Mid-October Round Up

It’s a mixed bag of good news and bad on various parts of my life. I always like to get the bad news first, and then ease the pain with the good news.

1. Blog! Bad news is I am not very tech-savvy (being from the age of manual typewriters), and when Blogger goes wacko on me I never know whether it’s just one of their endless glitches or if it’s actually user error. I love that Blogger is free and it’s easy to use in so many ways, but whenever I have to go into their help page I just get discouraged. Good news: I’ve managed to keep up a blog for more than a month now, with relatively regular entries. And it’s fun!

2. Pies! Pies are never bad news. Good news is we had these pies recently.

recipe here

I had never heard of buttermilk pie before two weeks ago, but now I’m a huge fan. They might not look like much but they are delicious – the closest description I can come up with is a combination between lemon meringue and vanilla pudding. So good!

We also had this, another amazing find in Southern Living Magazine.

The cake was gone before I could photograph it, so you'll have to settle for the magazine photo.

Apple-Cream Cheese Bundt Cake with Praline Icing? Yes! Actually the cake and filling are so moist and rich that it doesn't even need the icing, but I ate it anyway.

And soon we’re heading into pie season! (Although… if I eat pie every single day, is there really such a thing as pie season?)


3. Health! Bad news is I still haven’t gotten on anything resembling a regular exercise program. And hello-oo? Pies? My summer heat excuse for not exercising is gone; I need to get out there and get moving. Good news is that the headache frequency has decreased somewhat. More on that topic next week.


4. Stash! Bad news is I made two fabric-related purchases already this month! First, I somehow found myself in Goodwill in the material section, and could not believe there was 5 yards of 60” wool-blend suiting in a dark taupe. It reminded me of a delicious café mocha, and it was only $4.99. So I bought it. Of course that commits me to making something out of wool, but it’s good for me to have a challenge. The second incident was when I bought the 60+ yards of lingerie ribbon and elastic, but that could also be considered good news since I managed to walk by miles of fabric and not buy even a scrap.

The big good news is I’ve already used 23 more yards from the stash, not counting linings and trim. So at least I’ve accomplished a net decrease.


5. Garden! Bad news is the weeds are already coming up, right in the middle of the seeded areas. That always makes it impossible to pull the weeds without harming the seedlings.

Good news is there are lots and LOTS of sprouts – parsley, cilantro, radishes, beets, beans and lettuce so far.


6. Writing! No bad news on that front. The good news is I’m still planning on doing NaNoWriMo, and once they get the word count widgets working, I’ll post one here so we can all follow my progress. There are regional chapters of “Wrimos” all over the world, and the one in Phoenix will be having a few write-ins during November. I haven’t been to one of these before but I think it will be inspiring to meet some of the other wacky writers who like to do this sort of thing.

I hope you are having a wonderful month with lots of Good News!

Katrina