Book Baths

Enhancing your bubble bath experience, one book at a time.

In Five Years

THE BOOK:

Why is everyone crying when they read this book?

Prior to reading In Five Years, I was stalking the Instagram tag #infiveyears to see what the hype was all about and saw lots of posts where people were like “blah, blah, blah, I’m crying”. I’m not really a crier in general so I kind of dismissed it. Fast forward to a day after starting the book and I’m sobbing in the bath..so much that my tears were helping fill the tub. It was that serious.  

In Five Years is the literary gut punch I could not have predicted. It’s hard to want to give away too much about this book without spoiling everything about it, but I will tell you enough to encourage you to read it.

In Five Years is your typical “here is a premonition about the future via dream, will it come true?” As the story of fellow type A personality, Dannie, is revealed you can’t help but make predictions about how and if her premonition dream will come true.

You’re just minding your own business, happily reading, making your predictions, and BAM, the author shatters your heart into one million pieces. This book shook me. I’m so grateful that the Readheads Book Club made me read it because the message I was left with after finishing this book is one I will carry with me for the rest of my life.

I gave “In Five Years” 5/5 stars on Goodreads. Any piece of literature that can make my icy heart sob is a piece of art deserving of all 5 stars as far as I’m concerned. Definitely read this book in the bath to save money on tissues.

THE QUOTES:

“You mistake love. You think it has to have a future in order to matter, but it doesn’t. It’s the only thing that does not need to become at all. It matters only insofar as it exists. Here. Now. Love doesn’t require a future.”

“I am constantly trying to learn the rules, only to realize that the people who win don’t seem to follow any.”

“You are not wrong for loving what you do. You are lucky. Life doesn’t hand everyone a passion in their profession.”

THE BATH:

Y’all. This bath was so needed. Is anyone else feeling the stresses of today’s current events mixed with social media is just wearing on their soul?

I’ve said it before and I will probably say it one million more times. Reading is the best escape from the reality. Pair this with wholesome products created to do your body good.. pure heaven.

Don’t walk..RUN (well drive) to Target and grab these bath salts. The blueberry thyme made my skin smell so delicious. I find myself just wandering into my bathroom and uncapping them just for a sniff every now and again now.

The golden egg bath bomb is from Lush! If you’ve never tried a Lush bath bomb before you’re really missing out. Their products are always unique and my favorite thing about them is that they DO NOT TEST ON ANIMALS.

The golden egg will turn your bath a ridiculous shade of yellow that will linger for days, BUT it will be a wonderful time pranking your significant other when you tell them that you peed in the tub. I also sparkled until my next shower! Who doesn’t love being shimmery?

So grab your bath board, grab In Five Years, and grab your favorite bath products. Enjoy a moment of calm, you’ve earned it.

Are you in the club?

Welcome to Club Book Baths, a book club for anyone who likes to read books and then listen to other people talk about them!

Each month I will be choosing three new readers to join me as we discuss our book of the month via recorded Zoom session.

My first three readers have been chosen and we will launch our first episode mid-July for your viewing pleasure! An official date will be released soon.

In the meantime, grab your copy of our book of the month for episode one through my Amazon Affiliate link here: https://amzn.to/2AcvwqV

Lastly, invite your friends to join us on the Facebook group (Club Book Baths). The more the merrier! The Facebook group will be a great way for us to chat about the book and ask questions!

Thanks for joining me on this Book Club journey, I look forward to turning some pages with you.

5 Simple Ways to Quit Netflix and Become a Reader in 2020


DISCLAIMER Book Baths is a participant in the Amazon Affiliates program. This means that if you choose to purchase anything through one of my links, I will earn a little something to keep my website going, at no cost to you!
 
Why is it SO HARD to be the type of adult that I dream about being on Pinterest? I finally got fed up with myself nearly a year ago and started making changes. One of the first changes I made was to put down my remote and pick up a book, and I haven’t looked back.
 
1.     SET A TIMER. My Type-A personality is screaming at you to utilize this tactic, I do it all the time! I find this super helpful in getting me started on a book! This might look differently for you than it does for me. I typically will set a 30 minute timer on my apple watch and try to read for that long. I find that more often than not I end up reading for longer if I have the time, and especially if I enjoy the book.
 
2.     READ A GENRE YOU ENJOY! Please do not feel like you need to read the entire Bestseller list at Target to be a reader! If you enjoy a good romance, thriller, or Stephen King—read that! Reading is meant to be enjoyable, and I bet if you just start by making it part of your daily routine, you’ll be more inclined to step out of your comfort zone anyway!
 
