Happy 2025! Yes, I know I’m late but that’s kind of how I roll lately.

I’m starting to write this before work, bright and early Monday morning in hopes that it will get published in a reasonable amount of time.

I’ve been working a bit in my sewing room, organizing and crafting.

It seems as if I’ve been doing more collecting of supplies than using them lately. I want/need to remedy that.

I’ve been playing mostly with fabric but not always in a traditional sense. Fabric journal covers have been one of my recent endeavors.

I’ve been having fun using my stash and creating “sets” if you will. Everything coordinates.

I’m undecided if I’m going to open a new Etsy shop or not. There is a big, frustrating issue on the back end of things and I am no longer able to accept payments since my online bank I used was purchased. Etsy is not being very helpful or accommodating. In the meantime I keep creating without an end goal in mind. Honestly it’s really nice doing things that way.

Since I was sorting through fabric I decided to pull out my Christmas fabrics and make some Scandinavian star ornaments.

Several years ago I made a handful of them but had to look up the tutorial again to refresh my memory. I’ll share the completed ones at a later date.

I’ve been writing lists of crafty things I want to try…so many ideas, so little time.

One of my co-workers brought back these beautiful treats from her trip to India to share with our team.

They are Kaju sweets made with cashews, sugar, ghee and cardamom. The two I tried tasted as good as they looked.

I’m still unsettled on my WOTY for 2025. I loved brave so much, I hesitate to move on. I have a short list of words I may go with or I might just hang onto brave for another year. I don’t think there is any hard fast rule…and if there were I’d likely not follow it. :)

I have put together a full journal that I’m having fun making pockets, tags and other ephemera to include in and on the pages. It really is a lot of fun!

I can’t leave you today without an image of my best buddy Marvin.

Here he was watching an episode of Yellowstone with me. What I goofy cat!!!

I have a before school committee meeting Tuesday morning. No walk for me.

What are you doing today?

Just checking in again after a 2 month hiatus. Life happens but blogging doesn’t. :)

Last time I posted Mini-me and I had just gotten back from our cabin adventure. We were trying to get in as much as we could while she was job searching and I had the impending back to school dates looming ahead.

I was happy to get something canned this summer since my garden wasn’t super prolific this year. I was able to harvest enough hot peppers to make some cowboy candy aka candied jalapenos. I don’t need to make very much as I’m the only one who really enjoys it.

I’ve also been slowly working on using the supplies that I have accumulated. It does no one any good sitting collecting dust. I used the better part of a paper pad from my stash to create gift sets of blank notecards. It’s always nice to have some gifts on hand…and bonus that they are handmade!

Mini-me suggested that we go to the MN state fair on opening day this year. I’ve rarely turn her down when she wants to go somewhere since she tends to be a bit of a homebody. Wowsers was it busy! That day set an attendance record with 138,875 people!

We couldn’t leave without getting a bucket of these! We didn’t eat them all there. Only enough to jam the lid on the bucket after using some elite tetris skills. I froze cookies in small batches to enjoy for the future. In fact, I ate the last two cookies today.

On the bus ride to the fair, Mini-me got a phone call that she got the job she’d interviewed for a couple days previous. This was amazing news! Now she needed to find a place to live in and start work in 12 days. Yikes! It was a whirlwind… She is an admissions counselor for her alma mater. So cool! The only trouble she had was trying to find someplace to live in a small town at the beginning of the academic year. Everything is scooped up! However, between her heavy travel schedule on the college fair circuit and some temporary housing, it all worked out and she got an apartment after a couple weeks.

I had fun finding some furniture for her like this amazing vintage table and chairs at a garage sale!

Her place isn’t ideal but it’ll do for now. She’s hoping to get a roommate since she has a 3 bedroom all to herself. Again…that was all that was available!

So now we are really empty nesters. It’s so strange converting your children’s rooms to another use because its even more sad walking past an empty room. The smallest bedroom has become a sewing room, craft room. And now we have a guest room as well. So strange.

Another good update was that my most recent scans show no recurrence of lymphoma! Remission is a wonderful word!

I continue to walk in the morning before school as much as I can. The sunrise over the new parking lot pavement is lovely.

Last week was only three days which was great. I travelled to see Mini-me for a bit. I’m soaking up all the moments I can since I know they are fewer and farther between. Unfortunately my breaks from K-12 school only mean a busy time for her since that’s when people want to visit the university.

We went out a couple times in the brief time I was there. This place had really awesome coffee and a darn good Reuben sandwich. Eat local.

I’ll leave you with Marvin enjoying the “new” vintage quilt on the spare bed. I brought the comforter up to Mini-me so I’d have some blankets on the airbed. :)

Today had me back to work with an early meeting. No walk before school. :(