Book Review - What If?

This Christmas the boyfriend did good, with a selection of books which I am pretty excited to get my teeth into. The first being the book What If? by Randall Munroe. I wanted to finish reading this book in the new year, so it would become my first finished book of the year. But I had several long train journeys and it was a rather addictive book. Sam told me I was cheating anyway...

The book is based off the authors website https://what-if.xkcd.com/ (it is brilliant, go check it out) which was a favourite of mine a few years ago, but had slipped out of my mind. The basis of the website is that people submit their wonderful, whacky and hypothetical questions, that get answered with science  and research from across the globe. I find them very amusing and love the nerdy science part of it as well. The book takes some of the best questions that have been asked and puts them into print, with a couple of strange and unanswered ones for good measure.

It was a really enjoyable read, it made me laugh out loud and was really quite educational, without being too confusing or patronising. Broken down into individual questions and answers it was perfect pick-up-put-down book that was readable in bite sized chunks. Always perfect for any occasion.

I've decided to give number rating books a miss for now. I'm struggling to work out an intuitive system that works for every kind of book. I've decided that I will just give my thoughts and opinions for now, until I find the right thing.

Book Review: What Would Boudicca Do?

It feels rather odd to write a review before I have actually finished a book. But I believe in the case of this book, I am pretty safe in doing so.

What Would Boudicca Do? is a book celebrating the women of history in brilliant bite sized chunks, perfect for a few pages before bed. The book has a chapter dedicated to each women, and with a couple of pages gives us a synopsis of their life, giving us both the good and the bad, and how we can channel them into our everyday life.

The book has a feel good vibe to it, and gives us the history which we might not think to look for, and shows us women who we may never have heard of if we didn't know where to look.

The book is written in a relaxed, and fun to read style which I find easy to follow and doesn't have me scratching my head trying to understand what it is saying.

Overall I am enjoying this book, and it is giving me so much more information about the women of history that I never knew I needed to know about, and something to look back at history and smile at how strong and amazing these people were.

Book rating: I feel like I need to explain myself here, as this is the first time I have written a book review and I want to set up a book rating system to give the book a score out of 5. So I have thought about what I want to see in a book and have come up with the following three categories, each category will be rated out of five, then all the scores added up and divided by three to get the final score out of five. They are as follows:

1 - Readability: Is the book easy to read? What sort of language is used? Does the writing flow? Is it easy to get from page to page or am I fighting to the next chapter?

2 - Content: Is there a lot of subject matter or are we going around in circles? Is the subject made interesting by the writing? Is there depth to a story or plot? Are there backgrounds to each character, situation or decision? Does the writing give you loads of information at once or does it evaluate and pick out the good bits or the important bits?

3 - Put-Down-Ability: The last and final category kind of speaks for itself. Does the book make me want to keep turning the page? Is there so much going on that I just need to put it down to get my head around it? What is so "Just one more page" about it? Is there just one more thing to find out before you stop?

I hope this rating system makes sense, and perhaps if you have anything to add, anything to make it more interesting, or something I haven't thought about, leave a comment and I will try and get back to you, or improve the rating system.

So for What Would Boudicca Do?:

Readability: The language used is informal and easy to relate to. It flows nicely and is easy to follow. There are minor minor areas where I feel the subject jumps around a little bit, but overall I can read it quite nicely, so I'll give it a 4.

Content: The content is so much more then I realised I wanted to know. There is a lot of information that I don't think I find all in one place in many other places. I've enjoyed how individual parts are picked out and applied to everyday life and even the bad bits are not just glossed over but spoken about too. But there are some places where I am wanting more, I want to know more about specific stories and more about certain aspects of the people's lives. So I am going to give a score of 3 for content.

Put-Down-Ability: This book doesn't have any kind of cliff hanger, nor does it actually have a plot! But it is delightfully potato-chip-y. In that each chapter is so small that you just want to read one more. They are perfectly bite sized and perfect for reading a few pages before bed. The only thing making me want to come back to the book is the curiosity of who is going to be next. So for that, it is getting a 3.5 for Put-Down-Ability.

So the added total for each category is 10.5, so the final score out of five is 3.5.
Not a bad score for the book at all, and a lovely read if you want to find out just a little bit more about what some of the most important women in our history have done.

My all time favourite though, has to be Gráinne ní Mháille (Grace O'Malley), Irish pirate queen who did the f**k she wanted!

The Reading Challenge Books 4-6

I have been rather lax in my blog post writing recently. But I am hoping to change that. At least I am here writing now!

