Something for the Weekend ~ Summer Candles, Summer Reading

Good morning! It is absolutely pouring here today.

 With flooding.

"Raining cats and dogs"! My meet up with L for health food store and flea and tea are, we think, canceled. My Jeep is sitting in floodwater up to the wheel rims.. Oh well I need to vacuum anyway I suppose.

This will blow through and it'll be hot and sunny by morning. So---I have summer stuff to share: You know I love scented candles year round. I actually use more in the summer because the open doors and windows waft the scents away. This year I'm somewhat making do, couldn't go out to choose in person.

Above are White Tea and Sage [I thought this was Sea Salt and Sage! But the tea has a nice gengle aroma too]; and Trader Joe's Peony tin candle in a recycled lemon design holder.

This was a birthday gift. Big multi wicker in Sea Salt for dining room table.

I love how the colander becomes a lantern with dotty holes when lit.

This is on deck for August, ordered online. Weird but I love it, very authentic and evocative of summer gardening. ''Tomato Leaf/ Vine.'' The big jar now holds sea pottery shards, I found the small tin online. 1801 Candle Company. here

And this is my last of my stock of the beautiful and exotic "Havana " scent candles, BB&BW. It's perfume-y and rich, maybe amber? I only light it when I have [the now very rare] guests or if the house really needs a scent boost.

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Summer reading.

I treated myself to a printed  on paper copy of Country Living this week at the grocery store. It's a very old favorite, now just a shadow of the dynamic Americana it once purveyed.

My mother loved magazines! Vogue was her fave, and The New Yorker, but we also got [besides every fashion mag imaginable, including foreign editions], every home decor magazine. I didn't care much about the fashion reports ut I loved the home styling mags.
Country Living inspired my  love of quilts and flea marketing, antiques, and country cooking, and my country  cottage style. This issue is fun, not Nashville-y as the last time I bought it. I'm not a country music fan, mullets and pick ups and she left me and my beer soaked brain by the lonesome road? No.. This issue featured summer camp style--hahaha. Not lakehouse or Adirondack, but like kids' sleepaway camp. Huh. Surely memories of Camp Trippewah or even Cape Cod Sailing Camp cannot actually be a home decorating style? Not gonna happen in my house.

Then I've had this 99 cent thrift shop find out to enjoy with my afternoon ice tea or rose'. You may recall I love books that talk about the seasons, the circle of the year. And that is what this frivolous fluffy dollar book is all about. I enjoy leafing through each season.

For Summer It has Kel's pasta with tomatoes and Brie recipe!

Oh I do hope to get to the reopened farmers Market for some fresh picked tiny tomates and fresh basil and garlic. I have a Brie wedge stashed and waiting.

And watermelon sugar cookies. Someday? For mythical grandkids' visits? I have a big collection of sea life cooky cutters, whales and codfish, beach pails and sea stars. I used to make the cookies for BBQs, with icecream and berries. Any circle cut in half will work for the melons.

Oh and look, another farmers market  idea, a lovely berry pie!

Root ber floats!

useful ideas for thrifting a perfect sundress.

Remember my red sundress find last winter? Who knew we'd never again need a dress like that. [so this book, written 2012 is a smidge nostalgie. But fun.]



Cupcakes and Cashmere  on Amazon

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In the fiction category: this classic of summer reading, the new romance novel by Elin Hliderbrand, 28 Summers  here.  New so SPOILERS WARNING.



This farfetched slightly sleazy romance is based on the movie Same Time Next Year, which I pictured being Jack Nicholson and Dianne Keaton but no, it was Alan Alda [who made a great Army doc but a creepy lover/ leading man, and Ellyn Burstyn, again poor casting.] Anyway I ordered that free on Amazon Prime, haven't watched it yet. Same Time Next Year  [Amazon streaming]  Same Time Next Year [imdb info]

For the Hilderbrand book, I was most impressed by each chapter beginning with  the header noting events of importance that year. Mostly caught my notice because I'd say 75% or more were things I never heard of, lol. And I was there! This motif, that I thought was so very unusual and creative of EH was however, I then discovered,  actually taken from the film, which apparently shows newsreels of each decade.

The descriptions and setting are lovely, but I am not charmed by infidelity, heavy drinking, lovers with wives, mean girls, mean guys and  disloyal friends. And the lifestyle in general is very fairy tale. I spent many a summer on Cape Cod, adjacent to Nantucket and so far as I ever knew, this was not the norm. [Though I suppose ''the norm'' makes for dull reading?]. I'd give it 3 stars, four if you love books about summer loves and good times. The female protagonist is appealing, the hero not, not at all.

Other book mentions: The new Ruth Galloway, by Elly Griffiths, more cheating spouses and unrequited love, not much archaeology. Good news is Ruth seems headed back to the Saltmarkh in Norfolk, creepy lover will be gone. The Lantern Men

New Baldacci: Memory Man- unreadable. Walk the Wire  New Daniel Silva: I didn't even buy, all about the Vatican and popes?! Gabriel must be pushing 80? The Order 
                         
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My deck garden, struggling along.

I suppose the pots will love this rain! Hope they perk up a little.

Oh dear I just petted Mo and he is still very wet. Poor little man.

He has gone back to bed with his dolly and three throws.

If the rain keeps up I'll make chocolate chip banana bread.   Recipe here
If not I'll marinate the prematurely defrosted rib eye steaks and make shish kebabs tomorrow.

Have a good weekend..See you next week!

love

lizzy

gone to the beach.......

beach photos, Same Day Last Year.

"Always swim between the green flags, where the lifeguards are stationed!"