Lucky Girl & the Media Files

Congrats to Suzanne for winning the Giveaway!

First rule of blogging: never make a statement about when you will post something or about what you will be posting. I can't count how many times I've regretted doing that. This post is now two days late, thanks mostly to the fact that I was just too excited about my awesome New Year's to put off sharing it.

I loved reading about everyone's favorite books, movies, and songs of the year. Apparently I need to pay a lot more attention to Florence & the Machine, I appreciate the reminder to re-check out The Civil Wars and Radiohead's latest album, and I look forward to exploring all these musicians I've never heard about (I am really, really bad about keeping up with new music). I am, of course, in agreement with you Manon about Alela's record being a highlight of the year.

As for the movies, I obviously am with you Stacie about The Muppets being my favorite of the year. I love cerebral, "artsy" films, but my goodness I'll take singing and happiness and triumphant love over that stuff any day. It helps too that it's really the first movie that I feel that Mycie and I truly share. My other favorite movie I saw this year, though it came out in 2009, was Get Low. I am also really, really bad about keeping up with new movies.

As for books, 2011 was probably my slowest reading year to date. It took being a single mom to make me finally understand why the other ladies in book club sometimes have a hard time getting through the entire book. The Help seems to be the biggest book of the year, and I just finished it yesterday. Thanks to the comment from nowandthenstyle, I will definitely be checking out the movie to peep those pretty 60s frocks. I am totally intrigued by Samantha's recommendation of the book The Information. And after watching this, I am also wanting to check out Andrea's recommendation, Room:

I have noticed this new thing that publishers are doing to promote their new books- making little videos like this one. And this one, again via Stacie's recommendation:

And thank you Georgia for recommending Hark! A Vagrant. My boyfriend has been telling me to read it for a few months now, and I'm finally taking that suggestion seriously :-)

I need to ask for media recommendations more often, expand my little world a bit. I look forward to checking out each song, movie, and book you all suggested. Thank you.

And thank you all so much for your general comments. I was so surprised, and utterly delighted, to see that some of my readers followed me over here from my previous blog Nourished Mother. It makes me sad to even link to that blog since the webmaster decided to let it lapse without asking me and it is now but a shadow of its former self. It was amazing to me that the day that site went down (again, without my knowledge), though I hadn't posted anything new for two years, I started getting messages from women asking me where this or that certain article had gone. I had no idea until that day how useful and helpful my fellow "naturally parenting" mamas found my blog, and I am so grateful to you all who have expressed those sentiments to me in the aftermath of its decline.

Such as the Giveaway winner! I was stoked to see that the #14 comment was from you Suzanne, so that I could send off a little thank you package for all the sweet support over the years. Check out this little slice of life film made by Suzanne's husband Jay, featuring their darling children Christian and Willow.

All right, time to get back into the work groove after the holidays! Hope all of you are settling back into normal life comfortably and feeling relaxed...