A gentle posting pause

 Posting pause 

Back on Friday

Spring on day 2

It is almost, uh, it is 10 AM EDT as I type. Up once earlier, I looked out the window to see yesterday’s snow is not melting yet. No worry  because the ambient temperature might go up to 40° Fahrenheit this afternoon.

Half of Spring is ready while the other half catches up. Like me. Catching up. On days like this I want food that is easy to heat up because I don’t want my attention taken away from whatever task I’m doing. 

Cooking is a whole other task block. Easy food when busy is good planning. Lentil soup with chunky vegetables and a tall glass of ice tea is a good busy day menu. 

Making soup requires prepping the veggies. Without realizing it, I’ve been brainwashed to feel unpeeled carrots are bad. They are not. Peeling carrots is not required, especially when they are cut up and boiled in soup. 

My busy day will start with making lentil soup. 

Being busy requires prep work as well.

Day 79 of Week 12 March 2026

You know those days after a brief illness, when you suddenly realize you feel better? Well, that’s what this Spring feels to me. And now I’m thinking about what I’m going to do with that energy. 

Last fall I started a travel blog (after being on my mind since my early blogging days). March is the month I planned to publish the first excursion post. 

There are eleven days left this month to get that done. I have notes on a few places, all fairly local, as well as ideas to focus on. 

The weather forecast for the next few days is grim calling for some rain and snow.

Have a Sunshine On the Mind Weekend

Read about paper making 

Play a board game with friends

Browse UV umbrellas online

Mix a big green salad

Sing from a song book

Visit a bookstore

Bake a pumpkin bread

Won’t be long now

Welcome to Spring!

Spring is the newness season, weeks for flowers to emerge from the ground, shrub's to show their lovely blooms, and lawns to yawn heavy into the warmer air. The first sound of a mower is as delightful as hearing a robin sing.

Moving furniture to the better air conditioner cool air flow arrangement is always a pleasant task. This year’s downsizing makes it even better. I look around to see what is there that I can change, renew, redesign. Ideas flow well on a Spring atmosphere. 

 I don’t mind selling the coffee table I love so much. I face the fact it is too big for the space. Missing the iron hair pin legs is the problem. I look online to find a set to make a smaller coffee table. I am thrilled they are sold in stores, Walmart even!

Do you move furniture around in the Spring? Redecorate? Redesign your space?

Here’s the thing about posting

Counting the days in 2026

There may be some readers that briefly saw a post here for Things About Me. It disappeared after being posted twice a few days ago. Fun to type, but not fun to post as written. So, here’s the thing about posting personal information. 

How much of who we are that we share online is a choice we accept to a point. There is a line that separates. Only post as much as you feel comfortable with posting. 

Fun things about me:

I have no color that’s an absolute favorite. I lean towards ecru, teal and rust hues. 

Heineken is my favorite beer. I went from one a summer to a six pack to celebrate my younger years. It takes into fall to finish the 6 pack. I know how to drink, but I’m not a big drinker. 

When the wind pushes the screen door over to the other side, I laugh. When inanimate objects move on their own, it is a good wow look at that moment. If, however, the TV clicker floats across the room to me, then wow would not be my first reaction. 

I am a quiet person. An entire day can go by without my saying a word. 

Throughout my life from kid to adult, painting sunrises and sunsets has been a constant. I have no idea why. 

Pine trees are my spirit plant. Ravens and crows are my spirit animals. Cats are my spiritual consultants when they feel like it.

I don’t own a cat. 

Unbelievable Luck of the Irish

The New York Times

Wordle on Saint Patrick’s Day 2026

This blogger, me of heavy

☘️ Irish Ancestry ☘️

Solved Wordle on 2

two, second, 2nd try! 

My first on 2 for 2026!

😳

It feels unreal!

😳😳😳😳😳😳😳😳😳

Sweeping away old ideas, projects & such

Any week now
Pansies 2025

 Spring. It is a good season to sweep out cobwebs. Having old ideas and such drag on from year to year may not move any dials but, they can clutter pathways. 

I decided to take whale watching off my things to do. If a boat I might be on isn’t bigger than the ocean creature, then there’s no reason for me to go looking for it. 

