• This week’s bouquet is a lovely combination of whites, peaches, and yellow, with some pink foxglove for contrast. It included several ranunculus, which are my favorite.
• Used my new Staub x Smitten Kitchen braiser to make Chicken Rice with Buttered Onions. It was a delight to cook with and I had no issues scrubbing the rice out of the bottom of it, which confirms my suspicion that the finish on my dutch oven is pretty damaged. Which is not a delight but that’s why I bought a delightful new piece of cookware! The lid has a feature called aroma rain, how can you be anything other than delighted by that?
• I finished three books on Wednesday after work! Which is good because six holds came in this week.
• I learned from a friend that I could get a digital card for the library system in a nearby county online. I thought you had to visit a branch in person. So I signed up and spent an afternoon optimizing my ebook holds across the two systems.
• Strawberry season has arrived at the farmer’s market!
• Several times this week I saw baby praying mantises hanging out in the backyard! They were spending a lot of time hanging out on the house, act, which seemed weird. And somehow one got inside the basement and trapped in a spiderweb right by the door, but I was able to rescue and relocate it. I also relocated one that hitched a ride indoors on a houseplant that I’m acclimating to be outside for the summer. That one seemed particularly willing to hop on a bit of rhubarb leaf from the compost and get back outside. I dropped it off on my chive so it can feast on the aphids.