Author: Trish

Into reading, decluttering, budgeting, and doing jigsaw puzzles!
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Week in Review: January 4, 2026

This was a nice, quiet week. I worked Monday-Wednesday and then had the rest of the week off. I also had no appointments or planned events for either Michael or myself, and he went to his dad’s for the weekend. It was lovely!

I did spend some time looking back over my progress on my reading and puzzling hobbies. I am a total nerd and love tracking things, so I track my puzzles in an app called Puzzle Tracker and also on a spreadsheet (so I don’t lose the information if anything happens to the app). This image shows my puzzle stats for 2025:

I also compiled some stats for my 2025 year in books. I am pretty happy with what I read last year, especially since there were only 5 books that I rated 2 stars and 2 books that I DNF’d.

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Top Ten Puzzles of 2025

With a new year starting, I took a look back over the puzzles I did last year and came up with my top ten. I did a lot of puzzles last year, 145 to be exact, so narrowing down the list was a bit of a challenge, but a fun one.

Before I get to the countdown, I want to make a special mention of my first wooden puzzle, Sunset Mountains from Wentworth Wooden Puzzles. This was an absolutely beautiful puzzle that I had the opportunity to do as a traveling puzzle, and I loved the whole experience.

Sunset Mountains

Without further ado, here are my top ten puzzles from 2025:

10. Envelopes from Tania Wicks, art by Tania Wicks

Envelopes

9. Hue Wormhole from Antelope, art by Wenjia Wang

Hue Wormhole

8. Found Alphabet from Cobble Hill, art by Shelley Davies

Found Alphabet

7. Garden Allotment from Ravensburger, art by Georgia Breeze

Garden Allotment

6. Parenthese Enchantee from Trevell, art by La Jeanette

Parenthese Enchantee

5. Stay Cozy from New York Puzzle Company, art by Lore Pemberton

Stay Cozy

4. Rockies Explorer from Villager, art by Anja Jane

Rockies Explorer

3. London Cafe from Pieces & Peace, art by Miranda Sofroniou

London Cafe

2. Pumpkin Spice Cafe from WerkShoppe, art by Maria Taylor

Pumpkin Spice Cafe

And the #1 puzzle from 2025 was The Language of Flowers from Reverie, art by Winonaki Illustrations

The Language of Flowers
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Top Books from the Second Half of 2025

I love looking back over my reading log to see what books rise to the top. A few months ago, I posted my top books from the first half of 2025, and now I am sharing my top books from the second half of the year.

These were all 5 star reads for me:

  • Happiness for Beginners by Katherine Center
  • Catch Us When We Fall by Juliette Fay
  • This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone
  • Flirting Lessons by Jasmine Guillory
  • How to Stop Time by Matt Haig
  • Funny Story by Emily Henry
  • Loveless by Alice Oseman
  • The Seven Year Slip by Ashley Poston
  • After I Do by Taylor Jenkins Reid
  • Woodworking by Emily St. James
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What I’m Reading – January 2026

What I’m Reading Now

The Cyprian by Mercedes Lackey – Elemental Masters #18 – I have been a fan of hers since she started writing almost 40 years ago and am so thankful she is still writing books!

The Seven Day Switch by Kelly Harms – I am working my way through her backlist, so this one is up next!

What I Recently Finished

Fiction

  • Goblins & Greatcoats by Travis Baldree – Legends & Lattes #0.6 (short story)
  • Get Lucky by Katherine Center
  • The Bright Side of Going Dark by Kelly Harms
  • Wherever the Wind Takes Us by Kelly Harms
  • Catch Us When We Fall by Juliette Fay
  • The Half of It by Juliette Fay
  • The Seven Year Slip by Ashley Poston
  • Feeling the Fireworks: Starting Over in Devon by Rebecca Paulinyi (South West #3)
  • The Best Christmas Ever: A Wedding in Devon Novella by Rebecca Paulinyi (South West #4)
  • Trouble in Tartan: True Love in Devon by Rebecca Paulinyi (South West #5)
  • Summer of Sunshine: Missing Devon Novella by Rebecca Paulinyi (South West #6)
  • Healing the Heartbreak: Moving on in Devon by Rebecca Paulinyi (South West #7)
  • Dancing Till Dawn: First Love in Devon by Rebecca Paulinyi (South West #8)

Nonfiction

  • Queer & Christian: Reclaiming the Bible, Our Faith, and Our Place at the Table by Brandan J. Robertson

What I Added to my TBR

  • An Ancient Witch’s Guide to Modern Dating by Cecilia Edward
  • This Book Made Me Think of You by Libby Page
  • The Sugar Queen by Sarah Addison Allen

TBR Stats/Updates

  • I currently have 179 books on my TBR. Of those, 6 are nonfiction and 173 are fiction.
  • At the end of June, I created a focused reading list of 25 books I wanted to read by the end of the year. I have completed that list with 24 read and 1 DNF.
  • I read 126 books in 2025 (my goal was 75).
  • My nonfiction goal for 2025 was 12, which I achieved.
  • Here are some more stats from StoryGraph:
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Nonfiction I Read in 2025

I don’t read a ton of nonfiction, but I set myself a goal at the beginning of 2025 to read at least 12 nonfiction books over the course of the year. 

