Olive’s Top 5 Reads in 2020

For 2019, my reading goal was two books a month. This year, my goal was 3 books a month. I exceeded my goal this year by completing 38 books (with a few more partially read). This doesn’t include all the books I read aloud to my kids at bedtime. (Hello, Next Best Junior Chef Books 1, 2, and 3, and Unusual Chickens books 1 and 2 – all of which I read out loud twice…!)

Looking back, what surprised me is that 16 of them were audiobooks. I never thought I would enjoy audiobooks but thanks to our library’s audiobook system, I’ve been able to “read” while I paint. A win-win.

Now at year’s end, I’ve compiled my top 5 picks for 2020. Since it’s hard to rank them, I’m listing them by category:

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Olive’s Top 5 Reads for 2019

For the past few years, we’ve kept a sticky note on our fridge to track which books we’ve read throughout the year. This year, I set myself a goal of reading two books per month. Thanks to both kids being in school as well as discovering audio books from our local library, I managed to exceed my goal and read 30 books! Here are my top 5 picks, listed in the order of which I read them:

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The Two Best Family Practices We Initiated This Year

When I think about what we did as a family in 2018, two practices stand out in as particularly life-giving and beneficial to each of us. These were both spiritual exercises that we incorporated into our daily rhythms over this past year and were only possible because our kids are now at an age where they could both participate. The first was what we call Good Parts/Hard Parts. The second was what we call the Quiet Minute.
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