Today's Joy: Stacking Herbs.

Happy Saturday, Reader! Still had a few new herbs kicking around this morning when I got up, so decided to find them a fab new home (preferably one we can move indoors when the weather gets cold). Aunt had these unique stackable herb pots tucked under her potting bench. Evidently, when set up you water the top layer and the moisture trickles down through the lower layers and viola! Everybody gets a drink.

Anyway, I raided the compost pile for some nutrient-rich soil and got the whole thing potted in about 20 minutes. Now we'll have fresh basil, cilantro, rosemary and three different kinds of mint to add to salads, pasta dishes and fresh marinades. I believe the mint varieties include orange, chocolate and ginger mint. For more info on the stackable herb pots or where to find these and other interesting herb varieties, drop me a line.

Snippet from Aunt's Dictionary

Today's Joy: Me vs. The Great Summer Novel.

I'm fast with a book, Reader. That is, I read fast. Really fast. I'm not just talking being the first to finish a book. Or getting thru the Sunday paper in record time. Those are child's play. I'm talking seriously, freakishly mutant-fast!

For example, I finished the largest Harry Potter book (784 pages) in a day and a half (the others only took 12 hours a piece--mostly less). Every Christmas for years I've bought my brother the latest hardcover edition in R.A. Salvatore's Drizzt series (one of his favorites). He opens it Christmas morning and promptly hands it to me with a wry smile. I finish it that afternoon or the next day. He will get around to finishing it a month or two later, then he'll call me up and we talk about it. I've discovered that few things are harder to do than wait weeks or months for your friends & loved ones to finish the same book so you can actually talk about it!

I also retain nearly all of what I read. Whether it's reading contracts before signing or scanning dense, field-specific articles (you never know what might come in handy later), I'm able to read something and almost immediately formulate ideas, process connections and participate in a discussion about the topic. If you want an impromptu debate on a particular subject--I'm your girl. Just give me some relevant material and five or ten minutes to get it down.

Don't know how I got this way. I just assimilate information really well. So, finding the perfect summer book to lounge barefoot on the porch with usually means acquiring several new books or perhaps rereading a series of old favorites. One never seems to be enough.

I expressed this sentiment to Aunt last week and she promptly walked over to the bookcase and plucked a fat, hardcover from the shelf. She handed it to me and said, "You need to read this. It's a vampire novel, but it's not like any vampire novel you've ever read. It's wonderful and so dense that I was the only one in my book club to even finish it."

Well, I'm not big on vampire novels. But Aunt is a veteran English teacher and a consummate reader with excellent taste, so I took her advice and sat down to dive into this 642 page behemoth. What is it, you ask? Well, Reader, I will tell you. It is a most amazing, meticulously researched, gargantuan-scaled, cerebral adventure novel called The Historian, by Elizabeth Kostova.

As of tonight, I'm only halfway through it's engaging, thoroughly well-written pages. And I'm relishing every nuance and each little revelation! It also helps that Aunt has already read it and can discuss it with me as I go--a very refreshing sensation! If you too are looking for a literary challenge that is satisfying throughout, give The Historian a whirl. I'm betting you will also be impressed with this heart-felt & savvy take on the classic Nosferatu.

Today's Joy: Reconnecting with Old Acquaintances.
Been a crazy day, Reader! Worked a hectic day at both jobs. Somewhere in between, I got a phone call from a former coworker informing me about a retirement party scheduled this afternoon for another old friend. I had just enough time between shifts to stop by.

So, I did and surprised all my favorite old work-mates. Haven't seen any of them since I moved to Texas and now that I'm back, it was nice to catch up. Amazing how so many lives have changed this past year--some in disappointing ways, but others in positive ones. I made plans to attend church with one and photograph her next civil war re-enactment for another. In all, was reluctant to leave when the time came, which is always a sign of time well-spent. So glad I took the chance to reconnect.

Who would you like to catch up with Reader? Have you been putting it off for some reason? Too busy? Too much effort to reconnect? Feeling like you aren't in as good a place as you'd like to be right now? Or that your renewal of friendship may not be well-received?

Whatever the reason, if it's on your heart, take the time and reach out to that person (or family). That little nagging sensation in the back of your mind is God nudging you. Something in your reconnection will bring a blessing. It might be in your life, the other person's, or perhaps in a life you wouldn't expect. But your simple act of reaching out will likely have ramifications beyond your expectations.

Look at a day when you are supremely satisfied at the end. It's not a day when you lounge around doing nothing; it's when you've had everything to do, and you've done it. ~Lord Acton

Today's Joy: Putting It All Together.
Am feeling on top of the world, Reader! After 2 & 1/2 weeks of intense on-the-job training, something clicked in my brain today and all of the skills I'm learning suddenly fell into place. I felt like a dynamo whipping out inventory adjustments, credit memos, transfers and receiving every invoice in sight!

Got caught up on everything so the store's in great shape for tomorrow's month-end paperwork and I left the office tidy & well-organized. Love it! I can't believe how fast the time flies while I'm working. Hurray for being challenged all day long! And thank you, Lord, for leading me to this wonderful organization that makes a difference in people's lives. What a blessing!

