Rayen

While we were out and about on my birthday we stopped at Rockledge Gardens , which is one of the loveliest garden centers I've ever seen. Along with countless plants for purchase, there are all sorts of outbuildings where you can buy gifts, food and fresh vegetables in season. They have amazing landscaping ideas, too. Here's a wall made of pallet wood for displaying potted plants. Isn't that pretty? It's quite a trek covering the center's five acres, but worth every minute. Highly recommended if you're every within driving distance.

After so many (too many) DNFs it was a pleasure to read a properly-written book, which is absolutely Dear Old Dead by Jane Haddam. I actually took my time reading it because the writing, the story, the characters, the detective and basically every other element of the story were so good. At a charity, church-supported Harlem health center, saintly director and surgeon extraordinaire Dr. Michael Pride is not having a great night. After being arrested on a vice charge for frequenting a notorious gay sex club and having his image splashed all over the papers (keep in mind this novel was published 32 years ago in 1994), Michael is trying to clean up surgically the mess created by an ongoing gang war. Then he receives news that his wealthiest media mogul patron is waiting for him in his office, and goes to face the music -- only to find the mogul dying of strychnine poisoning. It doesn't help that basically everyone at the health center wants the mogul dead, and the poison used...

My birthday turned out better than I expected; I spent the day with my guy and my favorite person in Cocoa Beach, where I stopped by Knit & Stitch and invested in a little Noro and Juniper Moon yarns. My guy gave me a set of lavender and vanilla relaxation products from Bath & Body Works (not pictured) which I'm already using and are amazing. My favorite person gave these gorgeous silver, abalone and koa wood earrings from Na Hoku. I also stopped by Hello Again Books and splurged on a stack for reading during my vacation. We then went to an Asian buffet and ruined our diets. Honestly, being with my family and having fun in one of my favorite places in Florida made the day perfect. :) I should also mention that my friend B gave me two more books for my birthday, so I have lots of reading to look forward to this month. Thanks, everyone.

I'm officially on vacation! I really worked a lot of overtime to earn three weeks off, too. What do I have planned? Last night I slept 8-1/2 hours catching up after many, many sleepless nights. My guy even walked the dogs for me this morning so I could get in a couple extra hours. This is why he's wonderful. Let's see, other than going along with whatever the family has planned for on my birthday, I'd like to wrap up some projects, like the liner I'm crocheting for this art yarn woven basket I made in June. Still need to get started on the July tote for my calendar project. I want to start using my new project diary to record what I'm doing with, well, everything. I need to replace the missing buttons on my heavy jacket so I can wear that this coming winter. I'd also like to finish this short story, which I'm writing just for pleasure. Not sure if I will, but there's no deadline involved. Mostly I'd like to stop expe...

I usually get myself a birthday gift every year, but this one was the #65 milestone, so I wanted something especially fun. I invested in a Blind Date with a Book gift box from Fama Collections . Book gift boxes aren't for everyone, but I love them. I've gotten several over the years, particularly when I needed cheering up. This assortment of treats and little luxuries along with a mystery book is just perfect. I thought I'd let the Universe pick my read so I specified any genre. Let's see what I'll be reading. Ah, New Adult. Been a while since I was one. :) Should be fun.

I decided to tea dye the drawstring cotton bag I wanted to use for the project in the Summer issue of GreenCraft. This is because I like the color tea dyeing produces versus using coffee; it's warmer and looks more vintage. I have my own method of dyeing which I've used for lace and small bits of linen. The formula is pretty simple: boiling water + four tea bags + glass container in which to soak the bag in the tea. For darker color you use more tea bags. I wanted only a light dye so I let it soak for about an hour before I took it out. I then gave the bag a quick handwash. This isn't strictly necessary but I prefer to remove any remaining tea from the bag. Here is the tea dyed bag next to one that was not dyed. Note the shrinkage. Now that I have the bag done, I can give the project a go. :)

The Summer 2026 issue of GreenCraft magazine just came out, and it's just as amazing as every other issue for ideas on how to upcycle, repurpose and reuse things that might otherwise end up in the trash. Amy Camuglia's wearable art project is right up my alley -- I have so many fabric scraps they fill a bin, and a smaller stitch project is better for me these days. She turns her pieces into unique pendants and brooches. I've also been feeling the itch to make some assemblage jewelry, and Jenny Youg's Beauty in the Lost & Found details how to add antique objects as well as unusual chains to create memorable pieces. The one project I am absolutely going to try is Christen Hammons' A New Spin on an Old Bag , for which I can use some of the eleven drawstring bags I still have on hand (I had to buy a dozen to make my nephew's bag of money housewarming gift.) The issue also has a neat article on how to dye using natural botanicals, which I...

