REVIEW and Outfit--The Bridge from Me to You

Happy Monday!  A new week...and a new review!  Today's review is one of my June reads--The Bridge from Me to You by Lisa Schroeder.  This was a super quick read for me--I read it in ONE day with my two boys at home (applause, please).  

I have so much I want to share this week--reviews, videos, an outfit--that I'm also sharing the outfit that I designed for this book in this post.  Bonus!  So let's jump right in!

• Standalone novel
• Romance/Realistic

The Gist:

Lauren has a secret, a secret that has taken her away from her mother and to live her senior year with her uncle and his family.  

Colby is a star football player and he doesn't know how he's going to tell his family that he doesn't want to play college ball.

Two lives that will intersect.  When maybe they need it the most.

What I Loved:

• This book is cute, wholesome, and hopeful.  Like a Hallmark movie in a book!
• The book is told through both poetry and prose.  Lauren's side is told through poetry while Colby's is in prose.
• Lauren's secret isn't revealed right away, which keeps you wondering why she's really living with her extended family.

What I Didn't Love:

• Ok, this book is pretty darn cheesy.  Now I know I compared it to a Hallmark movie above, and Hallmark movies are relatively cheesy.  But there were some eye-rolling moments.  I work with football-playing teens everyday...they don't talk like Colby.  A too-good-to-be-true story.
• What Colby's friend Benny was doing/what caused his accident was never explored.  This could've been an interesting side plot.
• We never see Colby and Lauren's lives in school, the football game details.  I just think so much more meat could've been added to the book.
• The cover--it carries from the front to the back...but what's with the fence?  They don't walk on a fence...
• Because of the different in voice (poetry v. prose), I felt like I knew SO MUCH about Colby's story but not nearly as much about Lauren's.  Prose just goes so much further than poetry and when it's divided, the attention between the characters is obviously different.

A quick read, yes, but a cheesy one that wasn't overly impressive.  Only 2 stars for me.

 

But even though this read wasn't at the top of my list, I DID want to design a great outfit for Lauren!  Lauren's cousins are known for their matching stocking hats that they wear to the football games and Lauren even herself joins in.  So this outfit is what I would wear if I were wearing a stocking hat to a game:

It doesn't scream football, right?  Lauren isn't a "yay go rah!" kind of girl, but she does join her younger cousins in wearing a matching ski hat to a game, so this outfit is a really trendy outfit to wear even when you have to match a crowd.

• Colby's school colors were blue and gold, so I made gold a main feature of this outfit.
• Plaid and quilted vests are staple items for Fall, and they are perfect for football games.
• Distressed skinny jeans and combat booties give an edge while the monogrammed earrings keep it girly.

I totally want to wear something like this to a football game--would you?

For details on this outfit, check here.

So much to come this week!  Check back for all kinds of book/fashion goodness!