Abandonment & Update

Yep, I have practically abandoned this poor little blog. At first I was too busy posting on on my Pathfinder Pictograph blog but lately we haven’t been gaming much and I haven’t been posting there as a direct result.

So, for the past several months I’ve been working, gaming in other games somewhat, and mostly creating art. My scribbles during the Age of Ashes run are fun and all but that has become so infrequent that it just doesn’t bleed off any of my mad urge to create anymore. In my work as a teen librarian I do a fair bit of creating as I try out potential crafts to see if they are something I can run as an outdoor workshop or a take-home craft for the teens. I have so many ideas right now and I doubt many of them will see the light of day as Covid 19 the Delta variant seems to be gaining momentum. *sigh* Take home crafts will likely be the order of the day again before long.

We did get to hold one craft outdoors in person so far, we made little fish out of felt and stuffing and such. It was fun so I got out a zombie kit someone gave me a long time ago. The zombie design was terrible just… awful. So I used the materials from the kit to make something more appealing. A cuter zombie.

The one in the middle is the first felt zombie I designed using the materials from a kit. I then made the one on the right with my own supplies and a little from the kit. Zombie # 3 on the left is a little construction worker zombie I designed and created and from that point on I went hog-wild and created 12 more zombies over the past week or 2. I’ve just been designing and sewing up a storm. I’m having an absolute blast! Each zombie is unique and as I go I have greatly expanded the kinds of feature I can add. I love this so much. I’ve also been keeping a sketchbook, current pages include a fair number of zombie or zombie-related sketches, but I’m having a lot of fun. I store my horde in a little Estee Lauder … bag/case-thing which I think is hilarious. Super fashionable zombie horde transport for the modern necromancer on the go!

Future plans obviously involve a zombie workshop or take-home craft. Yeah. It’s hot and muggy here, well, the temp has dropped to reasonable but the humidity is still murderous. Anyway, I am still alive and keeping busy. Be safe.

November is Here!

It’s windy and spitting snow this morning on the edge of Cold Swamp. Welcome, November! Halloween/Samhain didn’t really happen here. We wore no costumes, didn’t honor our beloved dead, didn’t hand out candy. We watched a couple of scary movies and ate spider donuts, that is about it. Ah well. We’re all stressed and trying hard to just maintain these days.

I harvested the last of the mint yesterday and made fresh mint tea to go with our sausage, meaball, and potato dinner. It was a ridiculously hearty meal. Tonight’s plan is lentil soup to make up for it. I’ll be at work when my little clan eats it but I’ll either bring some to work or eat when I get home. I love Fall and Winter, love the cold, love coming in from the cold to find the warmth of our fire and drink hot drinks, love the dark that makes our home a little island of light and comfortable coziness. I love wearing the cozy layers of soft clothes, I love being able to stand wearing them without dying of heatstroke, and I love the long, long season of baking and making soup. I love the contrast of the cold and raw outside with the heat indoors. And I love the long, dark nights, the hush of falling snow, and the scent of woodsmoke in the air. I will be making my usual lentil soup, squash soup, and hopefully leek and potato soup, as well as searching for new soups to add to the line-up.

And baking! Oh the bread, the cookies, the homemade cakes! I’m all geared up and ready to shop for feast food here. Got my lists ready to go and might do a few practice runs of some of the trickier items. Muahahaha. Yum. I might try to flip lemon bread and make it with lime since I can’t have lemon anymore. I may have to learn to make pies… I’m not great at it, I can do it, but everyone else’s are better, it is known.

Fun fact: The house banners from last Xmas/Yule are still up. Yeah, I know, but it’s true. I like to leave them up till sometime in February but this past Feb we were looking at the progress of Covid19 and I thought how the banners coming down each year made me all wistful and I thought I’d leave them up a while longer, you know? until the crisis was past? Yeah, at this point I just don’t know what to tell you. Will it ever be past? I hope so. I really hope so.

