What are you up to this weekend? We are snowed in here in Louisville, but we’re making the most of it with comfort foods, good books, and hopefully a movie the whole family can enjoy. (Do you have recs that will please 12-16 year olds, plus their parents? Please share them in comments!)
My favorite finds from around the web:
- An 8-Year-Old Wrote a Book and Hid It on a Library Shelf. It’s a Hit. Such a cute story! (Gift link.)
- Why “We Don’t Talk About Bruno” Is the Biggest Disney Hit Since “Let It Go.” For everyone else who can’t get the song out of their head: this is why.
- Book Bans Are Targeting the History of Oppression. “What’s more, the sanitization of history in the name of shielding children assumes, incorrectly, that today’s students are untouched by oppression, imprisonment, death, or racial and ethnic profiling.”
- We are LOVING these dresser drawer organizers we bought for an organizing project in my daughter’s room.
- Nicola Yoon, J.Elle, And More Share Their Thoughts On Black Love And Why Joyful Books Are Necessary. Great interview.
- The Finely Pressed, Death-Defying World of Extreme Ironing. I didn’t know I wanted to know about this.
- Mapping fictions: the complicated relationship between authors and literary maps. I love a good book map. This exhibit sounds amazing.
- TV’s buzziest shows aren’t trying to trick viewers anymore. Have you noticed?
- Yesterday’s snow day baking: applesauce cake with bourbon raisins.
- My Year of Reading Every Ursula K. Le Guin Novel. What an interesting book project!
- The Best Bread in Every State. I was pleased to see my local bakery made the cut for Kentucky.
Don’t miss these posts:
- 101 powerful books to celebrate Black History all year long. February is Black History Month and I hope this list helps broaden your TBR throughout the year.
- Let’s talk about highly sensitive people. Learn what this term means and how it can help you better understand yourself and others.
- 10 giftable books to share with friends on Galentine’s Day. One of the best days of the year!
Upcoming Events:
- February 10: Patreon Livestream: Anne and team member Holly will talk about what they’ve been reading lately, answer questions from patrons, and recommend books. These events are always a BLAST! Join Patreon for more details.
- February 12: Galentine’s Weekend Watch Party: Watch parties are so much fun! Buy, borrow, or rent the 1999 romantic comedy Notting Hill, then join us as we all press play at the same time. We’ll use the Zoom chat feature to share our thoughts as we watch together! (This is a Modern Mrs Darcy Book Club event.)
- February 24: Live chat with author Liz Moore: Time for our Modern Mrs Darcy Book Club discussion of The Unseen World with author Liz Moore!
You can find more upcoming events here.
Have a great weekend!
29 comments
For a movie, I highly recommend Free Guy, which stars Ryan Reynolds as an NPC in a video game who becomes self aware. We watched it with our 10 year old and we all loved it (including the non-gamer husband).
The Mitchells VS The Machines is also good fun if your teenagers are not too grown up for animated films.
Free Guy was a lot of fun. We aren’t gamers either and we enjoyed it.
I have a movie recommendation for you…. Have you seen Eddie the Eagle? It’s funny and inspirational, and a family-friendly film about “Eddie The Eagle Edwards, a British ski-jumper who never stopped believing in himself even as everyone in the sport counted him out. Hugh Jackman stars as his coach in his quest to ski jump in the Calgary Olympic games. Plus ski jumping goes well with being snowed in…. We all loved it!
Have to add that I was happy to see that Niedlov’s, our favorite bakery in Chattanooga made the list!!
Either ‘Hugo’ or ‘Mr Magorium’s Wonder Emporium’ are great family friendly flicks.
Yess! Hugo is such a lovely film ❤️ Also the new Masterpiece series “All Creatures Great and Small” is an absolute delight! (It’s our family’s favorite tv series. We can’t stop watching that one on repeat!)
Yes! Excellent family viewing! Everyone loves All Creatures!!
Family movie recommendations: Hidden Figures, The Martian and The Help.
Have y’all watched the Lord of the Rings movies? Pirates of the Caribbean? Also popular for us when our kiddos were teens was anything Disney/Pixar.
Oh! And we loved the Night at the Museum and National Treasure!
We just watched My Dog Skip and we recommend for families.
McFarland USA! Great movie and based on an even better true story. Look up the real story after watching. There are also interviews with some of the real people that the story is based on. Charming, inspiring, funny & meaningful all at once.
Bonus pro tip: Get a Whirley Pop stovetop popcorn maker. I brought one for my husband one year and it is of the best gifts I ever bought. I spray a little olive oil on mine and a sprinkle of their fine salt. It is a healthy snack and very easy. It elevates movie nights. https://www.whirleypopshop.com/
YES! I was going to comment McFarland, USA. It is one of my all time favorites.
I didn’t even know about the bakery in the city near me. I can’t wait to check out their bread. Thanks for sharing that article!
The Mitchells vs. the Machines on Netflix was a hit for everyone in our family.
American Underdog is a new movie about Kurt Warner ,NFL player who overcame years of rejection before someone noticed him.
The newest Ghostbusters is available to rent…that’s on our list for the weekend.
Family TV/movie recommendations: Encanto (I know you already posted about one of the songs but we LOVE it!); Free Guy (I’m not a gamer – at all – and found it funny; tween and teen were all over the references); Sing 2 (tween and teen enjoyed; hubs and I knew all the songs); we all loved Soul as well.
Have been watching Abbott Elementary with my teen on Hulu and we both love it.
My mother and I just re-watched “King Ralph” with John Goodman, and oh my goodness, it was so much fun. His rendition of “Good Golly, Miss Molly” for a royal gathering is a joy to behold!
And I was surprised to see the winning bread bakery in Maine was a little bakery close to where I used to live! I’ve never heard of it, but my sister lives near there now. I thought sure it would be in Foodie-Heaven in our biggest city of Portland.
I hate, hate, HATE when book maps are in the frontpiece (Is that what it’s called?) of the book, and the library TAPES the cover over it. I just took “Black Sun” back without reading it for that reason. And don’t tell me to look on the back inside cover. That’s a different map, also taped over. Arghhhh!
Firedog Bread – my hometown, Keene, NH. Their claim – our bread never touches a plastic bag.
One movie we all loved was Master and Commander.
Movie recommendation – Red Notice on Netflix – stars Ryan Reynolds, Dwayne Johnson, and Gal Gadot and has lots of good action involving an art heist with some charming, quirky and funny moments thrown in. I enjoyed it way more than I expected and think it would be a hit for teens and parents alike!
Yesterday I read the article you linked to on book banning. Late yesterday this article on the same topic popped in my inbox, which I thought was good: https://gfile.thedispatch.com/p/it-takes-two-sides-to-fight-a-war
This is the perfect weekend to watch Cool Runnings.
Masterpiece theatre Around the World in 80 Days. It’s a series and so far we have only watched the first one but it seems good
I missed the weekend, but for the NEXT family movie night – maybe hit up an “old school” one. We have recently watched “Men in Black” and “A League of Their Own” with our 9 & 11 year olds and they loved both.
I enjoyed the piece on TV shows that aren’t trying to ‘trick’ us. That’s one of the biggest reasons we switched to watching British tv almost exclusively. Just solve the murder, please… no supernatural hijinks or Purgatorial plot twists necessary. 😄