No topic, just an addict checking in

[DragonflyMoon]

Wow... i met my husband online too! We all have so much in common! After reading all of your posts i am just amazed. I enjoyed everyone's story and actually, i was pretty emotional reading what everyone had to say. Thank you all for sharing! I am so glad that we have this opportunity to meet.

I am pretty new to the boards and have posted a bit of myself in my introduction, but here is a bit more info about me:

My name is Jenna and i am 30 and a new mom. My daughter's name is Luna. We all live in Spokane, WA and moved up here about 3 years ago from Denver, CO. I am from NJ originally (always a Jersey girl at heart!) I went to Ithaca College in NY and have my degree in Speech Pathology and Audiology. My senior year in college - one month before graduation - my father passed away unexpectantly. It was devastating. I always had control of my weight until that year. My "dark" year. After that the weight just kept on coming!

I started out with my Masters degree in NJ to stay close with my mom. After a year or so i had a "quarter life crisis" and started asking those questions... "Why are we here?" and "Life is so short... have to make the best of it..." and i picked up and moved to Colorado with my trusty sidekick, Sage, my Weimaraner. (Who is now eight years old and as crazy as ever!) The plan was that my mom would follow whenever the time was right. (She is my best friend and the coolest woman!)

Coincidentally, (or fate?), i had a email "pen pal" who lived in Colorado. Never thought i would even meet him - but when i moved there he kept asking me out. I thought... "Ew. That is weird. What if he is some stalker?" But then on the other hand i didn't know a soul there and i had been talking with him for about 9 months online. So i agreed to meet him for lunch one day...

And now we are married! We have been together since 1999. Just got married here in Spokane two years ago. How funny? He is a computer networker for a bank up here by day and a guitar player by night. He is a really cool guy - very spiritual and artistic and probably the only person who really knows me and loves me anyway.

I love music and art and movies. I love to dream and create. I love to read - just finished with Phillipa Gregory's books "The Other Boylen Girl" and "The Queen's Fool." I am hoping to reach my goal sometime so i can do all of the other things that i love to do and haven't been able to because of my size and self esteem.

My best friend and i just opened our own daycare out of her house. We don't have any clients yet but hoping that it will pick up soon. I'll keep you posted. I am secretly glad for now because it gives me lots of free time to check out these boards. I am soooo addicted to reading them! It really is helpful.

Thanks all for letting me share and be a part of your group!

[Finelly]

Fellow reader here! Love "The Other Boleyn Girl" and "The Queens Fool".

Who are your favorite authors?

[DragonflyMoon]

I can't wait to get my hands on "The Virgin's Lover," but it is only out in hardcover right now. I am going through withdrawal! My favorite all time author is Herman Hesse. Other than that, i don't generally pick books by author... although i guess i am really into Phillipa Gregory right now. I loved "Girl with Pearl Earing" and i am currently reading "Queen of the Tambourine" by Jane Gardam. Can't get enough of the historical fiction though. What else do you recommend? What do you like?

[Finelly]

Hesse is DEEEEEEP! I like him, too.

Loved Girl wiht a Pearl Earring, also. What is the Virgin's Lover about?

I'm heavily into historical fiction, also biographies of royalty and of artists and writers.

My favorite historical fiction author is Roberta Gellis - ever read her Rosalynd series?

Probably my favorite book of all time is Divine Secrets of the YaYa Sisterhood......

[Finelly]

Another great historical fiction writer: Anya Seton

[DragonflyMoon]

I haven't heard of Roberta Gellis but i will write that down and check it out. "Virgin's Lover" is the third in the series from Phillipa Gregory. It starts off with Elizabeth becoming Queen and her relationship with Robert Dudley. Should be interesting. Did you see the movie "Girl with Pearl Earring?"

[Finelly]

Yep, saw the movie, loved it.

Roberta Gellis is now usually only available at used bookstores. But well worth the hunt, if you are interested in either regency period or medieval times. She has an actual history degree.

[DebbietheHugBug]

Yikes :yikes y'all make me feel illiterate! I love Stephen King and Dean Kuntz. I don't read much anymore anyway :no

[DragonflyMoon]

I'm just getting into reading again... it had been a long time for me! I just hadn't been making time for it. I think i need to get a library card though; i keep dropping money on these books! But my friends and i are doing a cool thing... when we read a really good book that "speaks" to us... we sign our name, location and month that we finished the book into the front page (behind the cover) and send it on to someone else that we think would like it just as much. Then they do the same thing. We just started to do this... it will be cool to see how far it goes!

[Finelly]

What a fantastic idea!!!!

Well, if you guys haven't yet read The Divine SEcrets of the YaYa sisterhood, do it! It's not at ALL like the movie, btw. And it WILL speak to you!

[DragonflyMoon]

Awesome! Thanks - i'll put that on "the list" too!

[michigangirly]

oh man you guys have to read "The Girls Guide to Hunting and Fishing". It is awesome! I believe it is by Melissa Bank or Banks. Don't quote me on the author though. I also love "In Her Shoes". Ha again..I can't think of the author right now.. :nono. Alright that was my two sense... :wave

[DragonflyMoon]

Haven't read that either! But i'll put it on my (growing!) list of to-read! Thanks for the suggestions!

[elfish99]

Im with ya' Debbie. My reading tastes aren't quite as sophisticated as everyone else's here, but I have read Girl with the Pearl Earring. One of my favorite books though was Babara Kingsolver's Poisonwood Bible. After I read that I read almost everything else she's written and that was by far her best book.

[DebbietheHugBug]

I did read the Virgin Suicides about 10 years ago. Does that count? LOL My hubby has been reading the same book for 3 years. It's about the town I grew up in. It's called The Rape of the Town of Lovell. Can't remember the author. It's about a doctor that was sexually abusing his patients for many years. He was my doctor for awhile. I'm not in the book. I guess I left town when everything fell but all the people in the book are girls I went to school with and I knew their parents.