3.     UTILIZE GOODREADS. Goodreads is an awesome app where you can set reading goals, track what you’ve read as well as what you want to read. You can also rate and review books! I find myself scrolling through this app more often than not when I’m tired of normal social media sites and just daydream about all of the good books out there that I want to read.
 
4.     READ ON KINDLE, HOOPLA, LIBBY, ETC. While I totally empathize with how great a brand-new hardcover feels in your hands, it is not the end all be all to reading! Using the Kindle app and other apps that are easily accessible through your phone or iPad is an excellent way to turn some pages. If you’re waiting for a doctor’s appointment, taking a bathroom break, waiting for a friend to meet you for lunch, etc. it is so easy to open the apps and get a few pages in! I also love Kindle for the dictionary feature. I’m currently reading The Magicians by Lev Grossman and I swear this book has more unknown words to me than a dictionary. The dictionary feature has been crucial in helping me to understand this novel to the fullest.
 
5.     AUDIBLE. Don’t listen to the haters, audiobooks are still books. I listen to audiobooks in the car, while I clean, while I fold laundry, while I bike, ALL THE TIME! Apps like Hoopla and Libby have free audiobooks, all you need is a library card.
 
Do you have any other ideas on how to read more? I would love to hear about how you’re getting those pages in! Comment below and let me know!Woman lying in bath with foam and reads magazine, top view. Luxury bathroom with palm branch decor

A Kids Book About Racism

THE BOOK

A Kids Book About Racism is one of the greatest things I have read on the topic. It is targeted for children and written in a way that I believe will make sense to them. This is no picture book, but similar to The Book With No Pictures it uses word play to captivate its audience. It is direct. It is gentle. It explains how certain remarks could hurt a friend’s feelings. This book gets the job done.

With the events that have transpired since the murder of George Floyd, I can’t be the only one wondering how to speak to our kids about this topic in a way that will makes sense for them.

I have been teaching for eight years now, and each of those years there has been time embedded into our curriculum to teach students about important black people in history that have helped to make the world a more peaceful place to live. We have read numerous books on Martin Luther King Jr, and we have reenacted what it might have been like to be Rosa Parks when she said “no”.  We have had countless conversations about how our differences only make us stronger as a class family.

I have made it a point to teach my students about racism, but as I reflect I find myself wondering if I have done enough? I realize that I have probably never taught my students about the word racism and what it means. Why is that? I’ve been asking myself that question a lot these days and the only answer I have come up with is simply that I feel racism is an ugly word. Moving forward I feel it is important for kids to know what the word racism is and what it means.

I think as teachers we often struggle to come up with words that are gentle enough to explain things to kids. My first year teaching, there was a boy in the classroom next to mine without legs. When my students first asked me about this child I wasn’t really sure what to say to them. I said “That is just the way that God made him”. To this day, I wonder if using the word God in my kindergarten class was the appropriate choice. Kids are pretty resilient and it didn’t take long for them to view this child as just another member of our kindergarten tribe.

If you’re also struggling with how you teach students, or even your own kids at home about racism, I really recommend giving this book a chance. I do not feel that this is the only tool you should be using, but it is an important one, and a big step in the right direction.

Closing Thoughts: If you’re like me, you may be struggling lately with reading so many opinions on social media that don’t align with yours. I have accepted that I cannot change the opinion of everyone, try as I might. I have decided to focus on things I can control. I CAN control how I educate myself. I CAN control the actions I take to educate my students and my future children. I genuinely believe in our youth, and I know that their future will be much brighter than the nonsense that is 2020 thus far.

THE QUOTES

“Because of my skin color, people aren’t always nice to me.”

“Some people believe that having different color skin means you aren’t as good as others.”

“Racism is one of the worst kinds of mean someone can have.”

“Because being different means we have so much more to offer each other”

THE BATH

Anyone else a little jealous that the grown-up bath section doesn’t have products as fun as this?! Affiliate links are listed below.

Crayola Bath Bombs

Crayola Bath Crayons

Crayola Bath Slime

Crayola Bath Drops

Mr. Bubbles

Top 5 Essentials for your Book Bath

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TOP 5 ESSENTIALS FOR YOUR BOOK BATH

Firstly, what is a Book Bath? A Book Bath is a great way to combine a few self-care techniques into one bubble bath experience! It can be as simple or as elaborate as you choose to make it. There are truly days where I just put my phone in another room, grab whatever I’m currently reading and turn on the faucet. Then there are days where I’m determined to feel like a mother flipping queen. Listed below are my recommendations to just get going!