Quote courtesy of The Quote Garden.

Me, B & Leaky Bucket

Faith is reason grown courageous. ~Sherwood Eddy

Today's Joy: New Beginnings.
I took a step out in faith tonight, Reader. I attended my first women's community group through church. While God has blessed me tenfold since I've been home, I confess I miss the day-to-day closeness of my best girl friends (all of whom live in other states). Now that I'm attending a church I really like, it feels like the perfect time to reach out in search of fab new local female friends to share this faith-journey.

Over the last 14 years, I've been blessed with several lifelong women friends. We've met while living in a treehouse and while studying physics. Two started out as my boss and another as my editor. Over the years, they've been my conscience & spiritual guides, my personal beauty advisers, my cheering squad and (when needed) a gentle reality check. They've been generous beyond measure and once even crawled through mud to get my car un-stuck so I wouldn't get my dress filthy.

K & J

P.S. They can rock any look from purple alligator-print stilettos to pink-lined camo gear.

D at the Fort Worth Botanical Garden

Whatever we go thru in this life, it's my pleasure to remind them I still see the bold, young women underneath the mommy, wife and career roles they've taken on. What a joy to watch them grow and mature into better versions of themselves! I suppose I feel about my girl friends the way some women feel about having children--there's always room for more!

S & her new HHR

Anyway, I had a good time tonight and met some fascinating and honest women. Can't wait to get to know them better. Have that feeling of being right where I'm supposed to be--you know the one I mean--where you can clearly feel God working in your life. Something special is beginning. Can't wait to see how it will unfold.

As your faith is strengthened you will find that there is no longer the need to have a sense of control, that things will flow as they will, and that you will flow with them, to your great delight and benefit. ~Emmanuel

Quotes courtesy of The Quote Garden.

Today's Joy: Passion Flowers Opening.
I am ecstatic, Reader! Came home from work today to see my new purple passion flower in bloom. I fell in love with these wonderously weird tropical plants several years ago, when I first saw photos of them in magazines and on screen savers. But I figured I'd never actually see one in person. Finally got my chance while visiting the Oklahoma City Zoo over Labor Day weekend in 2008. I was smitten!

A few weeks later, I stopped by the Heinz Bros. Greenhouse in St. Charles, IL, where they were having a huge end-of-season sale. For $5 each, I took home my first hibiscus tree (a topiary with a braided stem of both red and pink varieties) and--couldn't believe my eyes when I saw it--a 5 foot tall blue passion flower. Though it was remarkably finicky (shed its leaves almost constantly) from the moment I brought it home, I did enjoy a few months of sporatic, gorgeous flowers before it mysteriously gave up the ghost the following January.



The passion flower is one of the most fascinating plants I've ever seen. I've often wished to have another. This spring, while visiting our favorite high-end garden center, on a lark, I asked if they had any. Turns out they had just one left and it was about to bloom. It was also pretty darn cheap as exotic, tempermental tropicals go (I doubt I will ever find such a deal for $5 again). So we brought it home. I fussed over where to put it so it would get the right amount of sunlight without drying out. I fussed over how to fertilize it and if I watered it too much and whether or not to re-pot it before it blooms.



Then, the minute I go to work, the little blossoms begin to open. They don't stay open very long--a day or perhaps less--but there is nothing like seeing that distinctive, zany flower unfurl on your back porch, offering a breathtaking private show. Amazing! Now I'm busy reading up on everything I can find about the care of these magnificent plants.

Phalaenopsis

Today's Joy: Impromptu Fun & Bargains.

Happy Sunday, Reader. Hope the day finds you recharging a bit in mind, body & spirit. After church this morning, I swung by Mom's on a whim and kidnapped her for an afternoon of nursery-hopping and landscape planning. We visited a few of our favorite garden centers including Platt Hill Nursery in Algonquin, IL and the local Menards & Lowes. There's something that loves a big box hardware store in summer, Reader. I think it has a lot to do with the amazing deals you can find as they try to unload their remaining plant stock.

We certainly walked away from Lowes smiling with bargain hunter's glee. As an Orchid junkie, I always stop and look through the Lowes tropical plant section indoors to see if they have any phalaenopsis in stock. They had a whole cart full at regular price. But low and behold, when I checked out the reduced rack of wilted sale plants, there were several gorgeous orchids sitting on top. I asked a nearby employee if they were indeed on clearance and was told that yes, they were starting to lose their flowers and in a day or two would just be "a stick in a pot". So they were selling them for $1.50 each plant.

Now, Reader, these were obviously healthy $20 plants, several with double flower stalks and one with white blossoms the size of my palm. True, each one had a single blossom in its last stages of bloom. But they all also had plenty of other blossoms as well as buds about to pop and new growth forming. So I snapped up four of them and got to the checkout before the cashier could disagree.

The same employee I originally dealt with walked by and sniggered as we were leaving.

"Not a bad deal for a stick in a pot!" she called.

"You're right!" I said.

With careful feeding, my four new phalaenopsis will continue to bloom for a few more months and then hopefully again, over the winter. We'll have fresh flowers in the dead of January. Not a bad deal for $6.50.