TBB Asks | Giving Thanks Edition

It's that time again!  I really do enjoy doing these TBB Asks questionnaires.  They're a lot of fun and I love scrolling through the link up and seeing some of the other bloggers' responses. 




This month's questionnaire is all about gratitude and Thanksgiving.  But before we get the Q&A, I just wanted to give you all a heads up that there are some affiliate links below and I may make a commission off of any purchases made through those links.  Now on with the q&a session.

Blog Tour | Love Rekindled & Ready For Love by Nyora René


Love Rekindled

Series: All or Nothing (Standalone)
Genre: Contemporary Romance | Sports Romance
Available On: Amazon | B&N | iBooks | Kobo
NBA superstar Malcolm James has everything- fame, money, and two beautiful kids- but no woman to call his own.  When his ex, Charmaine Mouton, arrives in Houston to sing the national anthem at the All-Star Game, he can't help but remember all the good times shared,  and he's determined not to let her get away again.

Five years ago, Charmaine Mouton made the difficult choice to pursue a singing career and lost the love of her life in the process. Now a successful recording artist, when she sees Malcolm again, she decides to reach for the life she left behind.

But relationships take work, and Malcolm and Charmaine will have to put in the work if they want their love to last the second time around.





Ready For Love

Series: All or Nothing (Standalone)
Genre: Contemporary Romance | Sports Romance
Available On: Amazon | B&N | iBooks | Kobo
As manager to some of the country's hottest stars, Denise Mitchell has it all and then some. Fabulous career? Check. Brownstone in SoHo, NYC? Check. Enviable lifestyle? Check. She works hard, plays even harder, and lives life to the fullest.

Enter NBA superstar Drew Smith. Fine as hell, down to earth, and the best sex she's ever had. But Drew is ready to settle down and change his ways, and he's set his sights on Denise Mitchell. She's his every fantasy rolled into one luscious package. The problem? She's determined to keep their relationship casual.

Well. . . we'll see about that.




Excerpt From Love Rekindled


Charmaine shifted in her seat and uncrossed her legs.  "Excuse me, I need to go to the restroom," she said to the group.

"I need to use the restroom myself.  I'll show you where it's located."  Malcolm rose from his chair and pulled hers out.  He knew from past experience that the restrooms were in a secluded corner of the restaurant and were easy to miss if you weren't paying attention.

As they walked toward the restrooms, Malcolm's hand grazed her lower back, close to the curve of her bottom.  Charmaine's back stiffened for a moment before her body melted into his touch.  Once out of sight of the other diners, Malcolm let his hand drift to her bottom and squeezed.  Still as juicy and firm as he remembered.

Charmaine's low moan reached his ears and she stopped in the middle of the secluded hallways.  Standing behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist, he ground his erection against her derriere, both of them gasping at the friction.

Malcolm guided Charmaine by the hips, steering them toward the alcove tucked past the restrooms.  On his first visit to this restaurant, he had come by the alcove by accident while looking for the men's room.  He leaned down and nuzzled the curve of her neck, inhaling her scent, before placing a soft kiss there.  When she moaned, he grinned and licked a path from beneath her ear to the curve of her neck.  Once they got to the alcove he spun her around, plastered his front on hers, and braced her back against the wall.

Looking down into her dark brown almond-shaped eyes, all of those feelings hit him.  Not just the lust-- although that was still his predominant thought-- but all the small things that he used to love about her.  Like her inability to hide her emotions from him and how she reacted to his touch.

"Mal. . .mmm. . . Malcolm, what are we. . . what are we doing?" Charmaine gasped.

He moved closer, pressing light butterfly kisses against he neck.  She felt so good against him, and he loved the way she arched into his touch and wrapped her arms around his neck, pressing her body closer to his.

He almost didn't respond to her question, but when she gasped his name and repeated her words, he pulled back, breathing harshly.  Her skin was just as smooth as ever and he was dangerously close to being lost in her.  His eyes met her dilated ones, and it took every bit of self-control he had not to devour her on the spot.  Instead, he let the back of his hand caress the side of her face as he stared into her eyes.

"This is a proper greeting, not the sanitized one you gave me earlier," he murmured.

"Proper greeting?  Sanitized?" Charmaine choked out, her body slightly arching away from his embrace and arms loosening from around his neck.

"Yes, did you really think a simple 'hi' would be enough for me?" he asked.

"I thought saying hi after not seeing each other for years was an acceptable greeting.  What did you expect?" she asked, head tilted to the side, body still leaning slightly away in his embrace.

"A hug to start off," Malcolm murmured, drawing her back to his body as he focused his attention on nuzzling her neck.

"Well, you're taking a lot more than a hug now," she said, shivering.

He smiled against her neck and closed both eyes, squeezing her body a bit more tightly to his.