Our 18th wedding anniversary is coming up. My husband asked me yesterday what I want to do for it. He is not in a good headspace at all and this was clear as anything when he asked that question. So I asked him what he wants to do and he said something like: “Our options are nil.” It’s sort of true in that we don’t have the option to go out to dinner, or to a movie, or even to go out and browse a bookstore together. (all traditional anniversary activities for us) But I mean we do have options. We could make a nice dinner and eat by candlelight, we could read aloud to each other, we could borrow a movie from the library or watch one of our favorites we already have kicking around. We could even go freeze to death in the shed to get away from the kids for a bit. Insulation and a tiny woodstove have to be the next things for the shed. Yep. How cool would that be?

As much as I love my shed it seems the garden is the priority. I have a very cool lady coming next week to start preparing the first of our gardens. The idea is that it will be sitting there ready for next Spring when it’s time to plant. She’s also going to work on expanding and diversifying our berry patch. I have such endless dreams for this project/series of projects, endless. So many things I want to grow. I can’t wait to be growing and harvesting FOOD.

Tune in next time for who knows what rambling! I should have garden progress updates sometime next week,

Temporary Snow

We have a shower again, we can bathe and smell nice, and I am very happy about that. The water control in our shower/tub broke Monday and we could not turn the water on. Now showers, no baths, just your’s truly washing her hair in the kitchen sink. Our wonderful plumber came and fixed it all up for us and it didn’t even cost us too much! So, Yay! One thing going right after going wrong.

I am slowly working on projects for xmas/Yule and making slow but steady progress. It would help if all the flotsum and jetsum from my husband’s work could finally be gone, but I am doing the best I can. We have our first snow of the season and it’s lovely. There’s a fire in the woodstove, coffee cake in my belly, and tentative hope for the future that the U.S. won’t become some kind of hellscape.

Tuesday Update: Now w/ Books!

It was 39 degrees when I woke up this morning, so lovely. Not that I want the growing season over just that I enjoy being slightly sane and enjoy being able to stand wearing clothing. I’m hoping to enjoy wearing sweaters again someday, maybe even this winter, when my crazy hormones finally loosen their grip. We’ll see. I am pleasantly chilly this morning.

My hubby is sick but of course started work before 8am. At least he’s home and can work in his bathrobe if necessary, he could work from our bed even. Working remotely is kind of awesome, I mean it would be better if it was more of a choice, but still. He’s working ridiculous hours now, that’s just a job at a school in September, to be expected.

Apparently I’ll be writing the grant proposal for the Cultural Council next month. My boss has confidence in me and promised to check it over before we send it. Look out, I just might become competent at my job! I still have plenty of gaps but I love what I do so I keep trying to learn it all. One thing at a time, I’ll get there.

My reading for the year is ahead of schedule. I think I’ve read 42 books out of 52 I aimed for. With life being busy, stressful and so on I figured 1 book a week would be a decent goal for 2020. Then it turned out the whole world changed and got weird so I might have to raise my goal or something. I am currently reading The Library of the Unwritten; by A.J. Hackwith, Crossings; by Alex Landragin, Among the Fallen; by N.S. Dolkart, Fury of the Demon; by Diana Rowland, and This is My America; by Kim Johnson. Next up: Beowulf; by Maria Dahvana Headley and Disfigured; On Fairy Tales, Disability, and Making Space; by Amanda LeDuc. I’m enjoying all the books I’m reading, I just can’t seem to settle down into one. I’m blaming stress.

I’ve only read one dud-book this year. Surviving the Lake House was just a dull slog. I almost never give a low rating to a book, I hate to do it, but I felt like the writer could have benefitted from serious editorial intervention. It was bad enough I looked up the publisher and, sure enough, self-published. I understand the desire to want to hold a book you’ve written in your hands. How amazing must that be? But writers need editors. They need a dispassionate someone to tell them; “This isn’t ready yet. It needs to have a consistent tense.” or; “You’re writing in the first person you need to tell your audience why you’re telling them this tale.” or: “You need more description. The reader needs to be able to visualize your characters, scenes and so on, they need to connect to the characters.” Plus all the usual grammar fixes etc.