I intend to write a blog post about the books I read throughout this challenge and I'm going to do them three books at a time. I am currently reading book number nine, but this post will talk about books four to six. If you want to catch up on the post explaining why I am starting and the challenge itself you can find it here along with my thoughts on the first three books I read:

- The Tales of Beedle the Bard
- Handbook for Railway Steam Locomotive Enginemen
- Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

The books I am reading are rather varied, and are not all planned out in advance. Part of me wants to plan it all out and would feel rather smug having done so, but I am also aware that I usually want to read something on a whim and having to stick to a years worth of books that I planned out one september would also drive me insane. So I didn't. I did however try to to keep track of the dates that I started and finished each book and where that meant I was in terms of progress. This I have semi-successfully managed. By that I mean that I have written down the dates I have finished each book, but may have forgotten it for some of them. I really hope it won't be too much of a problem.

The third book of the challenge was Mrs Bradshaw's Handbook by Terry Pratchett. I started this book on the 19th September 2018, and finished it on 26th of the same month. So it didn't take me too long to read. I do most of my reading at work in my lunch and tea breaks, so there are periods of time on my off shift where I don't really read. I should change that, it might make the challenge go quicker!

The book itself takes on the role of the Bradshaw's railway guide, but based in Terry Pratchett's discworld. It has little snippets of all of the characters and places from his discworld series and is rather funny in doing so, like most Pratchett. It was a joy to read and I found it funny and entertaining. I very much enjoyed this read and once it was finished, like always there was a small tinge of sadness at having to start a new book.

The next book was not a fiction book but part of an autobiography series. I say a series, because this author wrote an autobiography and then continued to write another three books after. I read Worms to Catch by Guy Martin. This is the third book he has written, covering more or less a year out of his life. Which in itself was crazy and entertaining.

I started this book on the evening of the 26th September and it was finished by the 11th October 2018. 16 days, cover to cover. Seeing as the goal was one book every two weeks this one took slightly longer than was needed. But I think I still have plenty of time, I'll work it out at the end.
I loved reading this book. It gave me insight into what went into Guy Martin's TV programs and his writing style is one that doesn't take any sh*t, is real and down to earth. Which I get on with. I find fancy words and big long sentences difficult to deal with. This is just real. I like it (so much so that you will see I read another Guy Martin book later on).

For the sixth book, I went for something small and silly. It was the book Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them - not the screenplay of the film (I've already read that) but the Hogwarts Library edition of the book that was written by JK Rowling to raise funds for one of her charities. I loved to immerse myself some more in the wonderful world that JK Rowling had created. It's a charming and silly little book and the kind that I could sit down and read in a day or two with no trouble at all. Which I expect is what I did, but as I forgot to write down when I finished it, I'm not to sure at all... Oh poo.

So let's work out if I'm on track with the challenge so far. Up to the 11th of October 2018, we know I have read five books. We're a fifth of the way through the challenge, yay! Going by our one book every two weeks quota, starting on the 1st September I should have read three books. We are doing well! I don't feel quite so bad having taken the time to read Worms to Catch. I am enjoying how this challenge is turning out. It feels good to have a goal in mind when reading books, and it acts as some gentle encouragement to pick up another book after I have put one down.

I didn't do much recreational reading when I was at college, as I was so focused on my studies that I was revising most of the time, and when I was wasn't I wanted to do one of my other 50 hobbies I seem to have collected. (Hobby Collector is now a thing okay.) Having finished my degree and starting my new job in August, I felt that I didn't want to lose the regularity of reading. I don't know if that was a conscious or unconscious feeling, but it manifested itself as a challenge to myself.

Looking at my progress so far in the challenge, (I have read a few more then just six when I am writing this, but you will hear about them in due course) I am pleased with the amount I have read. I feel a huge sense of achievement in having read so much, and there are happy memories connected with each and every book. I'm excited to keep going, and I am excited to keep learning new things.

So I will be back soon enough with the next three on my list.

The Reading Challenge

It is rather obvious that I have been quite quiet recently on my blog here, and with the start of my podcast, it has really been left behind. The podcast has taken over the purpose of the blog, and recently I have been posting shownotes for the podcast and links, and not much of anything else.

My plan from now is to change that. I will still have my podcast, (I am enjoying it a lot, and it feels a lot better way to show you what I am up to) but I intend to post more in-depth notes on each podcast and project within it on here, and only the minimum on Youtube. I may even include the in depth notes on Ravelry too for you who are on there - if you are find the podcast page under the pages tab and search for the Lemmon Juicer Podcast.

