tethered Book 1) by Jennifer Snyder

Book: Catalyst (Tethered Book 1)

Author: Jennifer Snyder

Publish Date: June 12th, 2013

Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform

Series: Book One

Book Info: Goodreads

Purchase Links: Barnes & Noble, Amazon

Synopsis:
Addison Harmon has just learned that she inherited a house from her biological mother who she never knew.She, along with her best friend Vera decide to take a trip out there to see the house. Addison has no idea what is about to happen.All she knows right now is that she needs to decide what to do with the house.When she arrives at the house,strange things start happening.She meets the very sexy Kace Sullivan who seems to know more about this house than she does. Addison is not sure that she wants to know about the secrets this house holds within it.

Disclaimer: I received this e-book in exchange for an honest review.

Review: 
I wasn’t sure how I would feel about this one because it looked so good. I was afraid that my expectations wouldn’t be met and I would have to chuck the e-book aside (very hard to do unless I want to hurt my Kindle) Thankfully I didn’t need to worry because I loved it and was very glad that I had gotten this book.

A lot of the book reminded me so much of Charmed and I LOVED that TV series so much. Addison was awesome. I could see the progression from being curious of the house to almost afraid of it by the end because she still didn’t quite understand what was going on. She was just hoping that all this creepy stuff was actually going on and that she wasn’t simply going crazy.

Vera bored me.We really didn’t get to know her very well and I was really peeved at her running out on Addison because she was scared. I believe she should have stayed and supported her best friend. Especially given the fact that Addison wanted her there.That should have trumped fear.

Oh Kace, I’m pretty sure he earned his spot as my number one book boyfriend. He was so dreamy and usually I don’t use those words to describe a man but wow, I loved him. I loved how he comforted Addison when she was scared. I loved how he provided her with information instead of hiding it.

I have a soft spot for cats so of course I have to mention adorable Binks. I knew there was something weird about him from the beginning. I wasn’t sure exactly what it was until it was explained in the book.

Oh Admer,another character that I loved. I knew that there was something strange about him from the beginning and I’m still a little irked that we didn’t know what was up with him until practically the end. Like Addison,I think he definitely knows more than he told her initially and I’m hopeful that he’ll give Addison the full story in the upcoming second book.

Editing-wise,very well done. I didn’t have any issues with the pacing or grammar,spelling or anything else. I just didn’t want to put the book down at all. The book kept me hooked throughout the whole thing.

I am giving this book 4 stars mainly because I don’t feel like I got to know Theo or Callie that well. If they are going to be important characters in the next book,I’m hoping that we’ll get to know them better.Aside from that small character development issue,I adored this book so much.