Allow Me to Share #47: End-of-year favorites
It’s my favorite time of year! End-of-year wrap-ups! I wanted to share a few of my favorites from 2021 (keeping up with this newsletter certainly makes that easy!), and I’ll be back next week with some new year’s thoughts.
2021 Favorites
Books
Favorite Nonfiction: After the Last Border: Two Families and the Story of Refuge in America by Jessica Goudeau, The Making of Biblical Womanhood: How the Subjugation of Women Became Gospel Truth by Beth Allison Barr, and Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents by Isabel Wilkerson
Favorite Fiction: Malibu Rising by Taylor Jenkins Reid
Favorite Romance: The Ex Talk by Rachel Lynn Solomon
Favorite Young Adult: The Poet X by Elizabeth Acevedo and Carry On by Rainbow Rowell
Favorite Memoir: Miracles and Other Reasonable Things by Sarah Bessey
Streaming
Ted Lasso (Apple TV+)
Dickinson (Apple TV+)
For All Mankind (Apple TV+)
Only Murders in the Building (Hulu)
(For the whole family) Lego Masters and Master Chef Jr.
Newsletters
Erin H. Moon - The Swipe-Up (This is where I find most of my memes/tweets.)
Zeynep Tufecki - Insight
Emily Oster - ParentData
Favorite Instagram Follows
I would love to hear some of your favorites from this year!
As a bonus recommendation, we saw the Disney movie Encanto recently, and it was SO GOOD! Great music (composed by Lin-Manuel Miranda), beautiful animation, and a sweet story with a wonderful message. Highly recommend.
Tested and Approved
I’ve been making holiday cocktails as my Christmas break project (so I wouldn’t spend all my free time cleaning out closets, though there’s been plenty of that!). The clear winner for me was this Spicy Pomegranate Ginger Paloma. I even did the sugared rim! Darby bought me these cute coupe glasses, and they make my drinks look so fancy!
Currently Reading
After almost 18 months, I am FINALLY going to finish this book! I’ve got 30 pages left, so I know I’ll get it done by the end of the year. It was a good read - lots of interesting historical details. I really enjoy reading political histories, but it certainly was not a page-turner. I’m glad I read it and glad to be returning the hefty hardback to my dad. :)
Meme of the Week
Every. Year. I do 85% of my Christmas shopping super early and then leave the last 15% for the day before. Why????
I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas! I have to admit Omicron is getting me down. It’s hard for me to get my hopes up about plans after the October and November we’ve had, so I’m trying to hold things loosely without being too pessimistic. We’ve got our rapid tests stocked up, and all we can do is take it one day at a time, I guess. Right now, we’re enjoying time with Darby’s brother and sister-in-law, who we haven’t seen for two years, and I’m thankful that it’s happening.
Until next time,
Kayla