Friday check in: end of the garden, packing, some sewing + reading

 

The geraniums are having a late-season burst of energy. I moved them to the back patio to make room for a mum and pumpkin on the front stoop.

The tomatoes are over.  The crop was nice this year, especially for the grape and cherry varieties. 

The zinnias I planted are still blooming and there are a couple of hopeful (or foolish) buds.  

My preoccupation is preparing for my long-awaited trip to Italy.  I leave tomorrow!  It will be my 51st Road Scholar program:  Rome, Florence, Venice.  Home October 23.   Temperatures there will be mid-70's during the day and mid-50's at night.  I'll take that fleece jacket for sure.

I've spent two evenings making Carolina Chain units.  69 units to go. Have I mentioned how tedious mass-production can be?   

 

I sewed four four-unit blocks to get an idea of what they look like.  I think the tremendous variety of prints will even out once they're all assembled. 

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Renee "Cash" Blackbear is a young Native American woman living in Fargo-Moorhead in the 1970's.  She grew up in a succession of foster homes which made her tough and feisty.  She works the sugar beet and wheat harvest. In her time off she's a pool shark.   A rural sheriff has befriended her (as a little kid she spent a night in his jail). He comes to rely on her talent for transcending a scene to see beyond the immediate.   That ability becomes the key to solving murders.   

Though I lived in Fargo 20 years after the stories take place I recognized the setting.

I binge-read the series.   The characters become more complex with each installment. I look forward to the next one!

Linking up with Finished or Not Friday and Off the Wall Friday