Daily Routine To Do Outside Instead of Inside

 

Rogan's grounds were lush with blooms and flowering herbs, exotic with olive and box trees and the

sparkle of fountains. The quiet was disturbed only by the call of gulls and the music of falling water.

Content, Maggie lounged in one of the padded chaises on a sun-washed terrace and sketched.

Born in Fire

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Table and Chairs by Des Blenkinsopp, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Increasing the amount of time you spend outdoors can have a positive effect on nearly every part of your health, from your lung function to your mood—but fitting it into an already-busy schedule can feel impossible. Here's a better approach: Shift the bulk of your daily routine outside and rack up those fresh-air minutes without any extra effort.

MARTHA STEWART

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“I thought we’d eat out on the deck.”

“Perfect.” She carried out the salad, went back for plates, flatware. By the time he pulled the steaks off the grill, she’d set the table—with the flowers—topped off their wine.

The Perfect Hope

Why Gardeners Need to Be Outward-Looking

 

“Gardening’s good for you. It gets you back in touch with nature.”

Night Moves

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Diliff, CC BY-SA 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Gardening is solitary work, but it's beneficial to think beyond one's own borders.

Tree Hugger

bookmaker’s sandwich

"Magee's man Finkle's here." Darcy hissed it as she

scurried into the kitchen.

Shawn glanced up from the trio of bookmaker's

sandwiches he was making. "Is he now?" 

Tears of The Moon

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Look whOt I found 😉

When I first heard the name of this sandwich I was caught up in this beautiful romance trilogy set in Ireland. The author, Nora Roberts, had mesmerized me with the green, earthy setting of the place. One of the main characters owned and operated a charming pub and “built” bookmaker’s sandwiches for his customers, often accompanied by a tall, frothy pint of Guinness stout.

ChinDeep

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Maggie drummed her fingers on a table in O'Malley's, tapped her foot, 

blew out a long breath. 

"Tim, will you give me a bookmaker's sandwich to go with this pint? 

I can't wait for Murphy all bloody after noon

on an empty stomach."

Born in Fire

"Danny Boy" 💚

"How about 'Danny Boy'?"

Maggie rolled her eyes. 

"Count on a Yank to ask for it. 

A Brit wrote that tune, outlander."

Born in Ice

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"What a pity that it is often the favourite repertoire of drunks on late-night trains!"

Danny Boy: mystery remains over a haunting tune

The Australian

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Phin only shook his head as he climbed the stairs. 

"I should've known you wouldn't remember. You were too busy drinking Irish

 and singing 'Danny Boy.'"

"I did not sing 'Danny Boy.'" Please, God.

"Can't say for sure. All those Irish tunes sound the same to me." 

High Noon

Dreaming of a rural idyll? Make sure you’re well prepared…

Staring up at the ceiling, she listened to the quiet. 
At times like this, it struck her how alone she was. 
There were no servants sleeping downstairs, as there had been all her life. 
Her closest neighbor was perhaps a quarter of a mile away through the woods. 
No all-night clubs or drugstores, she mused.


Night Moves 

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Colin Smith [CC BY-SA 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], 
via Wikimedia Commons

Things we wish we’d known before moving to the country

HOUSE TO HOME

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“Best to wear boots around here next time.”
“Yes.” Nonplussed, Kelsey looked down at her soft Italian flats. “You’re right.”


True Betrayals

Prince Rupert's drops

"I've something for you." Watching him, she took one of the glass drops from her pocket, held it out in her palm.

"It looks like a tear."

"Aye." She waited while he held it to the light and studied it.

He rubbed a thumb over the smooth glass. "Are you giving me your tears, Maggie?"

"Perhaps I am." She took another one out of her pocket. "It comes from dropping hot glass in water.

When you do, some shatter right away, but others hold and form. Strong." She crouched and chose a rock. While Rogan watched she struck the glass with rock. "Strong enough that it won't break under a hammer." She rose again, holding the undamaged drop. "It holds, you see. Does nothing more than bounce away from the blow and shine. But there's this thin end here and it only takes a careless twist."

She took the slim, trailing end between her fingers. The glass turned to harmless dust. "It's gone, you see. Like it never was."

Born in Fire

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400 year-old mystery of Prince Rupert's drops finally cracked

A Prince Rupert's drop looks like a glass tadpole from a beginner's crafts festival, but it's so strong it can take a hammer hit without breaking. That would be impressive enough, but if you break its tail, which can be done with finger pressure, the drop explodes into powder. The reason for this has mystified scientists for 400 years, but a team from Purdue University, the University of Cambridge, and Tallinn University of Technology in Estonia finally has an answer.

NEW ATLAS

Garden Sheds

A few miles out of the village, in a kitchen warmed with the heat and scents of baking, Brianna

Concannon looked out of the window as the ice-edged rain attacked her garden.