I'm taking the day off today to be a good sport. See you tomorrow. :)

Like Christmas, I'd be happier skipping my birthday every year. I dislike birthday surprises, and I don't need gifts, and frankly I'd rather stay home. With my family that won't happen, however, as they have their own ideas about how I should celebrate, so I put up with it. This year I began looking back on what I did for my birthday in the past, like visiting Tarpon Springs. Lovely people, terrible aquarium, great seafood. My guy decided we should go there. I went to Busch Gardens for the first time on my birthday one year because my favorite person loves it. I am not a theme park person, but it made her happy. I did enjoy taking photos of the animals. I generally spend my birthday away from home because my family thinks I should go some place spectacular or exotic and have fun all day, usually doing what they like to do. I like staying home -- I traveled and did all the spectacular, exotic, fun things when I was younger -- but since they don't ...

Living in the country means you never know what you might encounter along the way when you're out walking. Last week I spotted this across the street while I was walking Beau, and the glint of gold in the sunlight made me get my camera to bring with me on Shadow's walk. These are two golden silk orb weaver (Trichonephila clavipes), also known as banana spiders. These little guys are everywhere now; they build their webs at night and tear them down just after sunrise. Two of them had spun webs that together reached at least ten feet across and maybe seven or eight feet high, and I've never seen two of them so close to each other. The only reason I saw these was that I got up early that day walked the dogs about two hours earlier than usual. Nature is awesome. :)

The July tote for my calendar project is all about vintage, and the old fabrics that I love: feedsacks, cutter quilt pieces, embroidered linens and such. Working with antique textiles is such a pleasure. I'm starting with a genuine vintage feedsack as the background fabric, and a canvas tote for the foundation. I also invested in some vintage textiles from my favorite Etsy seller to serve as the fabric elements of my design. The problem with the canvas tote is that it has some staining on one handle, so I have to wash it first. After laundering I realized that the tote shrank quite a bit, and I won't be able to use the entire front panel of the feedsack as I wanted to. Easy fix: I will batt and back both sides of the feedsack and that will serve as the tote's background and the foundation. Stay tuned to the blog to see how I put this one together.

After the double DNF of June, I did very much want to enjoy Sandra Balzo's Dead Ends . One of my blind dates with a book, it promised a cozy mystery that would be maybe more interesting than the Pokemon brain the last book gave me. That's when the Universe decided to remind me that interesting is often used in Chinese curses. The book was either 1) not edited by anyone, 2) was not edited by a professional editor with an understanding of industry standards in regard to formatting, or 3) the author insisted on STETing the incorrectly formatted text and the frequent absence of other things like dialogue tags so you know who is speaking. This lack of correct formatting and dropping of tags make the text basically unreadable. If you're not sure why, tell me who is speaking the third sentence on this page. Is it the character above the paragraph, or the character below (who is also unnamed because there is no dialogue tag there, either.) As a pro I'm utter...

Last week my guy and I went wandering, stopping first to walk through the farmer's market in Celebration and hike around the big lake in the town center. I love Celebration. It's a beautiful town, and there are so many neat places to walk. From there we went to Lake Alfred and hiked around the Mackay Gardens and Lakeside Preserve. This is a gorgeous and very quiet spot for anyone who likes Nature walks. There are plenty of trails that wind through the preserve that make you feel as if you've stepped through a time portal and are visiting old Florida. There are also lots of pristine manicured spots that likely serve as wedding and party venues. Finally we found a lovely little antique mall, Country Primitives, in Winter Haven that has become one of my new favorites. Definitely stop by there if you want to see unique antiques and wonderful gifts for the vintage lover.

Last month I didn't post much about the tote for my calendar project, so here's what happened with it. It started as another fail, as if May's problems were still clinging to me. The thrifted fabric I chose was too short. My hands wouldn't cooperate with hand-stitching so I doubted I could do any quilting or embroidery. I felt defeated before I even began. My spiritual studies have taught me that it's important not to linger in the past or worry about what might happen in the future, so I set aside my negative emotions and started problem solving. I went out and thrifted fabric to solve the shortness issue and to line the tote. I picked out embroidery threads I love from my stash and did a little stitching at a time, as much as my stiff fingers would allow. I embroidered intermeshing circles, which I also love, over as much of the top portion and some of the print as possible. With this tote I wanted to express my happiness (and relief) over s...