What I intend to do for this blog now is to create some posts that are more discussions on what I have been getting up to, still focused on making and crafting, but less of the "I made this" and more of the "This is what I think and enjoy". I really hope that this is more interesting to you and will mean that there is more content on this blog that you will enjoy to read.

So I am going to start off with something that I have started that isn't really a making project, but it's a challenge I have set myself that I wish to share with you.

I have challenged myself to read 25 books in a year. Now that may not seem like a lot, and I am aware that usually the challenge is 100 books. But I'm starting small and keeping my goal something that I think I can achieve, because there is nothing more disheartening then an insurmountable challenge where you are only going to be disappointed in the end. Maybe, if I ace this challenge then we can work up to 100 books. But only time will tell.

The other interesting thing about this is the fact that I have not started this at the beginning of the year. I started my challenge on the 1st of September. I did think about this a little bit. I have only just finished my education and I am now working for a living (and loving it), and as almost a last goodbye to starting the year in September, I thought that it was a nice time to start a challenge.

As it was around the end of August that I was dreaming about keeping track of how many books I read in a year, I realised that I would read more books if I had an incentive to read more. I read for pleasure, and I love to read. But if there are other things that need doing, then I won't read. I have gone months not reading a single book because there are other seemingly more important things that need doing. This now gives me a reason to sit down and read, and something that I need to set aside some time for - and I love it.

The very last reason I decided to start in September, was the thinking that we spend a lot of our time waiting for the beginning of the year to make new goals and set ourselves challenges and resolutions for the new year. Whilst for some things that is the best way of doing them (I have a few things waiting for then) occasionally we put off doing things until the 1st January and they are forgotten, or the passion and drive for them is forgotten or dwindles. So, I grabbed the passion I had, and the motivation, and I picked the 1st of the month as a new start and I went for it. I probably never would have if I didn't.

It is important to remember that it doesn't really matter where you start your year from as long as you have the motivation and that it is a good time for you. I feel that now is a better time than any!

The very first thing I did towards this challenge was to create a way of keeping track of my reading. I decided that I would record the book I had read and when I finished it. I could have included a lot more information, but for now, this will do. Then it was a case of deciding how to track it, I have a bullet journal, and I am a visual person, I like to be able to see things and if I can see my progress then that will keep me motivated and on track. So. I decided that instead of having a bullet journal page dedicated to the challenge, I would make a chart on an A4 piece of paper, and I would put it up next to my bookshelf.

Whilst I love my bullet journal for keeping me on track and including whatever I feel like putting in there, I do tend to forget about things that I keep in it. The problem is that I can shut the journal. I close the cover and then I can't see it, so it gets forgotten. I struggle with my habit trackers, because they are not always on the same page that my weekly is on, so I forget it's there and don't fill it in. The wall chart for the books was to keep it in the front of my mind and keep me focused. So far it is working.

My boyfriend made a rough calculation for me and said that I would have to read about one book every two weeks to keep on track. That figure was initially quite worrying. I didn't know if I could do that and wandered if I had set myself up to fail. But I came around to the thinking that there wasn't really any point of an easy challenge. If it was easy, then it wasn't really a challenge, right?  So with this in mind, I pencilled lightly into my chart the theoretical two week "Due By" date of each book. This should keep me on track.

The first book I decided to read was The Tales of Beedle the Bard, by JK Rowling. One of the three small charity books she wrote as part of her bigger Harry Potter series, and a book that features in the books. Now I love Harry Potter and I loved the childish part of me that was satisfied when reading that book. What is great about it, is that after every one of the tails, there is a section explaining the moral of each story and how it shaped the wizarding world, as well as the variations of the stories that were told throughout the ages reflecting what life was like then for the wizarding children who read them.

I read this first book in two days. It's a small but loveable book. It was then I realised that, whilst the mathematical calculation was one book every two weeks, what it really depended on was the size of each book. I could read The Tales of Beedle the Bard 25 times over in 50 days. But that is not the point. I suddenly became less anxious of the challenge I set myself, realising that I could effectively "borrow" leftover time from other books, to read the bigger books. So I was proud of myself already, feeling ahead of the game, and now choosing the next book to read.

I decided on variety and chose to read a book that was most common in the era of steam railways.  The British Transport Commission, which oversaw the railways when they were nationalised from the big four companies into British Railways released a book as a guide for all its locomotive staff. Called the Handbook For Railway Steam Locomotive Enginemen.