My plan was to read one each month, and I kept pretty close to that plan. I doubled up one month and missed one month, so it evened out to 12 total for the year. Most of them were related to Christianity, but I did also read one memoir and one autism-related book. Here’s a breakdown by month:

January – Followers Under 40: The journey away from church for Millenials, Gen Z, and Gen Alpha by Rachel Gilmore and Kris Sledge

February – The Color of Compromise: The Truth about the American Church’s Complicity in Racism by Jemar Tisby

March – Baby Dinosaurs on the Ark?: The Bible and Modern Science and the Trouble of Making It All Fit by Janet Kellogg Ray

April – The Great Sex Rescue: The Lies You’ve Been Taught and How to Recover What God Intended by Sheila Wray Gregoire, Rebecca Gregoire Lindenbach, and Joanna Sawatsky

May – Reading While Black: African American Biblical Interpretation as an Exercise in Hope by Esau McCaulley

June #1 – God and the Gay Christian: The Biblical Case in Support of Same-Sex Relationships by Matthew Vine

June #2 – How to Fight Racism: Courageous Christianity and the Journey Toward Racial Justice by Jemar Tisby

July – Becoming the Pastor’s Wife: How Marriage Replaced Ordination as a Woman’s Path to Ministry by Beth Allison Barr

August – The Evolution of Adam: What the Bible Does and Doesn’t Say about Human Origins by Peter Enns

September – Autism Out Loud: Life with a Child on the Spectrum, from Diagnosis to Young Adulthood by Kate Swenson, Adrian Wood, and Carrie Cariello

October – I missed this month, but thankfully I read two in June so I was still on track to meet my goal for the year!

November – Diary of a Tuscan Bookshop: A Memoir by Alba Donati

December – Queer & Christian: Reclaiming the Bible, Our Faith, and Our Place at the Table by Brandan Robertson

Do you read a lot of nonfiction? Were there any standouts this year?

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Happy Beads

Happy Beads is a 500-piece puzzle from Ravensburger, and the artist is Elspeth McLean. McLean is known for her meticulously painted mandala stones and has had several puzzles made featuring these creations. The level of detail is just amazing!

I was pretty intimidated by this puzzle, but it turned out to be a lot easier than I thought it would. Each bead has a different pattern on it, so it was not hard to figure out where each piece went. Super fun!

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Catch Us When We Fall

Catch Us When We Fall by Juliette Fay is the story of Cass Macklin, who finds herself broke, homeless, and pregnant after losing her boyfriend Ben. Ben & Cass had spent most of their twenties drunk, and now Cass is faced with the challenge of sobering up for the sake of her baby. She turns to Ben’s brother Scott, who plays for the Boston Red Sox, for help. Scott takes her in despite his longstanding issues with his brother and his lack of faith in Cass’s ability to stay clean.

Even though this book deals with the heavy subjects of alcoholism and dysfunctional families, I found it very uplifting. I really enjoyed the relationships in this book, and I found the characters very realistic and relatable. It was good to see both Cass and Scott grow and heal as they face their childhood trauma. Fay does a good job of showing how much a support system means in the struggle to overcome addiction while also revealing how necessary it is for a person to get and stay sober for themselves rather than for someone else.

I highly recommend this book!

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Hello From Around the World

Hello From Around the World is a 500-piece puzzle from Mudpuppy, and the artist is Lemon Ribbon Studio. Mudpuppy is part of Galison but offers simpler images that are great for kids or beginners. I found this stamp puzzle to be super easy and a lot of fun!

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Wherever the Wind Takes Us

In Wherever the Wind Takes Us by Kelly Harms, Becca Larkin is fresh out of a twenty-two year marriage and all she has to show for it is an expensive sailboat. Selling it will give her enough to make a new start, so she and her daughter Liv decide to sail it from Maine to Miami to meet a buyer. After a rough first leg, Liv calls handsome sailing instructor Grant Murphy for help and abruptly leaves the boat. For the rest of the journey, Becca learns how to sail while trying to resist her attraction to the much younger man.

I could relate to both Becca and Liv, having seen divorce from both sides. Liv is struggling with trying to understand what has happened and how to relate to her parents separately, while Becca is trying to maintain a good relationship with her daughter without revealing too much sensitive information. I also thought Harms did a really good job of explaining the intricacies of sailing in an interesting way, and I enjoyed the romance between Becca and Grant.

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Ten Before the End Update

A few weeks ago I posted a list of 10 books that I wanted to read before the end of the year. I am very happy to say that I was able to complete the entire list!!

It was touch and go for a minute because when I put The Seven Year Slip on hold, it had a several month wait. But it finally started moving and I was eventually able to borrow it this month.

Here are the books from my Ten Before the End list:

  • Funny Story by Emily Henry
  • The Paris Cooking School by Sophie Beaumont
  • Tell Me Everything by Elizabeth Strout
  • Love, Theoretically by Ali Hazelwood
  • A December to Remember by Jenny Bayliss
  • Modern Persuasion by Sara Marks
  • Loveless by Alice Oseman
  • The Lost Bookshop by Evie Woods
  • What You Are Looking For Is in the Library by Michiko Aoyama
  • The Seven Year Slip by Ashley Poston

This was a fun little challenge!