Ep. 38 The best of books in 2015 with Modern Mrs. Darcy & Hollywood Housewife

Modern Mrs. Darcy’s Anne Bogel joins Megan and Laura to dish on the best in books for 2015. From their favorite authors and most-beloved reads to the books that surprised and disappointed them, you’ll hear all their big feelings about the best reads of the year. All of that, plus awesome of the week!

SHOW NOTES

Healthy Moving is offering a free class for YOU, Awesome! Text SortaAwesome to 33444 to sign-up or go to HealthyMoving.com/sortaawesome !

Awesome of the Week

Laura: TripIt App
Anne: Girls’ Night In
Megan: Switched on Pop podcast

Anne’s favorite authors:
Jane Austen
Wendell Berry
Kate Morton
Louise Penny
Jojo Moyes
Madeline L’Engle
Kate Atkinson

Anne’s favorite books:
Crossing to Safety, Wallace Earle Stegner
Jayber Crow; Port William series, Wendell Berry
Brideshead Revisited, Evelyn Waugh
Emma, Jane Austen

Laura’s favorite authors:
J. D. Salinger
Stephen King

Laura’s favorite books:
A Woman of Independent Means, Elizabeth Forsythe Hailey
Geek Love, Katherine Dunn
Personal History, Katharine Graham 

Hollywood Housewife: Favorite Books of All Time
Modern Mrs. Darcy: Book Lists category

Popular books in 2015:
A God in Ruins, Kate Atkinson
All the Light We Cannot See, Anthony Doerr
The Martian, Andy Weir
The Girl on the Train, Paula Hawkins

Other favorites:
Louise Penny’s Inspector Gamache series
Being Mortal, Atul Gawande
Frankenstein, Mary Shelley
Love and Other Ways of Dying, Michael Paterniti
Just Mercy, Bryan Stevenson
Fates and Furies,  Lauren Groff
Walkable City, Jeff Speck
Big Magic, Elizabeth Gilbert
The Art of Memoir, Mary Karr
The Puffin in Bloom Collection children’s classics

Find Anne on her blog, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter!

Find Laura on her blog, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter!

As always, thanks to Progger for allowing us to use the song Strut! Find more from Progger at Proggermusic.com

Feedback on today’s show? Sign up for the show’s mailing list at tinyletter.com/SortaAwesome or leave a comment below (click the date link). And don’t forget to find us in the Sorta Awesome Hangout on Facebook or @sortaawesomeshow on Instagram! You can find me on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram!

Ep. 36 A sweet slice of life, farming, and Advent with Jerusalem Greer

What a delight to have author and speaker Jerusalem Greer join Sorta Awesome as a guest co-host! Jerusalem’s book A Homemade Year is one of Megan’s very favorites, and in this episode, they dig into childhood memories, explore what a rebuilding year looks like on a farm, and give suggestions for those new to the practice of Advent. All of that, plus Awesome of the Week!

Show Notes

1. Acorn.tv

2. Sorta Awesome Holiday playlist on Spotify

3. A Homemade Year: The Blessings of Cooking, Crafting, and Coming Together

4. CLICK HERE to open Jerusalem’s Advent readings

Find Jerusalem on her blog, Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram!

As always, thanks to Progger for allowing us to use the song Strut! Find more from Progger at Proggermusic.com

Feedback on today’s show? Sign up for the show’s mailing list at tinyletter.com/SortaAwesome. And don’t forget to find us in the Sorta Awesome Hangout on Facebook or on Instagram! You can find Megan on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram! 

Ep. 32 Sarah Bessey on the awesomeness of solitude, surprises, and Sonic

Author and speaker Sarah Bessey joins Megan as guest co-host this week, and the two of them get to giggling over everything from jars of Noxema to the irresistible appeal of chick lit. This conversation spans the silly to the serious as they discuss parenting, daily rituals, the joy of being Canadian, and cross-the-border Sonic runs. All of that plus Awesome of the Week on Episode 32!

SHOW NOTES

1. The Great British Bake Off

2. El Sistema Oklahoma

3. Sarah Bessey: In which I am learning to live with the ache

4. Sonic Drive-In

5. Sarah Bessey: A beginner’s guide to Dr. Who

6. The Royal We, Heather Cocks and Jessica Morgan

7. Sarah Bessey: In which I share 10 books I read over and over (and over)

8. Kathleen Norris Quotidian Mysteries: Laundry, Liturgy, and “Women’s Work”

Find Sarah on her blog, Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram! Find her book Jesus Feminist on Amazon, and pre-order soon-to-be-released Out Of Sorts today!

As always, thanks to Progger for allowing us to use the song Strut! Find more from Progger at Proggermusic.com

Feedback on today’s show? Sign up for the show’s mailing list at tinyletter.com/SortaAwesome or leave a comment below (click the date link). And don’t forget to find us in the Sorta Awesome Hangout on Facebook or on Instagram! You can find Megan on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram!

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD EPISODE 32 OF SORTA AWESOME

Ep. 24 Asking hard questions and answering your calling with guest co-host Dr. Cara Pence

Dr. Cara Pence is a wife, mom, and active member of her church and community, and she is also a practicing general surgeon. This week, she joins us on Sorta Awesome to speak about the way her choices in life have defied the expected gender roles in both her faith community and the medical field. She shares the experience that almost made her quit medical school, how she battles mom guilt, and why having a husband who is a stay at home parent makes the most sense for their family right now. All of that (and more!) plus awesome of the week on Episode 24 of Sorta Awesome!