Now I volunteer on a steam railway and am involved in the firing and running of steam engines, and this book was given to me to give me more of an understanding into steam engines, and to help fuel that curiosity I had about how they worked and the best ways to operate them. It's been on a bookshelf waiting to be read for a little while, so it was the next book to read.

This book, being a little bit bigger than the first one, did take longer to read. It was also the end of the off shift and I was back in work again. So it got a good reading every break and lunch time. I really did enjoy reading it, and it was useful to begin to understand some of the intricate workings of the different types of valve gear and braking systems that are in use, or rather were in use.

Whilst I enjoyed the book, I did struggle a little bit. I'm not particularly good at reading reference or non-fiction books. Books that do not have an easy to follow plot I find difficult to read and that might be partially down to dyslexia. But I was very proud of myself when I got through this book with 8 days to spare. That means another 8 days I can spend on the next book if I need to right? This was a real boost to my motivation, and I decided to re-read a book for the next one.

This year is the 20th anniversary of the second Harry Potter book, and for my birthday my lovely best friend got me the Hufflepuff edition of the book. Having finished the last book on the train home from the Warner Bro's studio having seen The Making of Harry Potter exhibition, I really wanted to start this book. I am currently still reading it and have made considerable progress in the past few days. I have been taking it to work and have been managing almost a chapter per break time. So that is almost a guaranteed three chapters a day. This and the fact that I love the stories is helping me fly through the book.

Once I've got this one down, I'll be back to excitedly choosing the fourth book. I'm not sure what sort of book I am going to go for. I have plenty of books that need reading and am on a little bit of a book buying ban as I really need to get through some. But there are a few old favourites that are poking their heads up wanting to be read again.

What is your favourite book? Or your favourite books? Any recommendations? Or would you like to join me in trying to read 25, or maybe more books in a year?

Notebook Cover

It's been a long time since I last posted, and I really can only blame Module 11, it has taken so much work, time and effort, but I am pleased to say I actually passed it! :D

Anyway, I decided to make this little cover for a notebook or a book. I am always one for taking a book away with me, but it is always a little sad when you carefully put you book in your bag, only to take it out and it's managed to worm its way under everything, and bent the pages and now your water bottle has leaked all over it...
Admittedly this cover isn't waterproof but it can protect against most things!

The material I used I got in a fat quarter pack, and I used most of two of those fat quarters.

You need four pieces of material for the case, the width approximately 11 inches and 13 inches in length. I found folding a fat quarter in half along its long edge gave me the 11 inches before trimming the top down to 13 inches.

Two of these pieces will be the outside of the case and the other two will be the inside. Using a material in between the two materials can give the case more protection, but is entirely optional. I used some childs craft felt between my layers. It used two A4 size pieces, with a strip from another piece of felt to make up the width. If you are using felt, place the felt in the portrait position, with the fabric also in that position. There will be a gap between the felt and the top of the fabric, this is okay.

So we have four pieces of fabric and two pieces of padding. I started by laying two of the pieces of fabric right side together, then on top of that, laying one piece of padding. Making sure that the edges of all three pieces are lined up, I then made a seem with a straight stitch down one side, along the bottom and along the other long side, making sure to leave the top open. Then turn it the right way around. That is one side of the case.

I repeated that with the other three pieces of material, and I had two sides done. This is the point when I couldn't decide what fabric I wanted as my lining and what I wanted as the outside. Seeing as I had two halves with one side of each I decided to sew them together so each side was different.

I've got the two sides, and still the top is unsewn. I placed the two pieces right sides together (it doesn't really matter the way I did it, but if you want the inner and outer to be different then do!) and pinned them in place before sewing the two pieces together. Now this step can be done with a sewing machine, but my sides were very thick, and I didn't want to take much away from the space inside the case with seams. So I hand stitched around the outside. Admittedly this did take longer, but I think it was worth it.

Finally with the case mostly done, I just had to finish the top on both sides. I did this by folding the two rough edges inwards, and sewing a straight stitch along the top. Not forgetting to add a ribbon half way along one edge to be able to close the case.

There are a few different ways to secure the case shut, you could add buttons, button holes or loops to hold it shut, but I felt that a ribbon would be able to accommodate different sized books and notebooks that I wanted to put in there.

Also this case isn't just limited to books, it can be used for anything that would fit inside it that you wanted to cover!

I am sorry that I didn't take any step by step photos of how I did it. I can imagine that it could become difficult to follow. I am also aware that there might be an easier way to make this, so feel free to experiment and take away from this any ideas that you might have!!

Happy Making!