About Nyora René

NYORA RENÉ has always been an avid reader.  She discovered a whole new world full of possibilities when she developed a love of reading.  Nyora's favorite books involve handsome, alpha male heroes, and beautiful strong heroines.  When Nyora decided to follow her passion and write books, romance was the natural choice.  Her goal is to create wonderfully strong characters who are lovable and real, the kind of characters she would want to read about.  Her debut novel, Love Rekindled, hit the scenes in 2016 and was an Amazon bestseller.  In addition to writing and reading, Nyora loves to spend time with her family and friends; she also loves shopping and traveling.  She hopes to one day visit all 50 states, and has already checked off half of them.  If you still want more, check out her website or email her at nyorarene@gmail.com.

You can also find her on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and her Amazon author page.


Are you a fan of second chance and/or sports romances?  Let's chat in the comments. 

Sunday Post #5



This weekend has hands down been one of the worst of my life.  Hurricane Florence has done a number on the Carolinas y'all.  My hometown is currently under water.  A lot of people including my mom, baby sister, niece, and the rest of my extended family are still trapped there.

So many of my family and friends have lost their homes, cars, and their pets.  This is like a nightmare that I keep hoping to wake from.  I feel so hopeless that I can't get to them because the roads between where I live and where they are have been washed out and blocked by trees.  I'm hoping to find a safe alternative route to take once the water starts to recede, but that could be a while away.


They don't even live on the coast and are seeing this much damage.  I think we were so concerned about wind damage since that what we usually get that we didn't even think about flooding because it hasn't flooded this bad there since Hurricane Hugo.  I'm blessed because we don't have any flooding in our yard as of yet.  We have a neighbor's tree fall, but thankfully it fell in their yard and avoided hitting any houses, cars, and power lines.

Some of my other neighbors have mini ponds in their yards and one of our parks is completely flooded.  Our emergency crews have been great at quickly getting the power restored to those without and moving all of the fallen trees as they are notified about them.

Y'all this hurricane has taught me to never get comfortable or try to downplay storms.  Always expect the unexpected when it comes to Mother Nature and these natural disasters.   We've also agreed that the next major storm that comes through, we will be evacuating as one big family and going outside of the Carolinas.  This way we aren't separated and everyone is safe.

Please pray for the Carolinas.  If you would like to help here is a wish list of supplies that will be needed for cleanup.  Please consider purchasing something off this list.

Also, this post contains affiliate links, which means I may receive a commission for some sales made through some of the links below.

Friday Five Currently | Week 11


This has been a week y'all.  Forget a redo, can I just fast forward to happier times in the future?  Please and thank you.  I hope that everyone in Florence's path stays safe this weekend!

TBB Asks | Cozy Edition



September is here and you know what that means.  Fall is here and it's time to celebrate all things cozy!!  I'm so stoked that one of my favorite seasons is about to start.  I've been counting down to this since Spring started.

And because I love all things cozy related, I'm participating in the TBB Asks Cozy Q&A.  So let's get started.  But first, I just wanted to give you all a heads up that there are some affiliate links below and I may make a commission off of any purchases made through those links.  Now on with the q&a session.

Sunday Post #4


Happy Sunday!  I am so sore y'all.  I re-started my workouts and let me tell y'all, I felt so out of shape.  I'm pretty sure that I read somewhere that it takes our bodies longer than men's to adjust to working out again after taking a break.  This is just so not fair.

The bright side is that my kids have been joining me for my workouts and cheering me on.  It's been so encouraging hearing their little voices shout things like "You can do it, Mommy"  or "You're doing so good."  My son told me he was so proud of me for getting in shape and I wanted to cry a puddle of tears.  I'm so grateful that my kids are so sweet and supportive.

I hope that your weekend was as lovely as mine was!

Friday Five Currently | Week 10



TGIF y'all!  Thanks to our 3-day Labor Day  weekend, this week flew by.  Speaking of Labor Day, I had the most chill Labor Day ever.  I slept in and then finished up one the books I was reading.  The kids got to take a break from homeschooling.  So they enjoyed having the chance to play on their tablets and catch up on Netflix shows.  Let me know down in the comments what you did for Labor Day.

My Monthly Goals | September 2018


Yesterday, I mentioned how I had to have a sit down with my own self.  I have a lot going on in my life and I had to really just take a move to re-evaluate some things.  In doing so, I realized that in order to get on track and get to where I need and want to be, I need to start setting some monthly goals.

So here I am with my list of goals that I want to obtain this for the month of September.  Again I'm sharing them here for accountability and moral support purposes.  Let's get into this!

Friday Five Currently | Week 9


Am I the only one that feels like August has gone by in the blink of an eye?  Seriously it feels like Summer was just getting started yesterday and now school is in full swing.  I'm not going to complain though because this has been the blahest and most trying year for me.  Can't say that I'll miss 2018 when it's gone.  Anyways, cheers to having a 3-day weekend this week.