SHOW NOTES

1) Geocaching.com

2) The Good Wife on IMDB

3) Wiki on escape rooms

Find Cara on Twitter - @surgeonsongs  

As always, thanks to Progger for allowing us to use the song Strut! Find more from Progger at Proggermusic.com

Feedback on today’s show? Sign up for the show’s mailing list at tinyletter.com/SortaAwesome or leave a comment below (click the date link). And don’t forget to find us in the Sorta Awesome Hangout on Facebook or on Instagram! You can find Megan on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram!

Ep. 20 How to fit the fun into busy lives with Jessica Turner

Jessica Turner is the blogger behind TheMomCreative.com and is the author of The Fringe Hours. Today, she joins the show as guest co-host! As a working mom of three children, she knows the importance of creating efficient systems so you can free up time to have fun and pursue your passions. In this episode, she takes listener questions and shares her tips and examples of what this looks like in her life. 

SHOW NOTES

1) Honest Company

ePantry (new customers get a $10 credit using that link!)

Amazon

(Jessica’s affiliate links!)

2) AMC’s Turn

3) BONUS! The Fall; Bletchley Circle

4) Jessica’s husband, Matthew Paul Turner

World Vision

5) Fringe Hours website, Fringe Hours on Amazon

Find Jessica on her blog, Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram!

As always, thanks to Progger for allowing us to use the song Strut! Find more from Progger at Proggermusic.com

Feedback on today’s show? Sign up for the show’s mailing list at tinyletter.com/SortaAwesome or leave a comment below (click the date link). And don’t forget to find us in the Sorta Awesome Hangout on Facebook! You can find me on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram!

Ep. 16 Wisdom, grace, and a donkey with author Rachel Anne Ridge

What a delight to welcome my long-time blogging friend and acclaimed author Rachel Anne Ridge to Sorta Awesome! Publisher’s Weekly listed her book Flash: The Homeless Donkey Who Taught Me about Life, Faith, and Second Chances one of their Best Summer Books 2015. Today, she joins us to talk about coffee, parenting (especially parenting teens! eek!), and a donkey named Flash who changed everything for their family.

SHOW NOTES

1) Joy Williams on VENUS song by song at Medium.com

2) Heather King :: The Extraordinary Ordinary, Your Hard is Hard

3) Book Trailer for Flash 

4) FlashTheDonkey.com and Flash on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram!

Find Rachel Anne at her blog HomeSanctuary.com and on Twitter

As always, thanks to Progger for allowing us to use the song Strut! Find more from Progger at Proggermusic.com

Feedback on today’s show? Sign up for the show’s mailing list at tinyletter.com/SortaAwesome or leave a comment below (click the date link). And don’t forget to find us in the Sorta Awesome Hangout on Facebook! You can find me on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram!

Ep. 12 Oh, the Enneagram? It’s Awesome!

My friend and Enneagram coach Leigh Kramer visits Sorta Awesome today as guest co-host. Most of you know me as a big Myers-Briggs geek, but what you may not know is that I TOTALLY dig the Enneagram system, too! Before we get into personalty types, we share our Awesome of the Week (Leigh’s revolves around a secret haunt in Nashville known for celebrity and ghostly appearances, and I share what recent event made my whole body completely flush). Then Leigh explains the Enneagram system for us which leads us to talk about why people resist discovering their type. What does this look like in relationship? In friendship? In major life events? Tune in to find out!

SHOW NOTES:

1) From Leigh’s blog at http://www.leighkramer.com/
Let’s Enneagram it Up!
Beyond the Road Less Traveled By

2) Enneagram Institute (Leigh is a 4, I am a 9)
Richard Rohr’s The Enneagram: A Christian Perspective
The Wisdom of the Enneagram, Riso & Hudson

3) Leigh Kramer, yourenneagramcoach.com
FAQ page with more resources

Find Leigh on her blog, Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram!

Feedback on today’s show? Sign up for the show’s mailing list at tinyletter.com/SortaAwesome or leave a comment below (click the date link). And don’t forget to find us in the Sorta Awesome Hangout on Facebook! You can find me on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram!

Ep. 05 Erin Odom & Secrets to Sanity at Home

Many of you may know that the Ultimate Homemaking Bundle sale launches today. Erin Odom (of thehumbledhomemaker.com) is one of the co-founders of Ultimate Bundles, and I wanted to invite her on the show to talk shop … er … to talk home, I suppose.

Shortly after my twins turned a year old, Erin shared an incredibly simple piece of advice for managing the home with little ones underfoot, but that simple secret absolutely saved my sanity for many months to come. Erin and I talk about that advice she gave me, and then we talk about how the bundle business grew into what it has become today. Finally, she explains what all you can expect to find in the Ultimate Homemaking Bundle 2015. 

Click this link to listen to Episode 5 of Sorta Awesome featuring Erin Odom!

SHOW NOTES:

1. The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing, Marie Kondo

2. Dear Mom Who Can’t Afford Organic Food

3. Just click on that pretty pic and it will take you straight to the UHB site where you’ll find EVERYTHING you need to know to purchase a bundle for yourself!

(That link is my affiliate link. That means if you purchase a bundle after clicking on my link, I’ll get a few bucks for the sale. It costs you absolutely nothing extra to buy the bundle through my link and it’s a super simple way to support the podcast! Click here for all the fine print and click here to read the FAQs of this sale.)

4. Controlling the Spin Within

Find Erin on her blog, Facebook, and Instagram!

As always, thanks to Progger for allowing us to use the song Strut! Find more about Progger on their website and at BandCamp. 

Feedback on today’s show? Sign up for the show’s mailing list at tinyletter.com/SortaAwesome or leave a comment below (click the date link). Find me on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram!