Creative
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Tomato Portraits (and a couple of Squash!)
A few tomato portraits from this season. It’s been a few years since I’ve taken fruit and vegetable portraits—err, looks like I filed a kombucha post in the wrong category as you will see if you click through that—and I got around to doing a few one day before canning a few weekends ago. Hopefully I can get out and do some more this summer! Togo Trifle/Togo Trefle: These tomatoes have been fairly prolific this season but they have also been targeted heavily by the leaf footed bugs and as such I’ve had a ton of them rotting on the vine because of those pesky insects. Rutgers: This tomato isn’t…
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April & May 2017 Book Report
Completed Appalachian Odyssey by Steve Sherman: This Appalachian Trail memoir was written in the 70s and I both loved it and thought it could have been developed much more. What was most fascinating about this book was how it showcased the changes in the trail from 40 years ago versus now—it wasn’t completely off roads then! Not only that it also routed through towns that it does not route through now. Some of the sentiment was similar—the hiker hunger, trying to avoid unscrupulous people, etc. It actually reminded me of hiking the Florida Trail to some extent in how few people were hiking the AT in the 70s and the…
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Creative Priorities
With the recent time change we made some adjustments to our evening routine, the main one being that Forest’s bedtime was pushed back to 8pm-ish. Sometimes it is a little earlier, sometimes it is a little later, and of course being a toddler, some days he has his own intention for his bedtime. I’ve been loving that we get 1-1.5 hours outside after dinner in the evenings to play in the yard and to garden, or to take walks, though we haven’t done much walking the last few weeks. We’ve mostly played outside or bounced between the vegetable and flower gardens. It is pretty glorious to be spending these hours…
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March 2017 Book Report
Hi, my name is Misti and I’m an audiobook convert. I was completely and utterly burned out of politics this month and I opted to move away from podcasts a bit and intersperse my listening with audiobooks. I’m finding that I enjoy listening to mostly non-fiction or shorter fiction via audiobooks. I use a combination of Hoopla Digital and Overdrive for downloading audio and digital books. I have preferred Hoopla mostly because it is easier to search for books and usually something is available. The only problem is there is a daily lending limit set by the library so if I want to download something at noon one day I…
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January & February 2017 Book Report (And TV/Movie Report!)
I took about a month off from reading from the middle of December through the middle of January and it was great to disengage with books for that bit, but like always, I tend to come back around to take another gulp from some books. Since it has also been a season in which I’ve watched far more television than I usually do, I thought I’d talk about some shows and movies I’ve watched over the last few months. First, books! Completed Wishful Drinking by Carrie Fisher: With her untimely death back in December I kept seeing everyone talk about her books. I found this audio version, read by Carrie,…
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Reading Year in Review for 2016
I tried to find a post for my ‘word’ of 2016 but I guess I didn’t end up writing one. I decided my word would be ‘read‘ which seemed more actionable and doable than anything else. If I had chosen ‘run‘ I’m not so sure I would have been very successful. I have yet to figure out a word for 2017 but it may be a phrase instead. So, here’s my round up of total number of books read for the year and what they were. I was aiming for about 25 books, approximately two a month; let’s see how I did! In alpha by author: The Highly Sensitive Person…
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September and October 2016 Book Report
I was in the middle of a lot of books in September so I didn’t want to do a book report at that time. However, I’ve now finished a bunch of books and am in the middle of more! Before I launch into that I’m going to launch into a rave about how much I now enjoy listening to audiobooks because I figured out how to speed them up! I have always been super bored by audiobooks, finding only a few here and there that caught my attention well enough to listen through. Recently, though, I started seeing people talk about speeding audiobooks up because many readers are speed readers…
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Movie Night Cocoon Cardi | Finished Crochet Project
I was in the mood to make something wearable and relatively easy recently, something to stash-bust my yarn. I came across the Movie Night Cocoon Cardi via Ravelry (this link is Craftsy for those not on Ravelry) and it seemed perfect for the vat of acrylic yarn I have on hand. Plus, it was basically a giant granny square and there’s not much easier than that! The project was incredibly easy and I’m already planning on making at least two more for other people and think I could make a second for myself plus a third for myself using thinner yarn or crochet thread for something with more drape or…
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V-Stitch Fingerless Gloves | Quick Crochet Project
Ever since I made these fingerless gloves I have wanted to make more. For some reason it has taken me six years (!!!) to get around to making more! I was at Hobby Lobby recently and they had a huge pile of yarn on clearance. I was about to put the blinders on and walk on by but curiosity got the better of me and the hankering for fingerless gloves was there, so I had a look. I walked away with a two rolls of sport weight in neutral and brown colored yarn by Sinfonia. And some other cheaper yarn in Christmas colors for my weaving project. I have a…
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August 2016 Book Report
I haven’t read a whole lot this summer. Evenings until recently were spent outside in the garden and I kind of lost interest in reading on my phone while Forest fell asleep at night in favor of scrolling social media. Now that it is pretty much dark by the time Forest falls asleep and I escape his room around 8-8:15 every night I have evening time to read or craft. I’m also trying to make a point to read again on my phone instead of endless scrolling. I don’t have a huge update but here’s what I can brief you on. The last update was for May. Completed Olive Kitteredge…