The Best Holiday Movie of All Time

And here we are. It’s beautiful Christmas Eve and we arrive at the #1 of the Best Holiday Movies of All Time! The actual best holiday movie of all time. Can you feel the Christmas magic in the air? Can you hear Santa making his way? Have you been stuffing your face with delicious treats? Has holiday music been echoing in your household? Yep, I think you are ready for the ultimate, the best holiday movies of all time! This is for our Top 3 Holiday Movies countdown, so if you missed the first two, check #2 and #3 out here. We have such a special list today with heartfelt tributes and memories. We hope you enjoy.

Andrew – “The Polar Express”

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My theme for my #1 is “for children.” It was a classic when I was in elementary school and we would come into school in pajamas and read the book/listen to the audio book in the hallway as a school. Years later, the Tom Hanks iconic adaption would come out and satisfy a new generation.

Jul102017

Our Weekend in Pics

It was a hot weekend!

Mar312017

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them

Since Fantastic Beasts was released just a few days ago (Blu-Ray, DVD, etc.) and many people we know still haven’t seen it, we wanted to say a few words to help you decide whether you want to see it or not. The general idea is that, if you’re a Potter fan… like a TRUE fan of the HP Universe, you will enjoy this movie. You might not enjoy it as much as you wanted to, but it definitely adds to the cinematic universe that they created. It doesn’t (really) work against it in any significant way, so it does feel like Rogue One’s relationship to Star Wars, in that way.

Now, if you haven’t ever watched any of Screen Junkies Honest Trailers, and you appreciate some satirical comedy, we highly recommend you check out their YouTube page. They had the same idea about Fantastic Beasts this week, so they just released their own Honest Trailer, and while their job is to be hard on movies, we do think that this film deserves some credit. It does, after all, have a 73% on the Tomato Meter with an 81% from audience, as well as a 7.5/10 on IMDB.

Jan242017

24 Books a Year: Goal Completed

Last year, I set a goal for myself: to read 24 books in 2016 (two books a month). Why did I set this goal? Well, for a few reasons, really…

I love to read and want to consume more unread books in our library.
Reading is one of the best ways to learn how to write better.
Reading is great for inspiration.
I love a good challenge.

Aug302016

Men’s Health: September Highlights

Take 2. Men’s Health does these Seasonal Fashion Guides and this one includes the Fall Fashion Guide. I’m not a huge fan of it; it’s not really an incentive for my subscription. Still, this one had more of a takeaway than any in the past. You’ll see, but we’ll get to that last.

The bulletin section is a nice piece of smart marketing as the bold headlines really catch your eye. There are random tips here including how to avoid sounding like an old-man. How? Sing more. Useful section.

But it’s not even the useful stuff section, which fails to disappoint. Here are some highlights from that section:

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Jun112016

A Book to Inspire You: Big Magic

I forget where I first heard of Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear, but I’m very grateful to that unknown source. I’ve been writing my whole life–I’m no master, but I have always enjoyed creating stories. It’s a hobby of mine I hope to focus on now that the big wedding is done and that I have a little bit more time on my hands. But writing, or being creative in general, isn’t as easy as putting pen to paper (or brush to canvas or hands to flowers)–though, technically that’s what you need. Sometimes, you need a little bit of inspiration. This book more than does that.

Jan102016

What Game of Thrones is Missing

The Greyjoys.

Recently, as I was driving through LA, I saw this apple TV banner. While I haven’t watched Game of Thrones since the end of the first season came out live, I’ve heard a lot about it from others. Since we read the books before the TV series was out, we were shocked to find out they were making a series in the first place. No one else knew what A Song of Ice and Fire was since it came out in the early 90s. I can’t imagine there were too many people out there that were more excited about this show than us.

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Nov222015

Read For an Hour Once a Week

AT LEAST. I feel like there’s a reading crisis out there, and I want to help it! People are choosing Facebook over a page of a nice book and it makes me sad. There’s nothing wrong with social media, we obviously use it all the time. However, we will never stop preaching moderation. Balance! Weigh one hand with a phone and another with a book! I’m not telling you what to read whether it be nonfiction, fantasy, romance, or another type of fiction! I’m just telling you to stop, drop, and read!