Barnes & Noble

We recently made a trek into the city and that included a Barnes & Noble trip to turn in summer reading sheets. We got those book prizes, a new planner, and a replacement of an old favorite since we sadly lost our home library last year. These were some fun things I spotted while we were there. 

Christian Bookstores I Have Loved

I always love a good bookstore. New or used- I don't discriminate! At times I've thought it would be fun to run a mobile Christian bookstore, to fill up a bus with used Christian books and travel to different small towns in my area so everyone has the opportunity to enjoy good Christian messages at affordable prices! (Now that I'm typing this, I'm back to thinking about it!) I wanted to start a list here of Christian-specific bookstores I have loved. When we start traveling more again I'll keep growing the list. Maybe in the meantime somebody will find a great Christian bookstore full of books that will move and inspire them! 

ARIZONA

- Flagstaff: The Lion and the Lamb (now closed) 

IDAHO

- Coeur d'Alene: The Sower

- Idaho Falls: Seagull Book 

MINNESOTA 

- St. Cloud: Christian Corner Book & Gifts (in the mall)

TEXAS

- Cedar Park: Mardel

- Lubbock: Mardel (I posted about this trip here) 

UTAH

- Ogden: Seagull Book 

WASHINGTON

- Spokane: Faithful Christian Bookstore 

Adventures in Boise- part 2

 

Day 4- We started this day with breakfast and a walk around the green belt behind our airbnb. 

We went to the Discovery Center with family and it was a big hit, the highlight of the trip for two of my kids. That month they had an impressionist art exhibit (Degas has always been one of my favorite artists so that was fun), fossils, simple physics, space, and a big LEGO area. 

We had a smoothie bowl lunch at Boise Juice Co (100% gluten free + vegan at some locations) where our whole party either chose the peanut butter bowl or the Chocolate Cherry Cashew bowl. Delicious! 

Then we headed downtown! 

 

Maybe it's my dad's construction background coming out but another thing I love on trips is admiring beautiful old architecture. My husband loves this now, too, which is so fun! We point out neat old buildings to each other as we drive/walk and marvel at the craftsmanship differences between then (arches, turrets, balustrades🏰⛪!) and now (tall rectangular skyscrapers 🏢🏬, fast, so we can move on to the next 🤑🤑🤑) 

Our main focus downtown was a set of sister bookstores. Rediscovered Books is a store full of new books and Once and Future Books is their used branch. We did leave the used bookstore with several children's books thanks to Nana. 

We made dinner in the Airbnb and it was a learning experience. The plan was to do Boise Juice Co for lunches and to alternate rice bowl dinners with our hashbrown taco dinner but then we saw a new, clean ingredient veggie burger and everyone wanted to try that instead. It was good (our new favorite, definitely recommend) but it was a lot more work / more time intensive to make those + fries and next time we'll stick to the plan. 

Hubs and I ended our night with two episodes of A Thousand Tomorrows. 

Day 5- We slept in, ate breakfast in the Airbnb, and all went to a park with a great playground. My husband and I enjoyed a Lime scooter date- so incredibly fun! I do recommend these, but I recommend a helmet. You can get going a lot faster than you might think. 

We again had lunch at Boise Juice Co. I opted for the Popeye smoothie but I found it to be so bad it was undrinkable! I'm a green smoothie girl and I add far more spinach and kale than most people but I still found it to be bitter, bitter, bitter. Fortunately they'd accidentally made an extra smoothie bowl so I just had that. Again we all had the peanut butter or chocolate cherry cashew bowl. 

We checked out VIP Games and then got several items from our lists at Half Price Books, a store we enjoyed in Texas. 

This night's airbnb dinner was another I find to be so simple + easy for feeding a crowd- hashbrown tacos! I dumped hashbrowns, salsa, canned beans (drained + rinsed), canned sliced olives (drained + rinsed), and leftover sauteed mushrooms + onions into a casserole dish, mixed, and baked at 350 until nice and warm. In the meantime I steamed broccoli, sliced avocado, and added a thin layer of cashew cream to all the tortillas. That's it! Warm hashbrown mixture plopped into tortillas, avocado slices for those who want them, steamed broccoli on the side. You could easily add meat + cheese for those who want it. 

Uno and Sorry were played and then we said our goodbyes, packed up the Airbnb, and finished A Thousand Tomorrows (loved the show!)

Day 6- Time to head hoooooome! 

We checked out of Airbnb and grabbed smoothies + bars to-go at Boise Juice (three of us had The Original and three had the DragonFLY, both were hits) and began the trek home! 

Idaho books we have loved...