"I'll lose the columbine, I'm thinking. And the foxglove." It broke her heart to think of it, but she'd dug up what she could and stored the plants in the crowded little cabin out back. The gale had come so quickly.

"You'll plant more in spring." Maggie studied her sister's profile. 

Brie worried about her flowers like a mother over her babes. With a sigh, Maggie rubbed her own bulging belly. It still astonished her that it was she who was married and carrying a child, and not her home-loving sister. "You'll love every minute of it."

"I suppose. What I need is a greenhouse. I've been looking at pictures. I think it could be done."

Born in Ice

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A Gallery of Garden Shed Ideas

Add storage to your garden with personalized style.

 BETTER HOMES AND GARDEN

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On a clear day in the middle of May, Brianna watched the workmen dig the foundation for her

greenhouse. A small dream, she thought, flipping the braid she wore from her shoulder to her

back, come true.

Born in Ice

Éirinn go Brách

"I…" Brenna felt the color rush hot to her cheeks—the curse of a redhead. "Well, that's not…" 

Lies trembled on her tongue and simply refused to fall. "Oh, hell." She rubbed her uninjured hand over her face, then stopped abruptly, fingers spread around eyes that went suddenly wide and appalled. 

"Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, it shows?"

Tears of the Moon

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She had time to squeal, barely, and to swerve into the hedgerows as a car barreled around the curve.

Brakes screamed, the car veered, and Maggie ended up bottom first in the blackthorn.

"Jesus, Mary and Joseph, what kind of a blind, ignorant fool is it who tries to run down innocent people?"

Born in Fire

Born in Fire

The Amazing Birth Of A Hand Blown Glass Pitcher

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She set her mouth to the pipe and blew.
He watched the bubble form, fascinated despite himself. 
Such a simple procedure, he thought, only breath and molten glass. 
Her fingers worked on the pipe, turning it and turning it, fighting gravity, using it, 
until she was satisfied with the shape.


Born in Fire

How Smell Works

The scent of coffee woke her. Tess turned from her side to her back and lay dozing with

the homey, comforting smell. 

How many years had it been since she’d woken to the scent of coffee already brewing? 

When she’d lived in her grandfather’s house with its high ceilings and tiled foyer, she would come down the arching staircase in the mornings to find her grandfather already behind a huge plate of eggs or hotcakes, the newspaper open, and the coffee already poured.

Miss Bette, the housekeeper, would have set the table with the everyday dishes, the ones with the little violets around the edges. Flowers would have depended on the season, but they would always be there, jonquils or roses or mums in the blue porcelain vase that had been her great-grandmother’s.

There would have been the quiet whoosh of Trooper’s tail, her grandfather’s old golden retriever, as he sat beneath the table hoping for a windfall. 

Those had been the mornings of her youth—steady, secure, and familiar—of her young womanhood, just as her grandfather had been the strong central figure in her life.

Sacred Sins

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The sense of smell is closely linked with memory, probably more so than any of our other senses.

FIFTH SENSE

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Stan bent down over her, close enough that she could smell the simple department-store aftershave he wore. 

She recognized it and, on a wave of nostalgia, remembered her mother's driver had worn it, too.

For no other reason, her sense of trust in him was confirmed.

Night Moves

I Ditched the City and Moved to the Country

“Maggie, just how long are you going to go on this way?”

“What way is that, C.J.?” Her voice was low, husky, as if she'd just been awakened. It was a voice that made most men wish they'd awakened her.

The woman was infuriating. C.J. tugged a hand through his carefully styled, blow-dried hair. What was she doing three thousand miles from L.A., wasting herself on this dirty work? He had a responsibility to her and, damn it, to himself. C.J. blew out a long breath, an old habit he had whenever he met with opposition. 

Negotiations were, after all, his business. It was up to him to talk some sense into her. 

He shifted his feet, careful to keep his polished loafers out of the dirt. “Babe, I love you. You know I do. Come home.”

Night Moves

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When I burnt up my LA life out in the desert, (headshots, resumes, lingerie, lint--a flaming rainbow) and moved up here, friends and family were bewildered. Often they still are.

SHINE

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“Gardening's good for you. It gets you back in touch with nature.”

“I've no desire to touch nature.”

This time she laughed and lifted her face to the sky. No, the closest C.J. would come to nature would be a chlorinated pool—solar-heated. 

Up to a few months ago she'd barely gotten much closer herself. She'd certainly never attempted to. But now she'd found something—something she hadn't even been looking for. If she hadn't come to the East Coast to collaborate on the score for a new musical, if she hadn't taken an impulsive drive south after the long, grueling sessions had ended, she never would've happened on the sleepy little town tucked into the Blue Ridge.

Do we ever know where we belong, Maggie wondered, unless we're lucky enough to stumble onto our own personal space? She only knew that she'd been heading nowhere in particular and she'd come home.

Night Moves