Home and Shopping

"I took a blogcation for a month, enjoying a little road trip, a family visit, and just allowing myself some off time, doing pretty much not much. Isn't that what summer is for? I was saddened when I learned about Lake Erie's history. I wish I could have seen it in its original state; if it is so impressive now, how incredible it must have once been. We went picking at an organic farm and came home with almost eight pounds of berries. What will we do with so many, you might wonder." more »

Julia Sneden writes: The fad for matched napkin rings has grown and nowadays even the catalogues feature such sets. They weren't meant for decor, and they certainly weren't meant to match. They were simply a means of identification that allowed us to reuse our napkins, usually for a week at a time. In the days before miracle laundry machines, before detergents with or without bleach, (never mind cold-water soaps or power boosters) people didn't toss napkins into the laundry after every meal. more »

Joan L. Cannon reviews: After too many novels whose focus seems (if the reader is honest with herself) to be on the sexual antics and sensations involved with falling and being in love, this is a welcome rendition that allows for how real people after the flush of youth must behave. It seems likely that it would take a writer of Quinlen’s reputation to be allowed to have her two main characters act as they do. You will believe it all, and really root for a happy ending. more »

Roberta McReynolds continues her cake decorating saga: Holding the frosting nail in my left hand, I examined the blob with a critical eye, noting it tended to resemble a hunchback slug more than the emergence of a rose bud. I brushed it off into the bowl and tried again. This time I made a giant amoeba, with all the charm one could expect from a protozoon sagging upon a frosting nail.be impossible for one of my classmates; her homework for last week was flawless. The… more »