Saturday, October 18, 2025

The Sunday Salon: A Week of Family

 



I am very glad that you joined us here at the 
Sunday SalonWelcome! 

What is the Sunday Salon? 

The Sunday Salon is a place to link up and share what we have been doing during the week. It's also a great opportunity to visit other blogs and join in the conversations going on there. 





I've been visiting family in East Texas most of the week. I came home Thursday, and on Friday I visited more family who were camping at Galveston Island State Park. Saturday is our family reunion where I will...yes, you guessed it, visit with yet more family.






What I Read Last Week:

Little House in the Big Woods by Laura Ingalls Wilder




What I'm Reading Now:

Seraphina by Rachel Hartman (Fantasy)

Butterflies of Houston & Southeast Texas by John & Gloria Tveten





What I Posted Last Week Here at Readerbuzz:







The Classics Club has issued the announcement of the Classics Club’s 42st CC Spin.

What is the spin?

It’s easy. At your blog, before next Sunday, October 19th, create a post that lists twenty books of your choice that remain “to be read” on your Classics Club list.

This is your Spin List.

You have to read one of these twenty books by the end of the spin period.

On Sunday, October 19th, The Classics Club will post a number from 1 through 20. The challenge is to read whatever book falls under that number on your Spin List by Sunday, December 21st

Let's see who can make it the whole way and finish their spin book!

I have an almost brand-new Classics Club list. Let's see where the needle stops.

So here is my list.

1. Coronado's Children: Tales of Lost Mines and Buried Treasure by J. Frank Dobie

2. Far from the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy

3. The Glass Bead Game by Hermann Hesse

4. The Haunted Bookshop by Christopher Morley

5. Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes by Robert Louis Stevenson

6. The Weary Blues by Langston Hughes

7. Afoot in England by W. H. Hudson

8. Brendon Chase by B. B.

9. Bevis: The Story of a Boy by Richard Jefferies

10. In the Mountains by Elizabeth von Arnim

11. Out of the Silent Planet by C. S. Lewis

12. Warrior Scarlett by Rosemary Sutcliff

13. The Song of the Lark by Willa Cather

14. One Man's Meat by E. B. White

15. The Loved One by Evelyn Waugh

16. Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis

17.  The Adventures of Maya the Bee by Waldemar Bonsels

18. Miss Carter and the Ilfrit by Susan Alice Kirby

19. A Lost Lady by Willa Cather

20. Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino 


Have you read any of these?

Do you recommend any of these?






I began to list 3 Good Things every day during the pandemic. Now I've established a regular routine of writing down my 3 Good Things. Here are 3 Good Things from last week:


Good Thing #1:

A double rainbow
over our town's Rec Center.



Good Thing #2:

I made it to level 20 in Spanish
on Duolingo.



Good Thing #3:

Three of my favorite photos so far
from the 2025 Texas Pollinator Bioblitz.



Weekend linkup spots are listed below. Click on the picture to visit the site.

        

I hope you will join the linkup for Sunday Salon below.


Tuesday, October 14, 2025

The Best Things I've Ever Baked






I am a baker.

It's in my blood.

Both my grandmas were bakers.


I love to bake.






I am hoping that my g-kids will carry on with the baking tradition.



Here are my favorite blog posts about the best things I've ever baked...





















The Last Year I Decorated Christmas Cookies With My Mom


Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together. Each Tuesday That Artsy Reader Girl assigns a topic and then post her top ten list that fits that topic. You’re more than welcome to join her and create your own top ten (or 2, 5, 20, etc.) list as well. Feel free to put a unique spin on the topic to make it work for you! Please link back to That Artsy Reader Girl in your own post so that others know where to find more information.     

Saturday, October 11, 2025

The Sunday Salon: I am Officially Happy

 





Welcome! I am very glad that you met up with us here at the 
Sunday Salon

What is the Sunday Salon? 

The Sunday Salon is a place to link up and share what we have been doing during the week. It's also a great opportunity to visit other blogs and join in the conversations going on there. 







It was a busy October week for me. It was Banned Book Week, and lots of activities were held to remind people of the perils of banning books. Last weekend was busy with a tea on one day, and a trip to the Alley Theater in Houston to see The Da Vinci Code. Monday was my writing class. On Tuesday I had my last session of my Happiness Habits class. Our naturalist group's Fall Field Day was held at the Gulf Coast Bird Observatory on Wednesday. On Thursday, I enjoyed getting together for breakfast with one of my book groups to discuss Ron Rash's book, The Caretaker, and then I went to lunch later the same day to celebrate a friend's birthday. I began to participate in the citizen science project, the Texas Pollinator Bioblitz, on Friday, and I will post pictures of pollinators on iNaturalist until the event concludes on October 26. 

And now I'm headed up to East Texas where I often have spotty Internet, so bear with me while I attempt to visit your blogs away from home this next week.







What I Read Last Week:

How to Train Your Dragon by Cressida Cowell (Kids' Fantasy)

The 1619 Project: Born on the Water by Nikole Hannah-Jones and Renee Watson 
(Picture Book; Banned Books Week)




What I'm Reading Now:

Seraphina by Rachel Hartman (YA Fantasy)

Butterflies of Houston & Southeast Texas by John & Gloria Tveten (Nonfiction)






Banned Book Week challenges censorship and celebrates free expression here in the US. This year Banned Book Week is October 5-11. 

Here are the thoughts of naturalist/scientist/author Robin Wall Kimmerer about banned books:








What I Posted Last Week Here at Readerbuzz:







I began to list 3 Good Things every day during the pandemic. Now I've established a regular routine of writing down my 3 Good Things. Here are 3 Good Things from last week:


Good Thing #1:

I went with my friend 
early in the week
to a fun tea party at her church
and reconnected with lots of my old friends.





Good Thing #2:

This week I learned that 
I won this monocular telescope
last weekend.




Good Thing #3:

I finished my Happiness Habits class
sponsored by the nonprofit, Action for Happiness.
I am officially happy.




Weekend linkup spots are listed below. Click on the picture to visit the site.

        

I hope you will join the linkup for Sunday Salon below.