Wait a hot sec, you’re probably saying. If this is Year Two, where the heck was Year One? Obviously, I never posted about it, seeing as I was on 10-month blogging hiatus at the time. [Insert obligatory OMG-it's-been-six-months-since-I-blogged-last-I'm-so-sorry-I-have-no-excuse-except-LIFE-HAPPENS here. Aaaaanndd moving on.] BUT! I took photos aplenty of last year’s garden triumphs and tragedies, and I’ll post a few of them here for comparison, although frankly, this year’s garden is way more interesting. Sexier, too.

Anyway, I’ve been following RVAnews‘ “Garden Wars” feature with great interest for the past few weeks, and each time I read it, I find myself fretting over whether our beloved veggie patch is behind “schedule” or otherwise inferior because we didn’t have John Sarvay’s beautiful lavender (our lavender seedlings wilted), or Scott Pharr’s peas and carrots (mainly because we didn’t plant carrots this year, after last year’s were such a disappointment), or Ryan Smartt’s abundance of tiny greens (about a month ago we were up to our ears in arugula and buttercrunch lettuce, but they’ve since bolted and our newly planted greens just seem to wilt in the current heat wave). That, of course, is in addition to thinking, Man, my garden photos would be infinitely better if I had some cute toddlers to put in them…. AHEM, a topic for another post.

Anyway, as I read this week’s installment I was coveting the Sarvays’ green beans and the Smartts’ Big Bertha peppers and the Pharrs’ beer-battered squash flowers (I KNOW!)…and I had a bit of a revelation: You guys! (I said to myself) Our garden is awesome too! And our tomatoes are green just like theirs! And we have tons (and tons and tons) of summer squash! And we have pretty squash blossoms, too! And we actually have bigger cucumbers! And we still have SO MUCH kale!  And mint! And baby eggplant! And beets! It was a triumphant moment, I’m not gonna lie. Definitely worthy of exclamation-mark abuse. I totally felt like a bonafide, successful backyard gardener at that moment.

In affirmation of this victorious feeling, I went out into our darling, bountiful patch of productivity and snapped a few pictures. (More to come in my Flickr.)

Nothing like turning a tiny, dry seed into a monstrous green plant that produces edible fruits to banish feelings of inadequacy. And with that, I’m off to enjoy a lunch of summer squash salad — made with 90% homegrown veg.

Ah, autumn! I dig the way you make me crave oatmeal (with cinnamon and almonds and honey, please), snuggle with my husband more, and how you bring color to my cheeks with your brisk wind, and fill my neighborhood with the smells of wood smoke and old oil furnaces firing up for the season.

But there are parts of summer I’ll miss. The long evenings, for one thing. The way a cold beer is so refreshing after a sweaty bike ride or kickball game. Iced tea, too–OK, basically all cold beverages. And of course the wonderful ability to step out my back door and harvest some fresh vegetables for dinner.

Fall really seems to have set in here in Richmond. (Proof: today I am wearing a sweater AND a scarf, and I even turned our heat on–pretty low, but it counts.) I keep thinking about how various things are the “last of the season” lately…like when Ben and I went canoeing last week, or yesterday when I picked all of our garden’s remaining basil and made a ginormous batch of pesto in order to preserve it.

Not that change isn’t good. It’s actually kind of refreshing to let something cycle out of your life for a little while–makes it seem newer the next time it comes around. This year we’ll be making a real effort to buy and eat mostly produce that’s in season locally, and as much as I’d love a fresh, juicy blueberry (OK, more like a quart of them) right now, I have a feeling that the first one I pop into my mouth after 6+ months without them is going to be an epic experience. And anyway, I have a bowl full of chestnuts to roast.

Saw Whip It last night with two lovely lady friends. ‘Twas delightful (and expectedly campy). Afterward we all agreed that 1) we totally have girl-crushes on Ellen Page, and 2) the film made roller derby seem WAY sexier than did the real-life roller derby team passing out fliers outside the theater. Another case of life not imitating art.

Speaking of life-art imitations, I feel a bit as if I’ve been whip-it-ed (how does one form the past tense of “whip it”? whipped-it?) myself this week. It’s just been a whole slew of happenings and obligations and deadlines and responsibilities, one seeming to crowd in right on top of the last — but not in a wholly bad or overwhelming way. I mean, I like being busy. This week the busy-ness has been compounded by the fact that my hubby’s out of town. (But he’s on his way home right now, yay!)