All I have said, I post once again, in a mood swing moment about if I win the lottery top jackpot, are void. That swimming pool will not happen. 

Moving to Europe, buying forest land in Scotland, a cottage in Ireland, are off my dream list.  My income will never reach high enough to finance my dreams. 

A zip line ride is a folly I will no longer consider. I would, however, ride (again) the Coney Island roller coaster. The salsa factory and clothing line will continue in my dreams  for someday. The jewelry design company will not. Learning to fly a helicopter will continue. 

New dreams are in order. 

Ripples, Color, Candy & Creativity

What was I thing still life
digital photo

 What’s next to ripple to shore in the Spring pond of possibilities? 

I toss in pebbles of creativity, pastel colors, and, Easter candy. 

You know how your eyes do a  formula 1 connect to something your brain locks on? The Mine beam!? Hungry look beam! I keep taking mental snap shots of the store Easter candy displays. I’m suspicious of why that is happening because I’m keen in decreasing my sugar intake.  It is reason to increase my candy resistance. 

Pastel colors sing Spring to me. Every year I browse online for pastel sandals and flats. Rarely do I find a pair in any shade at a good price. I did find a pastel blue pair, but my size is out of stock. I will continue to look anyway. 

Creativity. Engaging in the use of hands to make things is, I believe, important to brain health. Today though, overcast and dreary, holding a book will have to do. 

Seedling Second Leaves

Curly Parsley
Adorable 2nd leaves!

 

Sorting Old Folders

After a major clear out project, I was left with two things, not enough out the door, and, areas (of stuff). Downsizing the areas will put more things out the door. 

This is one of those posts that between scheduling and posting, lost its value. Thus, a deep delete with a sort of start over. 

Sorting the folders I removed from the file cabinet I gave away, old memories fly out. Most of them I remember. A few I had to think about. One project has been in my notes for well over 20 years. There are pages of notes. 

Guess for a second what it is.

Ready? 

Holiday ornaments! I have been wanting and planning to make holiday ornaments and cards for years.  

One of the impediments is the paperwork, registrations, taxes, and such. For a very small craft business, there is no easy way to set up. 

Vermont has a business portal to help folks. Right off I meet a major problem. In order to receive a start your business check list, the type isn’t found on their list. Soybean Farm is not my goal. The point is, there is a lot of reading to do of material made more complicated than it should be. 

