A Week of Outfits: A Pregnant Lady Who Refuses to Buy Maternity Clothes

Throughout this pregnancy, I’ve been trying to figure out how to keep using my current wardrobe even as my body goes through a couple of changes! I really like reading the Week of Outfits posts on the blog A Cup of Jo so I thought I’d try and write a similar post just for fun! (Disclaimer: I didn’t actually wear these outfits all in one week, as evidenced by the fact that there are six outfits and all of these photos were taken at school! Also, I took these pictures a while ago because that’s how my blog works and I never get around to writing posts until several months later.)

Expecting

Excitement, anticipation, impatience – these are all feelings that I’ve experienced as I anxiously await the birth of my daughter. Whenever people ask Dangerous Dan how he feels about becoming a father, he says, “Nervous and excited.” I’m both nervous and excited too, although sometimes fear kicks in as well!

Being pregnant has given me a lot to consider in terms of my relationship with God. It’s a long nine months that don’t all look the same, and I’m thankful that God has given me the wisdom to see His gospel reflected throughout the various stages of my pregnancy.

How I Fell in Love With Romance Novels

(Yes, the pun was very much intended in that title! Happy Valentine’s Day!) 

After about a year of secretly reading them, I am now able to say with confidence that I enjoy romance novels. They’re no longer a guilty pleasure, they’re just a pleasure! 

Books and Podcasts

I’m always putting pairs of books together on this blog (I love my fiction/nonfiction posts!), so I figured I’d branch out a little and match books to podcasts! (I was also inspired by this blog post.)

Surviving Another Semester of Online Learning and Teaching

Hello everyone! Welcome to 2021! I definitely didn’t think this would be my very first blog post of the year, but I have a bunch of jumbled thoughts in my head that I need to organize, and I figured that I might as well share them here to keep myself accountable, too!

Unfortunately, a lot of the world is still in pandemic mode, and so my job as a teacher continues to be slightly different than how I’d envisioned it when I first entered the profession about six years ago. (Wow, time flies!) Back in May, I wrote a post about my struggles with online teaching as well as some aspects about my practice that I wanted to improve. It’s safe to say that, despite my deep reflective thoughts, online teaching is still difficult and these problems from back in the spring are still problems!

My Favourite Posts of 2020!

Now that we are approaching the end of the year, I thought I’d do a fun little round-up of my favourite blog posts that I wrote in 2020. This has been a wild year to say the least, and while COVID has been devastating for so many people for various different reasons, I’ve really been able to enjoy the time at home that it’s given me, as well as a renewed appreciation and thanksgiving for all that God has blessed me with in my life.

I Ignored All of My Reading Goals This Year

I don’t think there’s any question that 2020 was a year for the history books. (Literally, as a history teacher, I did so many random COVID-related activities with my students about historical significance and perspective to really hammer home how crazy this year was!) Thanks to the pandemic as well as the push for more antiracist reading in the wake of Black Lives Matter protests all over the US and Canada, my original reading goals basically fell by the wayside this year.

In any case, I wanted to sum up my reading for this year with my annual pie charts and graphs. Surprisingly, I still managed to get a lot of reading done despite how crazy the world became in 2020.

The First Annual Asian-Canadian Literature Challenge!

That’s right, I’m starting a reading challenge for next year, and I’m SO excited! I am pretty active over on bookstagram, and it’s been a great place to find recommendations for books written by Asian authors. As with most things related to media, American influence is extremely strong, and while I have enjoyed the books that I’ve read by Asian-American authors, I’m always trying to champion Canadian literature on my bookstagram account! I had a bit of a crisis in the middle of this year during which I felt like I wasn’t reading enough Asian-Canadian books, and so I’ve decided that in 2021, I will prioritize books written by Asian-Canadian authors!

Vegetarian Meals for People Who Love Meat

Over the past few months, about once a week, after eating the first few bites of our dinner, I ask Dangerous Dan, “Do you miss the meat?!”

“No,” he always responds.

It turns out eating less meat is easier than we thought!

Recurring Themes in My Reading This Year

We are getting close to the end of the year, which means I’ll be posting a whole slew of reading-related posts as I reflect on all of the wonderful books that I’ve read throughout the year!

I never seek out specific topics in my reading, although I love immigrant narratives and memoirs. This year, I realized that I gravitated towards certain themes and subjects somewhat unintentionally, which I found quite interesting!