Heat & Humidity

This weather is killing me. So disgusting. It’s 81 degrees out with 60% humidity and I walked for about 20 minutes, strolling, and I am so sweaty and uncomfortable. My hair is still damp from my shower and I’m considering a second one right now. I will definitely shower before going in to work. UGH.

If the promised rain would keep on coming maybe we could get a full berry harvest. Some of the wild berry bushes are in spots that drain a little too well. They are laden with hard, green berries just waiting for proper rain to ripen and make me very very happy. ^_^ We are harvesting and eating berries every day. I make smoothies with them since there aren’t that many yet.

Approximation of daily harvest of berries.

The library will likely be completely oppressive today. My Director is usually cold all the time and I am always too warm so it truly sucks in the summer. I’ll only be there for 3 hours tonight but I have to work all day tomorrow. I haven’t been on my feet that much in MONTHS, I’m going to be hella sore. I know, I am lucky to have a job at all, and I am grateful, this weather just makes me miserable.

My MIL in FL is getting really antsy. One in 3 people may be infected where she is and she’s getting a little scared. She’s also alone, bored, sick of all of it like the rest of us. I don’t know how I’d be coping if I didn’t have my husband and kids here. I honestly don’t know how non-gamers are coping. We play games with friends 3xs/week. Lots of laughs, just enough catching up with each other, I don’t feel super isolated. I do miss in-person games, getting together for wine, beer, food, but honestly, Roll20 gaming is social enough for me most days. I find normal zoom chats pretty boring, like phone calls but you can see everyone’s messy houses and split ends, we use them for the audio when we game. I can’t believe that’s all non-gamers get, zoom chats and such with friends and family. Oof.

Okay, don’t listen to me, I’m just cranky from the heat. bleh. Be safe!

New Year’s Eve

So, I haven’t posted in over 2 weeks. I guess I got busy between work, holiday prep, and life in general. HI! I’m back.

I had a nice holiday. Our feast was good, presents were well received by all, I got some books and things I really wanted, including a new tea kettle of better quality. My old one peeled and cut me! Apparently it was covered in some sort of metal or metalish facade. Sliced my thumb open when it peeled back with regular use. Oh, and I got some of my favorite, fairly expensive, tea so mornings are more yummy now. We all played my son’s new game, Red Flags, a hilarious card game where you try to set your friends up with the perfect date while other players sabotage things by playing what they hope will be deal breakers. So, I put out 2 cards: “Looks just like Scarlett Johannsen” and “Gives the world’s best back rubs” and then someone plays something hideous on it like; “amateur cannibal” on it, or, “constantly trying to kill you.” We played with 4 people, so 3 of us made up someone for the person to date and then tried to ruin the dates others made. Then we argued for our date, despite the red flag, and tried to get them to pick ours over the others. So much fun and a little disturbing.

The terrible storm has been and gone. We had rain, snow, sleet, freezing rain, hail, thunder and lightening. It was pretty insane. But we got through it just fine. We stocked the house and the porch with wood and got a few perishable foods to top off the pantry. We were ready for a power outage but lucked out and didn’t get one. We spent the day watching The Witcher on Netflix, reading, cooking, eating etc. The library closed early so my boss told me not to come in. We did have to get my daughter from the train at about 11:30 pm and the roads were pretty bad. We were ok though and my daughter is home from her big trip to NYC safe and sound.

My daily life is fairly satisfying right now. I get up, put wood on the stove, put the kettle on for tea, feed the cats, do some dishes, start some laundry, hang some laundry, bring in some wood, make the tea and head upstairs to wake my hubby. I’m on top of most things at my job now too so that keeps my stress level… level. Oh, and the making my own laundry soap thing is a HUGE SUCCESS. The stuff is amazing. The clothes smell clean, just lovely and clean, not perfumey. They almost smell like they were dried outside which is awesome. I think I’m hooked and will be making my own from now on. It’s so easy.

