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Be Prepared

I am still off meditating, but I am scheduling this to publish in my absence for National Hurricane Preparedness Week, May 3 - 9, 2026. It is so important for people who live in the southeast, Atlantic coastal and Gulf Coastal regions to get ready for hurricane season, which runs from June 1st through November 30th. You can find lots of helpful information here , and get updates on systems and storms throughout the season at The National Hurricane Center . Every year my guy and I take stock of our supplies of non-perishable foods, batteries, medications and everything else we might need in the event a hurricane cuts us off from civilization. My guy tests our generator, and makes sure we keep enough propane on hand to use the grill if we have to for cooking. This is because we have lived without power for weeks many times in the past, and have never suffered because we prepared in advance for such events. I have just tidied and reorganized our emergency pantry to see what I ...
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Last Month

While I'm off taking back my calm, let me show you what I got done last month. I experimented quite a bit in April, first by making a dishcloth out of cotton yarn to test whether or not I agreed with the opinions of some influencers about the fiber (end result: I don't agree, what a shock! Ha.) I also made a dog bowl mat for my pups out of cotton yarn, just to be sure I liked it. I tested out a skein of sport weight silk yarn by making a granny square out of it, which I may incorporate into my calendar project. Speaking of that, I finished the April tote for my quilting calendar project, which is a fusion of crochet and quilting. The cutter quilt pieces I've been saving forever for the right project (and I'm so glad I did) and the yarn I used to crochet the tote tops and handles is a worsted art yarn I thrifted last year. While investigating a mystery ball for the crochet blog I turned the yarn into a giant granny square. I made a scarf while...
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Finding Calm

After having some severe anxiety over the social media problem, and being forced to give up my Mastodon account, which I really loved, I'm going to take a break from blogging for some much needed self-care. I just need not to be around online folks until I've regained 100% of my calm. See you when I'm ready to brave being online again. Image by Enrique from Pixabay
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자신을 사랑하세요

The title of this post and the embroidery on this mini quilt I made last year are the same: jasin-eul salanghaseo . It's a Korean phrase that has very deep meaning for me. It came to me during a terrible time as a gentle wake-up call, and became a motto for this time in my life. It empowered me like no one and nothing else in my life has. What does it mean? The literal translation in English if you google it is "I love you" but the actual meaning is "love yourself." In the past I have always attracted people who do not actually care for me. They have told me they do care so they could use me, abuse me, swindle me out of money and otherwise gratify themselves at my expense. I'm not sure why they behave that way, but that was my heaviest burden. I have done my part by being naive, believing what they told me, hoping it would get better, and even thinking at times that I deserved to be treated that way. I had no one to protect me. Much of thi...
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Exercising Wise

If I didn't have diabetes I would probably never leave the house except to shop for food. I am a homebody by nature. I love my home, my guy, my nephew and our dogs. That's my world. I do not feel the same about the outside world and most of the people in it. The world seems dark and nasty, and most folks appear to be just out for themselves and what they want, and heaven help anyone who gets in their way. For these reasons I would happily stay at home forever. When I'm not writing, cooking, caring for the pups and my guys or doing my housework, I can sit for hours and crochet, read and watch videos. That's my life and I do love it. Maybe that's why I am a very sedentary person. Also, I've never found an exercise that I ended up genuinely liking. I've done gymnastics, weight lifting, dance, aerobics, swimming, tai chi and a bunch of other stuff. Now I'm so old and crippled by arthritis that all I can do is walk, but I do walk, twice ...
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Making Lemonade

You remember me showing you this deadline week disaster. The rack and shelves in my wardrobe ended up spontaneously collapsing, taking all my clothes with it. I have a philosophy about bad things happening, especially when I'm busy: it could always be worse. In that yes, my closet self-destructed, but we can fix it ourselves. Would have been much worse if the wall had come down with the clothes. It took about an hour to clean up, and my clothes went to live in the spare bedroom while my guy repaired everything. The rack and shelves just needed to be remounted, this time correctly. I tried to see this as an opportunity rather than the pain in the butt that it was. I'm not naturally a glass-half-full person, but it's the healthier attitude. So when my guy had finished the repair work I started putting my clothes back while removing things that were too big, too heavy or that I didn't like for some reason. I also weeded out most of my old cold-weather jack...
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Quackery & Common Sense

When it comes to diabetes management, there are a lot of videos on YouTube which are basically fear-mongering for views and sheer quackery for the quick-fix chasers. If you're diagnosing and/or treating yourself according to crap you watch online, you will likely suffer for it. If you're not sure, videos with titles like "Eat/drink this and reverse your diabetes in 24 hours!" or "The simple cure for diabetes that doctors don't want you to know!" or "Lose fifty pounds in a month (or even a week!) and end your diabetes with this trick!" are pure quackery. In my experience, pretty much any title with an exclamation point at the end is crap. Hey, I've fallen for it, too. Turmeric, which is often plugged as a miracle supplement in such videos, seemed like something I could try to reduce my inflammation due to arthritis -- it's a spice, right? How could that hurt? I also cook with turmeric regularly. Simple thing to try. At firs...
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