Good morning!
This is the time of year when I often find myself asking, What month are we in again? because fall feels like spring, or mid summer maybe. It’s confusing, but in a benign and kinda comforting sorta way. Anyone else have this problem?
But moving on. Right now I am…
Celebrating… the start of sweater weather. I love cold weather, wool socks, toasty fires, and hot chocolate. And speaking of cool weather, I’m gearing up by. . .
Ordering… these slippers! (Because it takes me forever to make footwear decisions.)
Rewatching… Ted Lasso. It’s funnier the second time around, never mind I’m still missing a good 10% of the dialogue. (I’m looking at you, Jamie Tartt.)
Waking up… earlier and earlier, which makes no sense since it’s so dark in the morning and I’m still going to bed at the same time.
Drinking… coffee three times a day instead of two. Because: see above.
Organizing… my life. I just ordered spiral-bound folders for all my random projects and a single notebook in which I intend to keep track of myself, à la a bastardized version of bullet journaling, which a friend recently briefly summarized to me and I realized I could probably benefit from. Any bullet journal fans out there?
Teaching myself… some (very) basic graphic design via Canva, a ton of YouTube tutorials, and loads of messing around. Canva has so many more options than Snappa (which is what I’ve been using for my YouTube thumbnails), plus Canva is much more intuitive and cheaper. I’m actually enjoying myself, which says a lot since I’m not that keen on techy stuff.
Wondering… how long it will be until my toenail falls off? I don’t remember getting injured so I imagine I was probably cleated in Ultimate a few months ago. The nail is almost entirely a mottled purple, and there’s a new one growing in under it. Mostly, I don’t think much about it (keeping it painted helps me forget about it), but last Sunday when I was playing Ultimate, my toe was too tender for cleats, so partway through the afternoon I had to take them off and play in bare feet, which felt much better but was also terrifying, thanks to the way-too close proximity of everyone else’s cleated feet, eek!
Asking… “How’s Charlotte’s backside look?” a couple times a day whenever anyone comes in from the field because I’m determined not to miss this birth.
Struggling… to get my next batch of clabber going, what the heck? All it involves is setting milk out. How is this not working?!
Eating… not enough vegetables. I’m craving greens and sweet potatoes and big salads. I could solve this problem, I suppose…
Strong-arming… my husband into making me a floating hideaway desk so I can have a two-monitor office in the main part of the house without having a pair of large blank screens staring me down when I’m not working.
Eagerly anticipating… getting the call from our butcher telling us to come pick up our pork. My husband took Fern and Petunia in last week and they will return to us as a variety of ground sausage, bacon (both Canadian and traditional), and a few butt roasts and hams, plus all the lard and bones which I’ll spend hours rendering and processing in the coming weeks. I can’t wait to find out how much each of the pigs weighed.
Waiting… to see how the slow-growing pigs taste in comparison to fast-growing pigs before we decide which kind of pig to get next. Because according to moi, having pigs is mandatory if you have a milk cow.
Bottling … my sour cherry mead, or at least I will be as soon as I can convince my husband to help me. I am so excited to have it in easy-to-access bottles for sipping and sharing.
Wanting… a good memoir to read. Something thought-provoking and well-written and attention-grabbing. The last good one I read was Take This Bread by Sara Miles which hit three things I care about: Nicaragua, food/cooking, and hard theological questions. Plus, the cover always made me pleasantly hungry. Suggestions?
This same time, years previous: the quotidian (9.26.22), Italian chopped salad, a bakery shift, what we ate, evening feeding, the quotidian (9.26.16), home cut, the run around, a jiggle on the wild side.
18 Comments
Anna
I still think about aspects of this memoir that I read in 2016, though as many of the reviewers on Goodreads point out, it’s not without its flaws. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1931763.Blood_Bones_Butter
Jennifer Jo
According to Amazon, I bought that book in 2012, but I never recorded it in my “Books I Have Read” notebook and I don’t remember remember it. Hmmm….
Nancy
Hi-thank you-enjoy your blog. I’ve just finished Feast by Hannah Howard. A young woman working in the food industry in New York-who also loves all things cheese (I thought of you) while dealing with an eating disorder and difficult love life. I enjoyed and I’m just starting her second book Plenty.
Karen
Onions in the Stew by Betty McDonald, she also wrote the Egg and I and The Plague and I….I haven’t read the last two…..and they probably fall more into the autobiography category, but they are each covering a different time in her life. Onions in the Stew was a delightful read.
DB Stewart
Have you read James Rebanks? I haven’t read his first memoir but I read his second, Pastoral Song. It occurs to me now that your life might be quite connected to his.
Shoshana
Memoir recommendation: Gary Paulsen’s Gone to the Woods
suburbancorrespondent
I just finished You Could Make This Place Beautiful. Very nuanced, the writing is prose but very lyrical (IMO).
What do you do with the bones? Just wondering…
Jennifer Jo
Broth! (I pressure can it.)
Jennifer Jo
How did you get that book? It hasn’t been released yet!
April
At the risk of being That Person, I will venture to point out that maaaaybe your coffee drinking strategy is backfiring and causing your early wakenings. Maybe.
I don’t do bullet journaling but I do have my own complex organizational system that involves magnet strips on my fridge (I write on them with dry erase markers) and several apps for different kinds of lists. Am interested in hearing your organizational adventures if you write about them!
Jennifer Jo
I doubt it’s the coffee — I drink it early in the day and this isn’t the first time I’ve upped my intake, but good thinking!
Your organizational system sounds high tech!
Mommychef
Memoirs…Solito by Javier Zamora or House of Sticks by Ly Tan. I liked Philip Yancey’s memoir Where the Light Fell more than I thought I would. Oldie if you missed it…Can You Ever Forgive Me? By Lee Israel.
kathiekurtz
Have you read The Covenant of Water by Abraham Vergese? I found it engaging and you won’t run out of reading for a few days at least! 700+ pages.
Susan
Lovely. I recommend Viola Davis’s memoir Finding Me. I also keep thinking about the memoir Rabbit by Patricia Williams, which was equal parts poignant, funny and shocking. Oh, and a quick but fascinating read is Molly Shannon’s memoir. The airplane story is worth the book alone. I don’t typically seek out celebrity memoirs, but these were excellent.
SK
Jacket weather, too.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tlaLIN91ac
SK
Oops!! Leather weather!
melodiemillerdavis
Have you read Hillbilly Elegy? I know it has been around awhile and I picked up my copy at Gift n Thrift, but I’d be happy to drop it off at your place. I did a small review 2 weeks ago. https://findingharmonyblog.com/2023/09/22/families-in-crisis-how-can-we-help/
Jennifer Jo
Yes, I already read that, but thank you!