Happy Friday, friends! If you are anything like me, I know that you are looking forward to this weekend. I have quite a few fun projects I am tackling for the site and am jetting off to Austin next week with Savings.com for a fun weekend of learning! In the meantime, it is a mad dash of laundry, deadlines, and playing catch up on the house. The usual.
Here are three things that are making me happy this week that I think you will love too!
Television We Both Love
As you may or may not know, we ditched cable so we either have to purchase a series through Amazon or wait for it to come through our Netflix or Hulu subscriptions. My husband signed us up for Amazon Prime this year and they have a partnership now with HBO and are offering several FX series shows that I am not able to get on Netflix or Hulu. Since we are paying for this membership, we are doing our best to get our money out of it and one way is through our television-watching.
I kept hearing great things about The Americans and we are only three shows in and I am absolutely in love with this series already. It’s a little Mr. & Mrs. Smith and a little Alias. The story is set in the ’80’s and centers around the marriage of KGB spies posing as Americans in suburban Washington DC. The show is set during the Reagan presidency and follows Phillip and Elizabeth Jennings, two spies who are in an arranged marriage.
The fight scenes are amazing, the acting is superb, and the plot just keeps thickening. A marathon of this show is on our weekend agenda and that makes me very, very happy!
Goodbye to Spotty Glassware
Summer is the season of wine glasses… oh, wait… maybe that’s just me (*ahem*). We have hard water and by hard water, I mean miserably hard water that builds up in my coffee makers, on our shower heads, coats our sink fixtures, and makes for the world’s spottiest dishware. I didn’t know what to do other than donate our cups each year and get new ones. We got a new dishwasher and it still wasn’t helping even with vinegar in my rinse aid and running all of our different cycles.
As I researched how to get rid of spots, I ran across this Lemi Shine in a “hard water woe discussion forum,” and it has changed my world. You add this where the dishwasher tablet usually goes and then put your dishwasher tablet in the other compartment. It boosts your dishwasher soap and makes everything shine like the top of the Chrysler building (said with my best jazz hands). Seriously, if you struggle with hard water, give this a shot and tell me what you think.
A Great Summer Escape
Let me preface by saying that this book is so very far out of my genre that when I picked it up, I wasn’t sure if this was ever going to be a book I could get into. I am just done with dystopian societies, I hate science fiction, and I really am not into shows like The Walking Dead. I got an advance reader of The Girl With All the Gifts from NetGalley and I can’t believe how much I enjoyed it. This book is wildly imaginative, suspenseful, and leaves you wondering who you should be rooting for as the story develops. I really, really loved this book. Unfortunately, it is just the kind of book that you shouldn’t talk about so that each reader can go on the journey with this child and find out just what makes her special.
It lagged a bit in the middle and there were times I was skimming through some of the scientific portions because they were so lengthy, but overall it was an amazing read that found me irritated every time some real-life activity had to interrupt my reading time. It’s been a long time since I have felt that way about a book like this.
I have reached out to the author for an interview, but he’s kind of a big deal… I am not sure if he will reply to my messages. I didn’t want to let this read slip through the cracks though so I am mentioning it today if you want to try something new.
It does have graphic violence and graphic language. Power through.
Don’t read the reviews, it will spoil your journey and discovery of Melanie and all her gifts!
*this post may contain affiliate links- I only recommend what I love though. Check out past editions of It’s the 3 Little Things!
Now it’s your turn, what makes you happy this week? Feel free to share in our link up below and link back to this post to participate or share in our comments below!
Share 3 things that are making you happy today!