Also in the spirit of full disclosure and keeping things honest around these parts, there are some affiliate links below.  This just means that I may make a commission on any purchases you make through those links at no extra cost to you.

Friday Five Currently | Week 8


This post contains affiliate links.  I will receive a commission if you make a purchase using one of my links.

Friday, is it you?  It's been a long week y'all.  So long that it has me wishing I kept a stash of wine stocked somewhere in the back of my closet, but I don't.  Unfortunately, alcoholism runs in my family.  Therefore, I enjoy alcohol in social settings or once a month for personal enjoyment.  Never to self-medicate or numb my emotions, etc.

That being said, the holidays are coming up.  So, I will be partaking in some wine sipping at family dinners.  Leave me some suggestions for yummy white wines and any sweet red wines that you may have.  Anyways, here's to hoping things start to look up over the weekend.

TBB Asks | Party Edition




Happy August!  I have mixed emotions about July being over.  On one hand, July was such a crappy month that I'm not sad to see it go.  However, on the other hand, the end of July means that it's time to say bye-bye to Summer Break.  School's starting up in a week and a few days.  I'm not exactly thrilled about that.

TBB Asks | Vacation Edition


I meant to get back on the TBB Asks bandwagon last month, but see what had happened was I totally forgot to type up my blog post in time for the link-up.  I still might come back and publish it here on the blog since I took the time to answer all of the questions.  Little Known Fact About Me #359: I prewrite out all of my blog posts in my notebook before I type them up.  My thoughts just flow better that way.  

June Reading Wrap-Up



I can't believe June is over already.  Only a month and a half left of Summer Break.  While I didn't do anything out of this world last month, I did come out of my reading slump! 🎉🎉

Cheers to that because I was beginning to think that I wouldn't be able to finish anything I picked up. In the spirit of full disclosure, this post does contain affiliate links and I may receive a commission for purchases made using some of the links in this post.  Anyways here's a look at the books I read in June.

Friday Five Currently | Week 7


This post contains affiliate links.  I will receive a commission if you make a purchase using one of my links.

Happy Friday!  Long time, no see.  Unfortunately, life happened in a major way.  So I decided that in order to preserve my sanity, I'd take a step away from the blog, YouTube, and social media.

Now that I've gotten a better grip on things, I'm feeling the creative juices flowing once again.  So I'm back!  Let's get right into this.  Here's what I've been up to.

What I Plan To Read For Summer 2018



via GIPHY


We just wrapped up our second year of homeschool and are officially on Summer Break!  🎉🎉 This means that I can actually partake in my favorite pastime- reading!  Y'all have no idea how much I've missed reading.  I started the year off on a roll but then I had to put reading to the side to help my daughter get her life because she was letting her grades slack.  Her brother, on the other hand, was killing it and really knocked it out the park with how much he improved in reading. 

Friday Five Currently | Week 6



This post contains affiliate links.  I will receive a commission if you make a purchase using one of my links.

Happy Friday!  We all made it to the end of another week.  Speaking of endings, where did Februrary go?  This year is blowing by quickly just like 2017 did.  And can we talk about how crazy the weather has been lately?!  Last weekend it was warm enough to turn on the AC but this weekend we're back to using the heat.  I would be forever grateful if Mother Nature could get her act together.  Please and thank you!

February Pinchme Box

"It's Pinchme Day!" My baby sister sends me this reminder every other Tuesday morning. For those of you who don't know what Pinchme is, it's a company that allows consumers to sample products from different brands. So essentially you get to test drive products risk-free and then decide if the product is worth investing your coins into. I love it!!

I have kids and bills. So I hate when I invest in products and they turn out to be duds. In my mind, I'm usually thinking about how that money would have probably been put to better use if I had known beforehand that it wasn't worth spending any coins on. Also, on Pinchme, you can leave feedback that gets sent to the brand. So if a hair company has a shampoo that claims to be for all hair types but you're a curly girl and that shampoo did nothing for you, you can let them know.

All in all, I think Pinchme is a win-win for brands and consumers. Now on the samples. This month I only got three samples but I enjoyed them all. Keep reading to get all the deets on what I got in my box. Also, in the spirit of full disclosure, there are affiliate links in the rest of this post. I will receive a commission if you make a purchase after clicking my link.


Friday Five Currently | Week 5



This post contains affiliate links.  I will receive a commission at no extra cost to you if you make a purchase using one of my buy links.

Happy New Year and Happy Black History Month!  I made the decision to take January off.  I had some personal things that I really needed to focus on.  But I'm back and happy to be back.  Taking a month gave me the chance to recharge my batteries and to be more present in my home life.  Anyways, I hope that your 2018 has gotten off to wonderful start.