Happy Mid-Year, friends! April/May is generally when things get humid and gross, but this year has been mostly rainy. Mid/end of June was when things started getting gross and sticky, though, and unfortunately for me, it’s going to keep going until August at least.
The past month has been busy — let’s dive in!
June Musings
I wrote one review over at The Arts STL for Sunrise on the Reaping — I’ll probably disappear for another 6 months or a couple of years, knowing me.
Books Hoarded
Immortal Consequences by I.V. Marie (eARC) – for the blog tour in early August
Books Devoured
June continues the trend of reading mostly mangas and maybe 3 novels, and I’m honestly okay with that. Manga and graphic novels in general are my palette cleansers along with romance (when I’m feeling it, at least these days; it’s bound to change at some point).
- American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang – I remember seeing the trailers for the show a few years ago (maybe it wasn’t that long ago) but never watching it, though I did remember mentions of a graphic novel for it. I just never got around to it until recently.
- Personally, I liked Lunar New Year Love Story better, though.
- Pearl of the Sea by Anthony Silverston, Raffaella Delle Donne, Willem Samuel
- Snow White with the Red Hair Vol. 6-7 by Sorata Akiduki
- A Business Proposal Vol. 1-6 by Haehwa, adapted by Perilla, art by Narak – I remember seeing the K-drama everywhere and had the webtoon on my TBR for the longest time but saw volume 7 at work a few months ago, so I went searching for the rest of the volumes! This manhwa brings me so much joy, and I’m kind of tempted to renew Netflix for a month just to watch the drama (along with some other stuff while I’m at it) while waiting for volume 10’s release.
- The Cat Who Saved Books by Sosuke Natsukawa
- There’s Something About Sweetie by Sandhya Menon
- Danger and Other Unknown Risks by Ryan North and Erica Henderson
- The Night Eaters Vol. 1-3 by Marjorie Liu
- Careless People by Sarah Wynn-Williams – I’ve been seeing this on social media a few times and swiped a copy of it at work. A lot of Wynn-Williams’s experience comes as no surprise, but it was still horrifying to read.
Fandom Assemble
Media we’ve consumed and enjoyed, or what we’re looking forward to that’s been announced lately.
- O by The Rose
- The Boy and the Heron
- Sonic the Hedgehog 3
- Mavka: The Forest Song
- Dear Evan Hansen
- Killin’ It Girl by j-hope ft. Glorilla
- Lemon Drop by ATEEZ
- Gnarly by Katseye
- Your Idol from the KPop Demon Hunters Soundtrack
The Breakdown
What catastrophes have the universe handed us throughout the month? Let’s find out. 🧐
June has been busy, but mostly on the work front. This is my first year working throughout the entire Summer Reading Challenge months — last year I started at the halfway point, so I missed the beginning rush. Next year will be my first year possibly doing programs during the summer, though (send help I’m scared but I’m in good hands, at least).
It’s also been the month of doing some unhauling! I started sorting out some of my books that I’d like to keep, books that I potentially want to get rid of and send to new homes, and books I definitely want to get rid of. It’s hard to part with them and decide which ones, so my room’s a bit of a mess for the foreseeable future* since I don’t want to mix them up with my library haul. Some of them I also want to get around to hopefully reading before next year, though, before I decide if I want to keep or get rid of them, so I’ll probably make an end-of-year TBR list soon for some of those books.
*I’ve got other unhauling to do, too. The books just ended up being first because they’re easily accessible…
Sheesh, I have so many books. How did I end up with them all?
I’ve also been unhauling some of my stationery — I did an upgrade to some Tombows (after giving brush pens a whirl over at Daiso and Paper Source — there’s a bit of a learning curve and I’m determined to pick up brush calligraphy since I last did calligraphy in high school, but I love them for coloring large areas) and Staedtlers during a Michaels sale and getting rid of some of the stuff that I never used when I was regularly bullet journaling and don’t see myself using in the future either. They’ll have a home for some programs at work, though!