Adults: Before I Called You Mine (Christian) // Beyond (Christian... I feel like this is more of a middle grade/YA book though) // I'll be Seeing You (Christian) // A Promise Kept (Christian)

Middle Grade: Running with Wolves (secular)

Picture books: Beauty and the Beak (secular) // Goodnight Idaho (secular, board book) // The Skydiving Beavers (secular)

Arizona

This particular trip was focused exclusively on Flagstaff. It was a short trip and the focus was family but we still managed to squeeze a lot in! 

Flagstaff Favorites (past and present): 

All That Dance performances // Bookman's // Brightside Bookshop // Grand Canyon // Jay Lively ice rink // Late for the Train coffee shop // Lava Tubes // Local Juicery // Lowell Observatory // NAU football games, dance, and theater performances // Riordan Mansion // Snowbowl // walking downtown 

Arizona picture books we've enjoyed- Goodnight Arizona (board book, secular) // Grand Canyon by Jason Chin (picture book, secular) // Roxaboxen (picture book, secular)  

I wanted to read some Arizona-based Christian fiction while in Arizona so I got Fire Dancer by Colleen Coble. This book is so full of Arizona, so that part was fun. But y'all, this book was just so dark and twisted! Filled with trigger warnings and lacking much redemption, I strongly recommend against this one even though it's very authentic to Arizona. 

In the past I read Christmas Joy Ride which was much more lighthearted but the Flagstaff descriptions were so wrong that it pulled me out of the story once I got to them. 

I'm still on the lookout for a great Arizona-based Christian fiction to recommend! 

Arizona books on my TBR- Borders of the Heart (Christian fiction) // Brighty of the Grand Canyon (secular middle grade) // A Distance Too Grand (Christian fiction) 

Fabled Books- Waco, Texas

My favorite part: you can actually enter a wardrobe, complete with hanging fur coats, to get into the children's section 😍 

Spokane birthday adventure

We checked out Book Traders and Giant Nerd Books, browsed Main Market, ate lunch at the delicious all vegan + gluten-free Boots, found a ton of board games were all interested in at Merlyn's Comics and Games, made trades at several Little Free Library boxes, and got a parking ticket. 😅 

Leavenworth, Washington

I have wanted to see Leavenworth for years. We finally went this weekend! We met up with my in-laws and it was a really awesome visit.

Leavenworth is a seriously adorable Bavarian-themed town. Downtown Leavenworth is the village, where every business follows suit. We went into a lot of shops I didn't document with photos (the shirt shop, the Cheesemonger (I sampled jalapeno Havarti and my son sampled rasberry cheddar, both good), Soup and Barrell, Shocolat, several cute gift shops... but these are the ones I did document and we liked every single one of them.

We stayed at the Hampton Inn and it was a great hotel. The rooms were very nice (and the TV had Hallmark = WE WATCHED A HALLMARK CHRISTMAS MOVIE, Y'ALL!), full breakfast each morning was excellent and had a lot of GF options, they had a lint-roller at the front counter when I asked for one. It's November so I wrote a whole lot of my Christmas novel at the desk in our room (and almost stayed totally caught-up, too!), and the walls weren't too thin that my in-laws could hear the kids singing and shouting despite being right next door.

We showed up at 9:30 on the first morning. A lot of places were already open but we opted to start by walking along Waterfront Park to give the shops more time to open. There was a great playground there and the views were just beautiful, especially because the fall foliage was still going strong.

We had brats from Munchen Haus on that first day and everyone liked it. There were two different vegan brats, and organic turkey dogs along with all kinds of more traditional brats.

We also went to Andreas Keller and had fries, and then all six of us split a gluten-free hazelnut torte. It was admittedly about a bite and a half each once we split it but those bites were really good!

The bookstore was cute and quaint with a pretty good writing section, all the food we tried was great, and my husband and I were extra excited for our first date night in a long time!

We went back downtown on Sunday night but nearly everything was already closed at 8pm. We went to Bavarian Bistro & Bar where he tried a gluten-free huckleberry cider and we shared a root beer float, but then they started closing so we walked around a little to find something else. There was another bar nearby, The Loft, where the live music sounded pretty good so we went in there to listen. The singer was actually an American Idol contestant (Maggie, but I didn't catch her last name), and she was really good. I mentioned that her voice was really unique and would probably sound awesome covering Dusty Springfield.

The Nutcracker Museum was really fun. I love Nutcrackers and took a lot of notes for the book I'm writing, but also just generally enjoyed seeing so many neat authentic Nutcrackers. My son really enjoyed doing the Nutcracker Hunt and then my mother-in-law bought them a Mouse King nutcracker ornament for our tree so we can always remember this trip together :) Also, how cute is this marzipan pig from Das Sweet Shop?

We all sampled all three gluten-free cookie flavors at The Gingerbread Factory and admired the ridiculous cuteness of that place.

More than anything, the details of the town were what made me so happy. I loved all the architecture choices and the little details like an axe as a door handle. I hope we'll go back again <3