Hello, this is my newsletter monthly wrap-up that I’m cross-posting from Ko-fi, as an alternative to an email newsletter because I haven’t figured out how that works yet and not sure anyone reads emails anymore lol. Once again as an alternative to evil social media, I highly recommend subscribing to my ko-fi (it’s free!) or using an rss reader to follow my posts on starsbegantofall.com at least until I move away from it because of AI.
First off is my monthly bullet journal spread, featuring space and bunnies and a retro landscape theme to use up old stickers I had.
I also post a photo of one of my thrift flips/upcycle summer projects, the black skirt from a shirt, worn in a jirai-kei style coord.
Of course, can’t end August without finally updating my setup for the summer, this time with the Final Fantasy series, specifically retro games such as FF1, FF7, FF9 and FF Tactics.
Then for some reason I decided to recover my 15 year old PSP case that was broken and peeling with this gorgeous Japanese print cotton fabric, so now it works (sorta).
I also made a handmade crochet tool roll case, similar to my husswif, but with a zipper pouch. Can I crochet? No…
[recipe review] split pea soup and soy braised beef and marinated eggs
Finally a belated recipe review post with 3 recipes I tried from my books at home that I didn’t feel warrant a photo.
As for events, this month was another hot one, allegedly a cool front came through but my area did not get that news update. I mostly spend my time working at home, some overtime work, sewing and crafting and cleaning, and cooking food to avoid the food recalls because we live in the third-world nation of United States of America apparently. On the first Saturday of the month, I went to two trinket trade markets with a small box of anime merch, cheap jewelry, fanart extras and blind bag stuff I didn’t actually want. I did complete a few trades and bought a figure from the local mall, then I headed to a brewery in the next city where the trinket trade took place at a plant fair where I also bought a plant and artwork along with the trades. The next weekend, I went to a trading card pop-up after getting my flu shot. We had our book club, and then that following weekend was my nephew’s birthday party at the pool. Afterwards I had a staycation at home that I scheduled since my family and friends didn’t have any summer plans and I wanted to get that PTO used up. That last weekend of August was rough; while I got a lot done with cleaning and organizing and selling old stuff, there were 3 celebrity deaths in a row and I was just grateful I didn’t have to work when the news hit because I wouldn’t be able to focus scrolling on my phone and feeling teary-eyed. I couldn’t say I knew much about Dolly Parton, only that her face was always associated with Jolene and reading books (both good things to me), and of course I watched a lot of works with Tim Curry and deeply admire his theatrical abilities, but it was Peter Cullen, the voice of Optimus Prime, that had me crying on and off all day. I had just bought tickets to see him at Fan Expo in September, but saw he cancelled a few weeks ago, so this was just awful news to have confirmed. I struggled through despite the emotional and physical pain, I even finished my next zine and distributed books to the 3 closest little free libraries by my house as my good deed for the year, inspired by those celebrity deaths. (What that zine is about, I shan’t say.) I also watched Coyote VS Acme since my animation friends were so upset by it getting cancelled despite good previews and I can definitely confirm it was a good movie for the older generations even though young kids predictably did not seem to get it. I did post 2 fics this month, I think, and my brother and I worked on my backyard at the very end so I managed to get nearly all of my to-do list done!
Like I said, August ended up being a tough month by the end, and I knew doom-scrolling on instagram all day wasn’t helping my mental health (or my productivity at work and at home either tbh lol). But I am making a concerted effort to contribute to this world regularly despite my despair, and just be better as much as I can. I’m grateful I have my family and close friends to connect with, and while I still have functioning vision, I intend to share my writing and artwork and other creations to others online and in real life, instead of just consuming poison into my body (I mean both eating and viewing/hearing.)