Book Review: Murder by Cheesecake: A Golden Girls Cozy Mystery by Rachel Ekstron Courage

Last year, I purchased a novel called Murder by Cheesecake by Rachel Ekstron Courage. It is a cozy mystery inspired by the TV series Golden Girls. I am not a big fan of Golden Girls, but I know many people love the show. One of my friends is a fan of the show. They were really excited when they found out there would be a cozy mystery novel inspired by the show. I was happy for my friend, but I didn’t really think the book would be right for me. (After all, I’m not a big Golden Girls fan!)

After my friend read the book, they began to encourage me to buy the book and read it too. After listening to them describe the book, I began like the idea of the book, how it was written, and other parts of it. So, I decided to buy myself a copy of the novel and read it myself.

Before I read the whole book, I decided to try the cheesecake recipe in the book. I talked about it and if I liked it in a previous post. (You can read it here) Aside from talking about the cheesecake recipe, I didn’t talk about the actual novel. I have since read the book and decided to write a review post about it!

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Bloomingdale’s x Wuthering Heights Collection Favorites

Last month, I discovered that Bloomingdale’s has a new collaboration in their stores. This collaboration is with the movie Wuthering Heights and the studio releasing it, Warner Brothers. The movie, which will being it’s theatrical run on February 13, 2026, will star Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi and is inspired by the English novel by Emily Bronte. The collection is part of Bloomingdale’s pop up shop called The Carousel at Bloomingdale’s. The collection is available at Bloomingdale’s in store and online until February 22.

I haven’t thought about Wuthering Heights until the buzz around the 2026 movie started. (‘m not a big fan of the book, so I didn’t think I would see anything I would like in the collection. Much to my surprise, I did find things in the collection I really like! The pieces in the collection, which includes clothes, jewelry, fragrances, beauty products, and more, has a gothic look to it, yet it I think it is very wearable.

After browsing the collection, I decided to pick my favorite items in the collection and feature them in a post. Before I show my favorite items in the collection, I wanted to mention a few things. Bloomingdale’s is a luxury department store, so the prices will reflect that.  All the clothing and jewelry in this post are by the brand AQUA. The napkin rings are by Kim Seybert. And finally, all the product photographs in this post are from Bloomingdale’s website.

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Skylar Boardwalk Delight Fragrance Review (With The Summer I Turned Pretty Limited Edition Packaging)

It’s fall now, except if you’re waiting until the fall equinox. Then it’s the very last days of summer! Anyway, no matter what season you consider it, I still have one last fragrance to review from Skylar Clean Beauty’s The Summer I Turned Pretty limited edition packaging.

In my previous Skylar Clean Beauty fragrance reviews, I reviewed the other two fragrances with The Summer I Turned Pretty packaging. (You can read them here and here) The packaging was in honor of the second season of The Summer I Turned Pretty. Now that season three is out, it’s time to review the last fragrance in Skylar Clean Beauty x The Summer I Turned Pretty collection.

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Murder by Cheesecake’s St. Olaf’s Cheesecake Recipe Review

Earlier this year, a new murder mystery novel was released. There are many murder mystery novels that get published every year, but this one was different. This one is called Murder by Cheesecake and is inspired by the TV series The Golden Girls.

I bought the novel after a suggestion from a friend of mine who just so happens to be a huge fan of The Golden Girls. Months after it was released, I’m still working my way through it (I started it a few weeks ago and I’ve been quite busy since then.) so I can’t write a review about it. So far I like it and it is written the same way the TV show would be.

Even though I’m still reading the book, there was something about the book I can review now: The St. Olaf’s Cheesecake Recipe.

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Skylar Salt Air Fragrance Review (With The Summer I Turned Pretty Limited Edition Packaging)

It’s July and that means it’s time to review another fragrance from Skylar. I love Skylar’s fragrances and how they are hypoallergenic. For summer 2025, I decided to review the three fragrances that were part of a collaboration for season 2 of The Summer I Turned Pretty.

