With Halloween over I’m starting to think ahead to Christmas. At work this week I was stamping for the 1st of December which means that’s three weeks today.

What I read

I did a bit better reading-wise in October than I had done the past few months as I got through 14 books (having a week off work helped!).

Only one BABAL*, though 1989 is tenuously connected in the BAP (books about publishing) genre.

I read:

• An Ice Cold Grave (Harper Connelly #3) – Charlaine Harris
• A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder – Holly Jackson
• Grave Secret (Harper Connelly #4) – Charlaine Harris
• The Secret of Secrets ( Robert Langdon #6) – Dan Brown
• A Fresh Start for the Country Nurse (Country Nurse #1) – Kate Eastham
• U Is For Undertow (Kinsey Millhone #21) – Sue Grafton
• The Skeleton Road (Karen Pirie #3) – Val McDermid
• Changing Seasons for the Country Nurse (Country Nurse #2) – Kate Eastham
• Murder Most Eastern (Great Maine Mysteries #1) – Nellie H Steele (Really awful – do not recommend!)
• Autumn Chills: Tales of Intrigue from the Queen of Crime – Agatha Christie
• Hex Around and Find Out (Moonshadow Cove #2) – Molly Harper
• 1989 (Allie Burns #2) – Val McDermid
• Holes – Louis Sachar
• Hollow Tree House

I ended the month still working through:

• How to Kill Men and Get Away With it (Kitty Collins #1) – Katy Brent
• Much Ado About Murder (Nevermore Bookshop #7) – Steffanie Holmes
• Hurrah for the Circus
• The Last Witch – C. J. Cooke

What I watched

• We have been watching Only Connect as well as Taskmaster and a few episodes of The Simpsons. We also started the new series of Only Murders in the Building (seriously, how many people can be murdered in one building?)
• For Halloween we watched The Nightmare Before Christmas (Brodie’s choice), and on holiday we watched Ghostbusters (again) as we couldn’t agree on anything else.
• I’ve watched a bit more of Byker Grove and have reached the 2000s – I had to remind myself that the 2000s are still not as recent as I think, as each episode still contains a warning about language and attitude of the times.
• My sister and I finally finished And Just Like That and I was glad to see from reviews that we weren’t the only people that thought the whole season was awful and the end baffling. We then moved on to Is it Cake Halloween.

What I did

• We had a week away in Burntisland (which is not burnt nor an island). On our first day we decided to walk to Aberdour which was the next place along the coast. It turned out to be a pretty long walk! But it had views of the Forth where we saw a load of seals, and there was a nice beach and park at the other end.
• One of the reasons we chose Burntisland was could easily jump on a train to visit Edinburgh. The first time we visited the National Museum of Scotland and then a few shops (like Forbidden Planet, Lego Store and Krispy Kreme as we don’t have those at home), and also found time for Brodie to have his photo taken with Paddington before we visited Camera Obscura. The next time we visited Edinburgh Castle and saw the one o’clock gun fired.
• Brodie and Ewan went back later in the week to visit Dynamic Earth but my knee was bothering me after so much walking already that week so I stayed in Burntisland and spent the afternoon reading on the beach (I even braved a paddle.)
• We took the car to visit Edinburgh Zoo and were glad we arrived early enough to get in their car park. This was Brodie’s first visit and he really enjoyed it – I think we saw almost every animal.
• One of the days we went through to Dunfermline and visited Pittencrieff Park (we will need to go back in the summer and explore properly as it’s huge), and we also went to the Andrew Carnegie Birthplace Museum where we practiced our Morse Code. There we found out they were doing a little trail for kids so we ended up also going to the Carnegie Library & Gallery (where we had a nice lunch) and Dunfermline Abbey & Priory Ruins. So much for it being a quiet, easy going day!
• On our way through to Burntisland we stopped off at Fife Zoo to have lunch and see the animals.
• Once we came back we decorated for Halloween, which mostly involves plastic spiders everywhere. (I’m still finding them now, two weeks into November…) We also went to Monikie for their Halloween trails and a hot chocolate, and to the library for a Halloween party.
• I discovered the joys of die cutting at work as we have a Sizzix Big Shot so I spent time cutting out lots of Christmas shapes for our craft table.

How was your October?

*Books About Bookshops and Libraries