I think Crayola Super Tips are underrated (I have a small pack I still use — they’re great if you’re on a budget/starting out with journaling), but I hate I can’t replace each pen individually like I can with Tombows. I also just really like that Tombows do individual packs of 10 so I can just get a pack or two with the colors I’ll most likely use and then pick a few others as I need. The one downside I hate is how they can’t fit in a lot of pen cases, but thankfully I have a Cinnamoroll one I got from Jetpens and another one I got from a clearance shelf back in college that fits them.
I’ve also been unhauling some washi tape as well — a lot of the ones I got came in sets and usually have a couple that I’m just not a big fan of, so I never use them. And honestly, if I’m not going to use them, I might as well give them a new home. There’s 1-2 from the ones I’m getting rid of I’m deciding to keep, mostly so I can use them like painter’s tape and when I’m occasionally creating guides for journal layouts.
For the remainder of my collection, I decided to finally pick up regular journaling again* so I can create borders and whatnot — it’s something I’m starting in July since it’s a new month (and it’s in the middle of the year, which is kind of perfect). I’m also just missing regular journaling — as much as I adore digital journaling (and the fact I won’t have prying eyes, at least as far as cloud services are concerned), I miss decorating my notebook pages with stickers and doing the occasional doodle when I’m feeling it. Additionally, I have some sticker sets I got from years ago I never used, and I’m hoping to use some of it up or giving them away (especially the planner ones, because I find that I’m not a fan of sets that include planner ones).
*I’m hoping to draft a post about my journaling has changed over the years eventually, inspired partially from my recent post about how my blogging style has changed over the years and Sumedha’s post about her reading journey.
A little update on rebranding!
And finally, I know I’ve been talking about rebranding for the past month and mentioned it last year — I’m sure I’ve mentioned throughout the years too that I’ve danced the idea around, but I never actually went through with it.
Last month I talked about how I came up with a name and experimenting with test images, creating a Substack and seeing how I feel, but June was the month I came up with a different name (similar to the one I wanted to go with last year), so I ended up creating a Substack under that name. I did nothing with the Substack like I intended just to see if I’m comfortable blogging with it, though, but I finally decided to pul the plug and got the domain for it. It’s going to feel weird no matter what.
So, uh… yeah, I guess I’m going to go through a rebrand??? (It was absolutely intentional for the title change in this month’s wrap-up, and I’ll probably be doing that for future posts among other things.) I’m probably going to take a hiatus after the blog tour for Immortal Consequences in August — whether it’ll be after the August wrap-up in September or right after the blog tour is yet to be determined — but I’ll be back by November for the blog’s 13th regardless!*
*I suppose it’s a risk I’ll have to take with going on a hiatus and never coming back; that’s always my fear when making hiatus announcements, so I never do it.
Let’s talk!
How was June for you? Tell me about your month!
Sophia started blogging in February 2012 for the hell of it and is surprisingly still around. She has a GIF for nearly everything, probably listens to too much K-Pop and is generally in an existential crisis of sorts (she's trying her best). More of her bookish reviews and K-Pop Roundups can be found at The Arts STL.
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Excited to see the rebrand! The journalling journey will be a fun post! I was considering writing it too but I don’t really have much to say after my How I Journal post where I added the history, so onto writing about other journeys 🤪
It’s so scary and exciting AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA. What do you mean I’m getting a new blogging identity of sorts?! I feel like it would be a fun post to write a few years from now when your journalling journey will have changed some more — either way, I look forward to reading the other journeys!
Wooooo rebrand here we come! I do have a bunch of crayola supertips but ever since I got my tombows I don’t really reach for them as much as I probably should. They’ve got a lot of colours and like you said, perfect for if you’re on a budget. I also dislike how you can’t just specifically replace each colour of them though like you can for tombows.
You get all the sneak peeks. <3
Not being able to replace them was absolutely the deciding factor into getting Tombows. They might be expensive, but they also last pretty long if I'm caring for them properly. It kind of evens out to be cheaper in the end, I suppose.