  1. A book. This part is important! Please don’t feel obligated to read something to improve yourself. A Book Bath is all about escape, read a genre that makes you happy! Lately I have been forcing myself to read outside of my comfort zone and it can often feel like a chore. There is nothing wrong with a good old steamy romance or page turning thriller for your Book Bath experience.
  2. Bubbles! WHY? Because they are good old-fashioned fun, and is it just me or is the sound of them dissolving therapeutic?
  3. A candle! Be mindful that you’re picking a scent that won’t be too overwhelming. I try to pair my candle scents to my bubble scents. This is my current favorite bubble and candle combo.
  4. A snack and beverage combo of your choice! I try to avoid things that are crumby because crumbs in the tub is not cute. My personal favorite right now are fruits you can snack on like grapes, blueberries, or apples slices. I would be lying if I didn’t admit to also eating cake in the bath every now and again! Treat yourself!
  5. Lastly, any little extra thing to make you feel pampered. Lately I’ve been into hair masks. I also really love face masks, lip masks, weird lotions and those under-eye thingies. Make this part creative and unique to yourself and what your body is craving!

BONUS: Don’t forget your bath board! Here is the one that I am using. I absolutely recommend it, Those side pieces move and are removable.

If you have any suggestions for a bath product that I should try, I would really LOVE to hear about it. Leave me a comment below!

Daisy Jones & The Six

THE BOOK:

Get ready to channel your inner Stevie Nicks with this novel. I found that every time I opened up this book I was instantly inundated into the sex, drugs, and rock and roll mentality that was so quintessential within the 1970’s. Daisy Jones & The Six is a story about a fictitious band on their rise to stardom. I’ve never read a book before that made me NOT want to fly through it. I typically enjoy a good page turner, but this wasn’t that for me. I didn’t want this story to end! I read it slowly and savored every page. I found myself so invested in the life of Billy Dunne and his dedication towards the band, even more so when Daisy came along. I wanted to hate Daisy Jones, but also wanted to be her very best friend. Her ability to be so unapologetically herself is very empowering, hence why the character of Daisy is easy to get invested in as well.

I think that one of my favorite things about reading is the ability a good book has to make you feel like you’re living another life. This book was sex, drugs, and rock and roll. It makes you feel like you’re a free-spirited groupie along for the ride with the band and every experience that they go through.

Most days I enjoy waking up and being me. Teaching first grade, loving my husband, petting my cats, it’s not a bad life. But feeling like I was the missing member of the Stones every time I opened this book.. that’s not a bad life either. I would rate this 5/5 stars on Goodreads, Daisy Jones & The Six is a vibe you don’t want to miss.

THE QUOTES:

“But loving somebody isn’t perfection and good times and laughing and making love. Love is forgiveness and patience and faith and every once in a while, it’s a gut punch. That’s why it’s a dangerous thing, when you go loving the wrong person. When you love somebody who doesn’t deserve it. You have to be with someone that deserves your faith and you have to be deserving of someone else’s. It’s sacred.”

“Passion is…it’s fire. And fire is great, man. But we’re made of water. Water is how we keep living. Water is what we need to survive. My family was my water. I picked water. I’ll pick water every time.”

“All I will say is you show up for your friends on their hardest days. And you hold their hands through the roughest parts. Life is about who is holding your hand and, I think, whose hand you commit to holding.”

THE BATH:

This bath was just what I needed to indulge in a long soak with a groovy book. The book has a prevalent theme of drug use throughout it so I thought it would be cool to try out some CBD products! They turned out to be a little pricey, and then I stumbled upon this Hempz brand and was so very excited! The Sweet Pineapple and Honey Melon bath bomb had sweet undertones that were just heavenly and didn’t make me sleepy like a lavender normally does. The bath salts I could have done without, but they sure were pretty! The hair mask by Hask really made me feel like I was pampering myself! The profile picture doesn’t portray my frizzy red mane that’s usually tied up in some disastrous bun. As always, the bubbles were brought to you by none other than Dr. Teals.

I’ll leave you with some food for thought: You can’t pour from an empty cup. Make the time to keep your cup filled, so that you may fill others. If you should happen to fill your cup by partaking in a Book Bath.. well then “Cheers!” to you.