I have so many things I want to learn, make, do. Lip balm is a success so now I want to try making lotion. I’ve been making some cool tea blends and I want to make more. I can hardly wait for summer so I can harvest some wild ingredients and grow some of my own. Oh and I hope to be able to garden without killing stuff and also get a nice yield. I am so bad at gardening. I need to take a class or something. I want to make soap, candles, learn to use a Chinese steamer, learn to weave baskets, etc etc. My son and I want to get all set up to make terrain for gaming too. There’s just so much. Since I don’t know how to weave baskets I watched a tutorial on crocheting baskets and made one of my own. I modified an existing pattern to make one with a handle and a cover.

I’m pleased with it and I used one of the buttons from my late Gramma’s stash. ^_^

Well, much to do, so I’ll leave you here. Tomorrow I will make a post for a bright, new year full of endless possibility. Be well.

Snow Day!

By happy surprise my kids and I have all been granted the day off due to the weather. We got up and shoveled, they will rake the porch roof and kitchen roof later and re-shovel the walkways for me. It’s been a fine day so far, the snow is beautiful, the wood stove is humming along, and we are warm and snug inside for now. My Sweet husband had to go into work because his bosses never see fit, even under perfect circumstances to do so, to call a snow day. If he was home life would be ideal today.

I am letting dough rise now for bread later on and I’m currently simmering simple syrup to reduce it by 1/2 so I can make dried, sweetened cranberries. My sourdough starter is still alive and yummy and I am shocked to my core over it. I haven’t had much luck with it in the past but this time seems to be going well. Tonight, since I’ll be home to cook, I’ll be making Swedish meatballs and mashed potatoes. Nice hearty fare for cold weather and the hard work of shoveling

So, it’s later now, I’ve been busy all day, been sticky and covered in flour, been out in the snow a little bit too. Dinner was yummy. Sourdough bread warm from the oven, Swedish meatballs, mashed potatoes, and a bit of beer. ^_^

Possibly the nicest looking loaves I’ve ever made.

The cranberries have been in and out of the oven all day as I used it to cook other things. They spent some time atop the wood stove too, we’ll see how they come out, they have hours to go yet. The snow continues to fall and will until around 4 am. My eldest is at work and will have to drive home in it on roads that are cooling and freezing as I type. I worry so much. (Be safe my little dove.)

We’ve got over a foot of snow so far and it is still falling.

Be safe, Everyone!

Welcome, December!

We’re officially ready for whatever the storm brings, or, as ready as we can be. Wood box and wood rack are full, got tons of kindling, put away the outdoor umbrella and wicker chair, packed the house with groceries and bedded down the plants as best we could. We already had candles and full bird feeders, oh and we got some sand for the walkway. We’ve plenty of cocoa and beer. There’s a merry little fire going in the woodstove ahead of even the first flakes. I got a nice fat book from the library and a few movies too.

I love winter. I love the cold and the beautiful snow, I love the dark, and the hush that comes when the snow falls. I love watching the birds at the feeders and the acrobatics of the squirrels. I’m not a fan of icy walkways and all that, I like unbroken bones. I wish we could hole up at home for weeks at a time. We’d read and game and drink cocoa and glogg.

So I’ll be reading Labyrinth of the Spirits; by Carlos Ruiz Zafon while my hubby plays Red, Dead Redemption and my younger 2 kids play some weird mashup of Firefly, Fallout and Skyrim, and my eldest daughter heads to work. (Be safe, Honey!!!) I hope the roads will stay nice until after she gets home. I’m supposed to run a Harry Potter ornament making workshop Monday but I could do with a snow day. We probably won’t get anything like that, the kids will go to school, my hubby and I will go to work. Ah well, it can’t all be skittles and beer.