Want to make a difference? Research how your state is set up for a small at home business. If you discover a need for improvement, then contact your local legislators. 

~~~~~~~~~~~

From the old folders

Worcester Mountains Vermont
5x7 inch watercolor

Plant on table, corner over from my work desk
with a view of Lake Champlain (right window)
Skiff Hall, Champlain College circa 1993
(finished Liberal Arts Associates degree 1995)

Backgrounds for greeting cards

Day 72 of Week 11 March 2026

Almost Spring

What’s been going on out there in blog land? Being away this week under a stressful situation, returning feels like arriving home from a vacation I don’t remember taking. 

Our emotion reserves have a personality that fits the cuteness of a dog with its face out the vehicle window joyfully breathing in all the glory life has to offer. Ah, if we could be chill as a happy pet. 

My week has been interesting in that my approach to the stress was different. One tool is to pick one task and get it done. There are no dishes in my sink, (of note). A small file cabinet will have a new home. I’m enjoying going through the folders stored in it (that I see maybe once a year). I repaired most of the vintage lap quilt cover. (a fabric section from the 1940s added to a 1990s section.) I pushed through an anxiety surge to go out to lunch with a friend. 

How has your week been?

Winter Photograph: Remnants of Last Year

Dry Petunias

Slow on the go for this week

Update 11 March 2026:

Repair is not only done, the best approach to fixing it is known! 🥳 100%

Update 10 March 2026:

The plumbing problem returns! Clogged drain that was cleared yesterday, clogs again when washer drains. I have no words

Prayers

There’s nothing like a situation where the fix is known, and nothing is done, to ruin your day. You are told what the problem is and what to do. That is information clear and precise. To make it more stressful, you didn’t insist to the people responsible for the repair, make it happen. Hoping it is going to stop, get back yo normal, is understandable.

So, on day 4, I’m taking a much needed rest from the stress by doing much of nothing all day and into the week.* 

The leftover stew is good. 

Need to see flowers

* Well, not so fast. On the ball with fixing the problem, maintenance guy had people here early morning. The repair is done. It was a lot bigger than I thought. 

I be happy! 🥳😂😁👍😎

Back slowly to getting things done, in a relaxed way. 

When the carrots are calling

Loving the wind, a favorite Earth action, it amazed me when taking geology courses at UVM, to learn how very important wind is to Earth’s systems. It is a fascination of mine to think the wind carries dust over the Atlantic ocean from the Sahara desert to land America, (mostly to the south). (Link below)

How we anchor ourselves in relation to the world around us and our place within our community, our family, our relationships has always been fascinating to me. Methinks, Saint-Exupery’s book, The Little Prince, sitting on the globe of Earth is where that intrigue began. Since I posted online about the book in early 2000, I’ve read online others also have that fascination from the book’s illustration. 

Dust carries. We carry. From our shared experiences, efforts, ideas, inspiration there are connection systems between us similar to how Earth operates. AI has no soul to develop connections like we do. 

Right now, I should be chopping vegetables for stew. Instead, I’m finishing up this blog post. Like the rain, I need to stop. There’s carrots calling me.  

Link to Sahara Desert dust info:

https://www.trackthetropics.com/saharan-air-layer-sal-tracking/

Day 66 of Week 10 March 2026

The sound of wind when it rains is not the same when it snows. Wind and rain make more noise. The vent cover outlet rattling 

is louder, more determined. 

Snow is softer than rain. Strange to think about the rain, snow and wind sound relationships. What else in nature is there that we don’t think about?

Have a Thinking Weekend

Have baked apples with vanilla 

or maple walnut ice cream

Read about Earth’s water cycle

Watch a funny movie

Browse raincoats online

Draw a fancy umbrella

Dance when you wash your hands

Finding the good answer

How much of what we are accustomed to doing is being transformed into something else?

My journey with the search assist was no way I will use AI to I like using it all the time. It scans the Internet in seconds to create a comprehensive answer. I use to do that in several minutes to several hours of research. 

Trivia: Search assist has no answer for: comprehensive answer.  

So what’s next? 

There’s beautiful sunlight to read by.

However, I need to clean my fridge. I will feel better when it is finished.  But, there is sunshine to read by. I’ll clean the fridge.* I know there’s banana bread in the freezer. No AI needed for that answer. 

A March Sun Rising

* Started fridge task. Was distracted by must take care if it plumbing issue. Had to deal with that. End up on the Internet while waiting

Now it is dinner time. 🥴

March 2026 Lunar Eclipse

Awake already, I braved the cold to take photographs of the Lunar Eclipse this morning. I had to go inside to warm up. I wore my quilted vest over my puffer coat when I went back outside. 

Trees were in the way. As the Earth turns, the Moon went into the horizon at the fullest part of the eclipse. Darkened, the Moon might have been partly visible, but not to me or my camera. It is fortunate the eclipse happened during the full Blood Moon. 

Here are two of the best pictures I captured. The first is just before the full eclipse and very close to the horizon. The 2nd photo is the eclipse just about half way. The images are taken using my iPhone 17 Pro to my camera screen. The last image is taken using my iphone.

EDT Vermont USA

Lunar Eclipse
Taken with iPhone 17 Pro
The white shape upper right, is not in any of the other
pictures taken at that time or any other time. 
Note, the location is over an old cemetery
established in 1790.

Reflection Monday March 2026

When the sun shines, life feels brighter. 

Sunshine is packed with happy memories. 

If we don’t feel happy, our brains know that we have been and will again. 

Sunshiny view from across the room

Welcome to March 2026

 Hello March 2026!

Lion Resting, 1650-1652
Rembrandt van Rijn

Signs of Spring

Starting seeds indoors to use or plant in the ground lightens the cold weight of winter. 

Triple Curly Parsley

Buttercrunch Lettuce