Like with the previous fragrance I reviewed, Capri Summer, this fragrance is exactly the same as the non limited edition version. The packaging, on the other hand, is part of Skylar’s collaboration with The Summer I Turned Pretty. I decided to use it for reference photos. Also, just for reference, the third and final season of The Summer I Turned Pretty will premiere next week.

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Skylar Capri Summer Fragrance Review

I have many beauty brands I love and highly recommend. One of them is Skylar. Skylar is a clean beauty fragrance brand. I discovered it many years ago while searching for new beauty companies to try. I was specifically searching for brands with hypoallergenic products. Skylar was one of the one I discovered.

After trying it for the first time, I quickly became a fan of the brand. I still enjoy their fragrances and enjoy the relief of using a fragrance that isn’t going to aggravate my allergies.

Summer has started and it’s time to bring out my favorite summer fragrances. Since I’m in a summer state of mind (Fragrance wise) I wanted to review one of my favorite summer fragrances from Skylar: Capri Summer.

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Skylar x The Summer I Turned Pretty Perfume Trio Feature

Back in the early 2010’s, I discovered The Summer I Turned Pretty novel series. I read it, like them, and then moved onto other books that were newly released. Many years later, a series based off the series was released on Amazon. Although I was excited to see the series, the books will always be my favorite way to experience the story.

Even though I like the series, I felt conflicted about buying the tie in merchandise. Although they were really pretty and were my style, I felt they were too youthful for me. So, I skipped on purchasing many of the merchandise. The ones I purchased are items I really like and make me happy to this day. Three of the products I purchased were the Skylar x The Summer I Turned Pretty perfume collection.

I love the fragrances a lot, I decided to save reviewing each of the fragrances for future posts. Instead, I will be focusing on the collaboration packaging and if they are truly worth purchasing.

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Books I Read in January 2025

It is a new year and so far it has been a busy one! Along with my normal job, I’ve been busy with things that happened in the latter half of 2024. One of those things was my mixer broke. From December 23 through the first weekend of January, I had plans to bake and freeze food (Such as cookies and muffins) to eat in the first half of 2025, but I couldn’t because I was without a mixer. Even though I ordered a new mixer, it didn’t show up until mid January. Since I allocated a lot of time to bake, I spent this time reading.

I do not consider myself a fast reader, yet, in January, I was able to read three books the whole way through. Some of the books I’m really enjoying while others I am not. Still, I wanted to talk about them in a post, just in case I don’t remember to talk about them on this blog again!

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Book Review: Sound of Light: A Marvel School of X Novel by Amanda Bridgeman

I used to really like Marvel Studios movies, but for the past few years I haven’t enjoyed them. Instead, I shifted my focus from watching Marvel movies to reading comic books only.

I have been aware of Marvel novel that have been published over the past few years. For the most part I passed over many of them, but a few have caught my eye. One of them is Sound of Light.

Last year, during a time when I missed the way the stories old Marvel Studios movies had, I decided to pick up some of the Marvel novels I own. I was hoping I could fill the void these movies left when the story telling and other elements of the movies changed. The first books I read was Sound of Light. After reading it, I decided to write a dedicated review about it.

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Art, Fan Art, and Book Fan Inspired Small Businesses to Shop on Black Friday 2024

It’s Thanksgiving week which means so many great things. For shoppers, and anyone looking for bargains, it means it is time for Black Friday sales!

This year, I wanted to share small business I really like that are available to shop online on Black Friday. They are all taking orders (Unless I wasn’t aware they were closed this week!) and some may even have sales in honor of the big shopping day. I don’t know all the sales they have or any special offers for Thanksgiving and Black Friday, so please check out their websites to see if there are any specials available!

I also want to mention that I have either purchased from the stores or have been watching them for a while and have good reviews. The links to the shops are going to be their own shop websites or Etsy stores. If there is an Etsy store and a separate shop website, I will link both.

None of the links in this post contain affiliate links. The stores featured in this post are not sponsored.

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