Three beautiful things from my past week:

1. I ran into my friend Katie, from my volleyball team, as I was on my way to the garden. It was great to catch up in person.

2. I got up early on Wednesday (my one meeting-free morning) to head to our local yuppy grocery store/restaurant/bar because they recently launched a weekly apple cider doughnut special. The doughnuts were … terrible … but now I don’t have to get up early on any subsequent Wednesday to rush over there. (To be fair, it does sound like fryer oil temperature and their desperate attempt to keep up with the demand is to blame here, so it’s possible they could rectify the situation in the future. But I don’t need to pay to find that out.)

3. A relapse of warm weather meant I went to the park to read after work while wearing shorts and a tshirt. I mean, sure, eventually I was using my phone’s flashlight to finish the chapter, but I wasn’t cold!

How about you? What’s been beautiful in your world lately?

Three beautiful things from my past week:

1. Rudi has gone out to Salt Lake for the foreseeable future. I miss him, but I think it will be good for both him and his mom. I’m glad that he had the flexibility to be able to go.

2. After hitting four stores over three days in search of bathroom cleaner and finding only empty shelves, I stop at the local mom & pop, where their shelves are full. They also had baking supplies back in the spring, so I must remember to hit them up earlier in my hunt.

3. I had pre-ordered cinnamon buns to pick up at Sunday’s market before we knew Rudi would be gone, which meant I had four to eat over the week, rather than just Sunday and Monday breakfast.

How about you? What’s been beautiful in your world lately?

Three beautiful things from my past week:

1. Soybeans at the midweek farmers market.

2. Neighbors and family friends out in Utah who can stand in as caregivers for us.

3. The Seattle Storm won the WNBA championship this week over the Las Vegas Aces. Since the Storm had three UConn women’s basketball alumnae and the Aces had none, I didn’t have to feel mixed feelings about who won. Plus, the Storm is helmed by Sue Bird, who at 39, is the second-oldest player in either the men’s or women’s NBA.

How about you? What’s been beautiful in your world lately?

Three beautiful things from my past week:

1. Rudi and I have seen these guys playing in the park by the garden once before. They seem to have a weekly pool noodle football game. As best as we can tell, it’s a variation on flag football, but with less touching, presumably for sake of COVID-19. Either way, it amuses me greatly to see these guys running around waving their pool noodles in the air.

2. At my request, Rudi picked up Halloween-hued fairy lights from Target. We’ve only strung one of the three strands so far, but the orange, green, and purple lights make the early darkness more bearable.

3. Sarah and I refused to let the pandemic keep us from our annual fall tradition of picking apples and buying cider doughnuts.

How about you? What’s been beautiful in your world lately?

Three beautiful things from our past week:

1. We spent the afternoon on Assateague Island, home to one of the wild pony herds in the U.S. We went camping at Assateague/Chincoteague about five years ago and I hadn’t seen any ponies, although Rudi had encountered them while out on his bike. So I was delighted that several of the ponies were out next the roadside as soon as we came down on their side of the bridge.

2. The day was overcast and a little cool and drizzly, with the water warmer than the air. The yellow flags were out indicating dangerous riptides, so I just stuck to wading. But the beach is the beach is the beach.

3. Somewhere along the line, Rudi and I have managed to spend 25 years together. He makes me tea every morning, sometimes even in the pot that he hates. He comes and kills/removes bugs when I ask him to (or screech), even if he’d been asleep at the time of the encounter. He gamely listens to hours of video when I get tired of having ear buds in and can probably give you word-for-word recitations of some of my patient testimonials at this point. He’s been party to the best and witness to the worst of my life for two and a half decades, and I am a lucky and better woman for it. Happy anniversary, Rudi!

How about you? What’s been beautiful in your world lately?

Three beautiful things from my past week:

1. I recently heard about a yuppie doughnut shop (this is shop where the doughnuts are fancy and cost the better part of a $5 bill apiece as opposed to the blue-collar doughnut shops I grew up with) in the Virginia suburbs, so Rudi and I headed over there last Sunday. A bonus to sampling them in September is that their fall menu included several cider doughnut variations. I’m pleased to report that their cider cake doughnut is the best in the MidAtlantic that I’ve had outside of a farm (and that their other doughnuts were equally tasty). Rudi and I have declared them our favorite of the local yuppie doughnut shops.

2. Several dvd holds came in for me at the library this week. Onward is the latest Pixar film, and it is the utterly charming (and a little weepy) story about two teen brothers who inherit their father’s magical staff and the quest they embark upon (using the older’s extensive roleplaying experience) to bring him back to life for a single day.

3. Karen and I got a chance to catch up earlier in the week for the first time in a couple months. It was really great to hear her voice.

How about you? What’s been beautiful in your world lately?