Friday Favorites - Valentine's Day

 

Just over a week to go and I received a Williams Sonoma reward in the mail, so I thought I'd take a look at all things heart on their website.  Here are my favorites.

Emile Henry Ruffle Heart Dish

It comes in pink as well and makes a really unique charcuterie dish

Heart Tableware - I love the long tray with the arrow picks

Le Creuset Shallow Heart Oven - perfect for a one pot dish that you can take straight to the table

Cast iron heart-shaped muffin tin

Marble heart cheese board

For a cheese board

Or a candy board

I really liked the heart-shaped skillet in this I Heart You crate but wouldn't really have a use for the other items so I popped over to the Lodge website and found this one below...

They also had this one...

...which was unfortunately already sold out

But there was this cute Hershey's Kiss-shaped skillet which would be perfect for a Valentine pizookie

Around the 'Net

On the eve of the Winter Olympics, the Yarnbombers of Menston in West Yorkshire have come up with this gem of a postbox topper, so creative.

Go Team GB!

Wednesday Hodgepodge - Volume 639

 Welcome to the Wednesday Hodgepodge!  Here are this week's questions, which you should answer on your own blog and then pop over to Joyce's blog (click on the graphic for the link) Wednesday to add your link to the party.

 

1. The Winter Olympics kick off on Friday, February 6th...on a scale of 1-10 how excited are you? (1= eh and 10=watching every event all day every day). What's your favorite Winter Olympic sporting event? 

I'd say I'm about a 7.  I love the Winter Olympics and from the snaps I've seen, the parade of nations in their winter garb is going to be amazing - watch out for Mongolia!  It's hard to pick a favorite but I'll say curling tops the list.

2. In other sporting news, the Superbowl (American football's championship game) will be played on Sunday, February 8th. So tell us...what's your superpower?

We are a family divided this Superbowl.

We're faux fans of the Seahawks (I say faux because we're not really interested in football, but we support our local team) and Sophia is a die-hard Patriots fan.

My superpower is the ability to spot something that is not where it belongs.  I subscribe to "A place for everything and everything in its place" and I can instantly spot something out of place.

3. Are you a romantic? 

Yes, I love all things romance - flowers, chocolates, date nights, and love stories in film or books.

4. Blue cheese-yay or nay? How about feta? If you said yes to one or both, what's a dish you like that calls for one of these? 

Yes, blue cheese dressing for buffalo wings and feta on a Greek salad.

5. What's more important - doing what you love or loving what you do? 

I think it's loving what you do.  If you're unhappy at work or at home or with a certain group of people, make a change.  Life is too short to be unhappy.

6. Insert your own random thought here.

Do you have Kanopy at your local library?  Kanopy is a streaming platform offering thousands of films, documentaries, and educational videos for free through public and academic libraries. Explore classic cinema, indie films, and award-winning content with your library card.  There's been a lot of blog posts lately about audiobook services at public libraries, but our library just launched Kanopy.  With the cost of streaming services going up and up, it's nice to have this free option for viewing.

London 2025 - The Haul

 

Apart from lots of reuseable shopping bags (they are so pretty), and souvenir guidebooks from each of the major historic sites, my main haul was ornaments.  I have so many British-themed ornaments, it was time to give them their own tree (thank you, Tanya, for the inspiration).  There were so many beautiful ornaments in the stores and at the historic sites and by far the nicest ones were the felted and beaded ornaments that were quite flat and easy to pack.  I passed on the ball and glass ornaments for fear that they wouldn't make it home although I couldn't resist the shopping bags from Fortnum & Mason, Selfridge's, and Harrods.  I wrapped them very carefully to make sure they made it home.  The Costa Coffee tart is less fragile.

Here's a peak at all things felted and beaded and this holiday season, I'll share the tree.  I'm still working on some souvenir tea tins that I picked up at World Market.  I am going to have Vic drill a hole in the top of each tin lid so I can hang them.

The vendor tinkertailor.com is the manufacturer for many of the felted ornaments and I wish that they sold retail on their website and not just wholesale.  They do have a Public Enquiry section on the site so perhaps I'll give it a try to see if I can get one of the festive crackers that I missed at the Buckingham Palace Shop.

Life Last Week (January 26-February 1, 2026)

  

The weather for the week ahead:::

Slightly warmer this week.

