Planet Nice Crafts

Hello Everyone. 2022 has been JAM packed - from one challenge to the next, I have been on my toes! Recently, there has been a welcome lull so I have made it back to Planet Nice Crafts. 😊 Reading has been a steady solace throughout and here are this year's finished books: 1. A Dance with Dragons by George RR Martin - I finished this book in January 2022, and writing this in September, I miss my favorite dysfunctional families. There is the prequel series to satisfy appetites but the books are so much better (and less gory and violent). An almost 20 year effort for me to read it but it was worth it. 2. This is How it Always is by Laurie Frankel - Winter 2022's One Community Read, a fantastic public library program. 3. Under a White Sky, The Nature of the Future by Elizabeth Kolbert - I learned of this book from a Chicago Tribune article. 4. Thrawn Ascendancy Chaos Rising by Timothy Zahn. 5. Land of Love and Drowning by Tiphanie Yanique. 6. Prairie Fires the American Dreams of La...

Hello Everyone. I hope all is as reasonably well as can be expected. Unfortunately, nothing very new here at Planet Nice Crafts, not even with the birds. Sewing is ticking along slowly. I did replenish my supplies at Vogue Fabrics in Evanston in person. It was a nice adventure.   Gardening is moving along, the change of seasons is here. A few tomatoes and peppers remain. The string beans, kale, and the tomatillo are the workhorses and are still producing good harvests. The pumpkins have kicked in but are battling the fungal disease, powdery mildew. And of course, the beetles are as hungry and numerous as ever. The pests and diseases should slow down now that it is cooler, but the plants slow down as well. There is a bright spot without issues so far and that is the second crop of snap peas. The peas were planted in early August and though they had to get through the August heat, they established themselves more quickly than those which were planted in April. No garden pictures ...

Hello Earthlings! Due to the nasty cough taking a very long time to resolve, no crafting activity on Planet Nice projects has occurred since January. To my surprise, the cough was not due to sinuses being out of balance but instead a virus – not the flu, just something else I picked up and furthered its path to other hosts, probably. This has been a challenge in multiple ways, especially not taking advantage of the Southern light exposure streaming into my work area, but I carry on. Sewing has been ongoing as the College of Lake County prepares for its opening night next weekend of “As You Like It” by William Shakespeare. Because I have no project progress to share, I am going to share knowledge on a design style called Retrofuturism which was I don’t want to say popular, but came to the buffet table of design in the 1960s and 1970s. It combined an optimism for the future, a fascination with space and technology, and streamlined shapes. Think the Jetsons. What brought my atte...