Wrap Up: January 2025

Oh, January, what a month you were. The month started with me getting a head cold for a little over a week and it was extremely annoying but other than that I was totally fine. The month as a whole though was a little rough. I’ve got a lot going on with work and have felt pretty stressed for the majority of the month.

There were good things though, so let’s get into that! Grab a drink and a snack, get cozy and let’s chat about all things January!

I think it’s safe to say that my reading year is off to a pretty good start! I’m glad that I was able to make time to read even with all the business going on currently. Every year I tell myself that I’m going to read some translated work and each year I fail at it, but this month I read 2 translated novels, so I’m already 40% of the way through my goal to read 5 translated works! I also read 2 books that are on my 25 in 2025 list (the link to my blog post is below), completed both the word and cover prompt for the Buzzwordathon and participated in Winterween.

I found a new 5 star with I Am Not Jessica Chen, had a lot of really enjoyable 4 star reads and most of my 3-3.5 star reads I liked a lot as well. 

This month I decided to try Book of the Month again (my referral link if anyone wants to try it). I had a subscription years ago, but found that I wasn’t reading the books that I was getting so I stopped. However, my reading tastes have evolved since then and they now have a lot more books that I’m actually interested in and excited to read. Since they had one of my anticipated releases as a January pick, I figured it was the perfect time to join again since I’d been thinking about it for a while, and I just picked my February box and I’m really excited!

I’ve now gotten the idea to maybe revamp the blog again. I really like the style of headers and such that I have now, and while it does represent a style that I like, I don’t know if I’m still loving it, so I think I’m going to change up my headers starting next month, and I am going to eventually change the theme of the blog but I’ve yet to find one that I REALLY love, so that will take a little more time, but you can expect some new headers and main banner next month!

Books read this month:

1. A Sea of Unspoken Things by Adrienne Young (ARC, 4 stars)
2. Funny Story by Emily Henry (Reread, Annotation, 5 stars)
3. Yin Yang Love Song by Lauren Kung Jessen (ARC, 3.5 stars)
4. I Am Not Jessica Chen by Ann Liang (ARC, 5 stars)
5. A Doll’s House by Lisa Unger (4 stars)
6. Darkly by Marisha Pessl (4 stars)
7. Night of the Mannequins by Stephen Graham Jones (2 stars)
8. Here Lies a Vengeful Bitch by Codie Crowley (3 stars)
9. My Darling Dreadful Thing by Johanna van Veen (4 stars)
10. Plain Bad Heroines by Emily M. Danforth (3 stars)
11. Lies on the Serpent’s Tongue by Kate Pearsall (4 stars)
12. Bloom by Delilah S. Dawson (3.5 stars)
13. A Dark and Drowning Tide by Allison Saft (4 stars)
14. The Kamogawa Food Detectives by Hisashi Kashiwai (3.5 stars)
15. The Restaurant of Lost Recipes by Hisashi Kashiwai (3.5 stars)
16. The Empress of Salt and Fortune by Nghi Vo (3.5 stars)

Blog posts and vlogs I loved this month:

• I always look forward to Michelle’s reviews because I think we tend to have pretty similar opinions. I loved her review of I Am Not Jessica Chen, and her review of You Between the Lines has put this book on my radar and I can’t wait to read it!
• I also loved Michelle’s 2025 Releases by Vietnamese Authors post! There were a few books on here that I already knew about, but I added a few more of them to my TBR.
• I find trends so interesting, really regardless of what the subject is, but of course I have an interest in bookish trends specifically. I really liked Lila’s post on Bookish Trends of 2024!
• Rachel Lynn Solomon is one of my favorite romance authors, and I’m so excited for her new release, What Happens in Amsterdam. Helena is the ultimate RLS expert, so I always look forward to what she thinks of her books and I’m so glad to hear that she loved What Happens in Amsterdam. Her review made me even more excited to read it!

My posts this month:

• Reading Journal 2025 Set Up and Goals
• No Place Left to Hide Review
• 25 Books in 2025
• Winterween Wrap Up
• The Rival Review
• I Am Not Jessica Chen Review

As I mentioned in the intro, this month has been pretty rough on me. There’s so much going on with work and it’s definitely been stressing me out, but there were some really good things about the month as well!

We started rehearsal for the musical I’m directing/choreographing/stage managing, and it’s going very well! It’s been a lot of fun to work with the kids; they’re a really fun bunch and we have a lot of fun in rehearsals — this is for sure my favorite part of my job currently, and even when work is stressful, I enjoy going to rehearsal.

One of my 2025 goals is to bake/cook more and I made a few things! Here are the recipes I made this month

• peach streusel muffins (I need to make them 4302843028 more times and try all my favorite fruits in them)
• southwest pasta salad with a super yummy jalapeno lime dressing
• cheesy breadsticks when I made pizza (though I use store bought dough, I do not have the time to make my own)
• pesto cream sauce
• double chocolate chip cookies (my parents requested that next time i make a double batch lol)

A February goal is to not order out at all, so I’ll be trying some more recipes next month, and there’s a specific cookie recipe that I’m looking forward to trying around Valentine’s Day.

I’ve been doing a lot of journaling this month! I got my February bullet journal spreads set up pretty early on in the month and even have gotten a jump start on my March set up, I did more in my theatre journal (well, okay, I did a spread for one show of last year, I have many more to do), and started a general life/anxiety journal to just write down my thoughts and how I’m feeling as a way to help with my stress and anxiety. I’m not pressuring myself to write in it every day, but I want to actually journal about the things that I’m stressed or worried about in the hopes of being able to let those things go and find the cause of the feelings. In 2025 I’m hoping to really prioritize my mental health, and this is the first step that I can take to really do that.

I’m planning on trying more creative hobbies this year, and while I have some new ones that I want to try, I’m starting by getting back into one of my favorite hobbies from my childhood, coloring. I spent like an hour or so coloring one of the free coloring pages on Book Babe Designs (a favorite shop of mine!) and it was so fun and relaxing — it was so nice to turn my brain off and just pick some colors and get to work. I’ll definitely be doing more coloring to unwind!

I feel down a rabbit hole of playing One Direction themed sporcle games, and honestly, it was so much fun and really tested my knowledge of their lyrics (mostly for songs from Up All Night, if it was from any other album I got it pretty quickly). That also led me down a Taylor Swift themed sporcle rabbit hole, and I’m still having a great time. It’s become a bit of a habit to play a few rounds before I go to bed and it’s been a very nice way to unwind!

This year I’ve decided to track what tv shows, movies, musical proshots, etc. I watch since I’ll sometimes forget at the end of the year (plus I love an excuse to make a spreadsheet). I started the year with a Gilmore Girls rewatch because I always need the comfort, rewatched the old seasons of The Great British Baking Show, season 2 of Xo, Kitty and rewatched seasons 1-3 of Sweet Magnolias since season 4 comes out next week. I also rewatched the Waitress proshot while working on my bullet journal. Season 2 of School Spirits started this month, and I’m so glad it’s back, though I wish it was more than 6 episodes!

I am continuing with my monthly playlists this year, and I’m sure none of you will be shocked by my most played songs in January, but here’s the playlist if you wanna check it out!

As always, January felt 34873982743928 years long and a lot happened this month. Some good and some not so good, but we got through it. I’m looking forward to February and hoping that it’s a little kinder than January was.

I’d love to hear about how the beginning of 2025 has been treating you! What did you read, what did you do, likes, dislikes? Tell me all the things!

Until next time 💜