🙏 Sunday Reflection | I’m Back & Here’s My Belated July 2021 Wrap-Up! ☀

Hello everyone and a blessed Sunday to you all. I am excited to be back and I hope this post finds you all well. A sunny, stormy and hectic July has passed here in the UK for me and now it is time to reflect on what we’ve been doing, reading and watching over that time.

💜💜💜 Life 💜💜💜

First off, I had the crazily busy and emotional run down to the end of the school year, with two great farm trips; leavers books and gifts to create and organise; a super fun sports day; end of school exams; and a truly wonderful prom. 😁Then our year group ‘bubble’ was closed early, which meant no proper end of term or leaver’s assembly to say goodbye to two of ‘my boys’ that are now nineteen-years-old and moving on from us. 😞

Then came the start of the much-needed and well-deserved summer break! Which saw me packing up and setting off for almost a two week holiday. The first week, I enjoyed relaxation, praise, teaching, fun and fellowship, out in the beautiful rolling countryside of Kent. Followed by four days, on the Hampshire coast, to visit family and places I haven’t been able to see in 16 months! It was all marvellous and just what I needed! 🤗

💜💜💜 Books 💜💜💜

With all that going on, you would be forgiven for thinking I am about to say my reading dropped, but in fact it didn’t, as I took great comfort in three books from some of my favourite authors:

• The Comedy Club Mystery by Peter Bartram
• Men At Arms by Terry Pratchett ⭐⭐
• The Rose Garden by Susanna Kearsley [re-read]

All of these were wonderfully comforting reads, but my pick of the month has got to be my re-read of Susanna Kearsley’s romantic time-slip novel, The Rose Garden, which has cemented this as one of my favourites of Kearsley’s many splendid novels. 💘

I have also continued dipping in and out of the revenge tome The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas and the Christian non-fiction The Case For Christ by Lee Strobel, whilst away on my holiday. So that’s now five books read, one DNF’d and two ongoing for my 10 Books of Summer 2021 reading challenge. 

💜💜💜 TV & Films 💜💜💜

On the other hand, my new viewing has stayed pretty low – no surprise really, when you realise I had no TV for a week on my holiday – with me watching just one new film and two new-to-me series in July:

• Fatherhood (2021) ⭐⭐
• 72 Dangerous Animals: Asia (2018) ⭐
• Before We Die (2021) ⭐

Two of these were watched with ‘my boys’ at school, during the indoor portion of their lunchtime break, and we all really enjoyed the bittersweet comedy-drama Fatherhood (2021), starring Kevin Hart, so that has to be my pick of the month. 😊

I also started watching the highly anticipated third series of Netflix’s popular romantic-drama Virgin River and I enjoyed comforting re-watches of The Mummy (1999), The Mummy Returns (2001), The Matrix (1999) and two of the Harry Potter films; although realising how long ago some of these films now came out is making me feel a little old… 😅

💜💜💜 Blog 💜💜💜

Finally, it is here on the blog that has truly suffered from neglect, due to how busy I have been. I only managed to share one review for Agatha Raisin and the Witch of Wykhadden by M.C. Beaton ! However I did manage to have great fun taking part in Six in Six | My 2021 Edition and The Classics Club | Spin Event #27; and as my reading has continued well, I have plenty of upcoming reviews to share with you and I have the rest of the summer break to catch up! 🤞

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For now, that’s all folks! I look forward to catching up with you all next Sunday for my regular, hopefully quieter, weekly reflection; and in a month’s time to see how August has treated us all. Wherever you are in the world, I hope you and your loved ones are well: staying healthy and happy. God bless and bye for now!👋

(I have linked this post into the weekly meme, The Sunday Post)

Now in the comments let me know: How you are? What you have been reading and watching? Or please leave a link to your own Sunday post or monthly wrap-up post.