August 23, 2017

As the season slips away: 6 summery somethings I still want to do

August 23, 2017/ Lisa Carpenter

summer sunset

Kids are back in school. Pumpkin-flavored coffees pour forth from the coffee shops. Halloween candy and costumes line the shelves at the stores.

It seems fall has arrived full force despite the calendar still showing summer on the schedule.

As September 21 — the official final day of summer despite what the retailers profess — creeps closer, I'm mulling over the summer sorts of stuff I meant to do and didn't. A few stand out that I still want to do, still hope to do, before I can no longer...

August 18, 2017

Friday briefs: Squash, cinnamon rolls, and Instagram weirdos

August 18, 2017/ Lisa Carpenter

SQUASH
Many successful gardeners — my daughter Brianna included — recently began seeing the bountiful fruits (and veggies) of their spring and summer labors, picking, pulling and happily harvesting this and that from their yards.

I'm not a successful gardener. I am, though, happily awaiting the right size and right time to pull and prepare the two — count 'em, two! — squash I did manage to grow in my woebegone garden of sorts.

zucchini and summer squash

Woot! I'm celebrating the wee bit of success for this black-thumbed gardener wannabe. (Truth be told: I'm pretty sure they grew only because Brianna started them for me at her house then passed along pots with the babies for me to plant and finish the job.)

CINNAMON ROLLS

It has never resonated with me when friends (and strangers and social media connections) mention eating entire containers of ice cream or cookies or bags and boxes of chocolates all on their own, being literally unable to stop themselves. Because I'm not all that in love with sweets. I've never really gotten...

August 11, 2017

My (uneventful) week in photos

August 11, 2017/ Lisa Carpenter

I haven't done much of anything worth writing home about about on my blog this past week. Which, in all honesty, is okay with me. Sometimes busyness and booked calendars are highly overrated (not to mention exhausting).

Even with nothing much on the agenda, though, I did manage to take — and in one case, appropriate from my daughter's Facebook page — photos of the nothing much marking my days. Following are a few such markings from my past week.

bear yard art
A chainsaw-crafted set o' friendly bears a neighbor recently...