On my reading pile:::

 

The Distant Daughter, The Secrets of Trelenna House by Lorna Cook - slow going - I really should have made making a dedicated reading time each day one of my New Year's goals.

On my TV:::

Still working our way through this.  We're up to Season 8.

I'm also working my way through Outlander again in preparation for the final season coming March 6.

Also, episode four of The Pitt.

And coming at the end of this week - the Winter Olympics!

Checked off the list:::

• Enjoyed the Honor Roll senior luncheon on Monday - sat at a table with some folks I'd not met before.
• Made Olive-Nut Spread for the small group meeting on Wednesday which ended up being cancelled so guess what we've been snacking on since then?
• Picked up a Confetti Nothing Bundt Cake for Sophia's birthday, put the final touches on her birthday package, and mailed it off.  It should have been there on Saturday, the day before her birthday but the postal service failed me, and it won't be there until today.  I found this idea online:

Because I was mailing the package, I used an empty Starbucks cup (the short size fit perfectly in the cup holder tray) and popped a Starbucks Happy Birthday gift card inside, I substituted a Jellycat Amuseables rose bouquet for the fresh flowers, and instead of the cosmetics in the center, I added an Amazon Happy Birthday gift card.  Sophia has a very long Amazon wish list, so I thought I'd let her do her own shopping.

So cute!

• Appliance repairman came on Thursday and will have to order parts to get the stove working - the digital display unit is out.
• Participated in another Zoom call with the Outlander tour folks which was so enjoyable.  Great to hear from others who have been on the tour and meet folks like us who are looking forward to a future trip.
• We noticed an irregular mark on the ceiling of the office, so Vic spent most of Sunday in the attic to trace the problem (it's a small leak) and then on the roof to figure out a repair.  The area home show is coming up at the end of April, looks like we may be roof-shopping!
• Happy Birthday to this little Munchkin, these were taken on her first Christmas.

Crafts roundup:::

December Daily is done!  On to the 2025 Christmas Card album.

And in other news:::

The camera roll was very slim this week.  Just a few to share.

Happy Anniversary to us - a goodie basket to take with us on our weekend getaway coming soon.

This popped up on my Facebook - our trip to Scotland next year won't take us to the Shetland Islands but they are a stop on a Viking Ocean Cruise that I have bookmarked for a future cruise.  I'd heard about The Shetland Bus on an episode of Shetland, so I'll check Amazon for a copy.

Farewell, January and Welcome, February from my favorite site on Facebook, Slow Simple Seasonal.

Friday Favorites - Care Packages

 

Several readers have posted recently about care packages, usually sent to college-age kiddos as a little "I love you and I'm thinking about you" gift.  There is nothing nicer than opening a package to reveal all sorts of (often themed) goodies.  Here are some of the ones I sent to Vic when he was on deployment.

This was the January Bon Voyage box - the one I gave to Vic as he was leaving - it had some cold/flu type items and mini cans of Sprite as well as his favorite snacks

February's box for Valentine's Day - I used Large Flat Rate Boxes from the post office and 12x12 scrapbook paper to decorate the bottom and sides as well as letters cut with my Cricut on sticker paper

March's St. Patrick's Day box - this was the DVD age, and they could watch the movies on the ship

The empty Easter box

April's Easter box - the plastic eggs held Hershey's Kisses

The Game of Thrones box - Season 6 had just been released - this was a box for Vic's office, full of treats to share with his crew

A Just Because box

Filled with as many blue things as I could find

Father's Day box - I have no idea why I sent him a Tread Depth Gauge when he was out to sea!

July 4th box

The spicy box - whatever chips, jerky, and other spicy things would fit

The coffee box, another box for his office - full of instant coffee packages and assorted coffee time snacks

Second to the last box - Mahal Kita is I Love You in Tagalog - decorated to look like the flag of the Philippines

The box was full of things I picked up at the Asian store

The final box - inside the envelope was a heart-shaped puzzle card that I had broken apart

This is a box I sent to Sophia for her 21st birthday - she was blogging at the time, and this was a box of beauty items for her to blog about - I suppose these days it would be to put up Instagram stories!

I sent boxes regularly when Sophia was in college - they had monthly themes (easy to do when there is a holiday in the month) and always included things for her to use to decorate her dorm room door as well as holiday treats.  Unfortunately, I don't seem to have any photos!

If you're thinking about making a care package, I hope this post has given you a little inspiration.