The highlight reel:

• had a super-fun humpday happy hour with a handful of wonderful women and loads of delicious eats that I had a ball preparing (you MUST make these brownies from Smitten Kitchen, and this white bean-cherry tomato salad from Simply Recipes — both are divine). PLUS, close to half of the ingredients I used came from our garden! Double win!
• experienced my most successful week of Etsy sales yet: six sales since Tuesday! I’m stoked about having such a positive shop relaunch, and brimming with new ideas for things to make and do.
• got to eat all the leftover brownies myself since Ben’s away.
• it’s really starting to feel and even look like fall in Richmond, and the weather this week was decidedly on the cooler side of crisp. Bonus: Our A/C hasn’t run since last Sunday.
• finally, I was going to leave you with a magical video to enjoy, but YouTube seems to be down. Do yourself a favor and search for “fleet foxes tiger mountain peasant song cover” next time you’re YouTube-ing. You won’t be sorry. (Thanks to Tarfia for bringing this wonderful video to my attention.)

Well, this was long overdue! Just relaunched my Etsy shop, with loads (OK, more like a dozen or so) of sweet new one-of-a-kind jewelry creations. I’ll be listing stuff throughout the day, so keep hitting that Refresh button! And, BONUS, every purchase from now until next Tuesday gets FREE SHIPPING.

Ten months later…I’m back! So sorry to have neglected you so long, dear blog! Where have I been, you ask? Let’s just say grad school keeps me busy. (Ohai, understatement, how nice of you to drop in.)

Be that as it may, I’m well into year 2 of grad school now, and determined to better balance my poetic/scholarly interests with my crafty ones. Last week I made a new lightbox and photographed a bunch of newish jewelry, and I’ll be relaunching my Etsy shop this week. This blog is gonna get busy, too. Stay tuned!

So November totally flew by for us. Wow. Just said goodbye to my folks, who came up for Thanksgiving. It was great having them here — and not just because Mom insisted on washing the dishes after every meal (but really, who was I to disallow her that joy?). We introduced them to duckpin bowling, took them to Belle Isle, Ben gave us backlot tour of the Richmond airport, and we joined about 8,000 other people at the opening night of GardenFest of Lights at Lewis Ginter. Oh, and of course there was lots of eating. Dad smoked a turkey, but I handled the rest of the cooking (my first time being Thanksgiving hostess!). I know it was a success because Ben gave his stamp of approval to my gravy (which I’d never made before). I think we have enough leftovers to last us til Christmas.

Speaking of Christmas, holy crap it’s soon! I’m getting ready to pull out our stockings and hang the Advent calendar we made last year. We’ll probably go get a tree next weekend. Figure we might as well make our house as festive as we can, since it looks like we’ll have a Richmond Christmas. I may get to go to Florida next week for a few days but it’s pretty unlikely we’ll make it down there for Christmas itself — it’ll be sad to not be with all of our family, but a private Christmas is fun too. We’re trying to think of a new tradition to start this year…suggestions are welcome.

The semester wraps up next week (I’ve got one last 20-page paper to finish and turn in), which is exciting — then I have about a week (less if I go to FL) to prep for the Richmond Craft Mafia Handmade Holiday craft show. If this blog has any Richmond readers, I better see you there! I’m working on some rad Christmas cards and ornaments, plus my signature recycled silverware jewelry, and maybe even some cozy crocheted accessories. And on that note, I’ve got work to do!

Which means it’s almost Ben’s birthday, then it’s almost Thanksgiving, then it’s almost the end of the semester, our anniversary, and Christmas! This is always an exciting time of year for me. Yay for fall and pretty colors, too.

While I’m here, how’s about a quickie weekend wrapup-type update? Continue reading →

Best thing I’ve seen all week (found near Mechanicsville). Until this, that is:

I’m sure it would be overwhelming for both you and me if I tried to cover all the intricate workings of my life in the past month, so permit me to simply skim some of the highlights (or you can just check out some photos), which will most likely primarily involve weekends, because that is when I do more interesting things. (If you are truly interested in hearing me drone on about Composition Theory, workshop-speak, why I’ll probably never write another sestina, or the challenges of working with English-language-learners or unmotivated freshmen in the Writing Center, buy me a drink or something and I’m sure I’ll have plenty to say about any combination of those things. But this doesn’t seem the place for that.) Continue reading →

I realize this is a paltry showing as my first post in nigh on a month, but I’m ankle-deep in drafting a 15-page paper for Composition Theory (yes, it’s a mind-numbing as it sounds) — of which paper I have thus far written the line “Good college writing is” — so I can’t stay long. I simply had to hop on here and announce the following: Gas in Richmond (specifically, at the FasMart on East Main) is below $3 a gallon! I don’t even need gas right now, but this seems rather monumental in my mind. I honestly did not believe I would ever see gasoline for less than three bucks again in my lifetime. But there it is. Yep. You probably didn’t hear it here first, but I felt the need to make note of it. For my next post perhaps I will break the space-time continuum.