Month: June 2025

Fabric Resources Michaels

To continue my review of fabric resources in the area now that JOANN Fabrics has closed, I checked out our local Michaels store. I also just saw the headline that Michaels has bought out JOANN’s. If a JOANN’s store reopens near you, know that it is owned by Michaels. Interesting.

Anyway, I stopped by our local store to see what was happening. Just in the last several weeks, they seem to have expanded their fabric collection.

Ribbon selection is good.

Embroidery floss looks all organized.

They still have their wide collection of yarn, although I don’t know if they’ve begun incorporating the brands from JOANN’s.

They have some cut and packaged pieces, but WalMart seems to have a much broader selection.

They have this standard display of thread.

They have a small selection of batting and stuffing.

Within days of JOANN’s closing, Michaels had this sign on their State College store!

I can see, eventually, there will be more fabric choices around town. Depending on where you live, you may also have a favorite independent fabric store near you. It’s nice to know I still have choices near me, but I might have to look a little harder to find which store has what I need. Enjoy!

Garden Update June 5, 2025

With more than 6 inches of rain over the last month, the garden is having a hard time getting started! We finally have a few days with some warm sunshine, so I expect everything will go crazy. Here are a few pictures to show you how things are doing today!

The dogwood trees in the front yard are finally in bloom and the blossoms are turning from an off yellow/white to a brighter white.

On the patio, I’ve pulled the first batch of radishes and replanted with new seed.

The lettuces…Little Gem and Black Seeded Simpson…are ready to be thinned (and eaten!). Yum!

Bert has been thinning the onions and eating them! Here’s how big they are now:

The cherry tomato plants are doing well, with blossoms showing their color!

Up in the garden on the hill, the established plants like lavender and echinacea are doing well.

However, the seeds for carrots, beans and zucchini are barely coming up…just too much rain. I’ve had to add some bean seeds to the rows because the birds were picking them out of the ground as they tried to sprout.

So far, one tiny zucchini plant has made it out of the ground! Somehow, the weeds are doing very well!

One final group of seeds/plants I had not included before…Bert started pumpkin seeds a month or two ago and decided to plant them right beside the wood pile…no fence at all. I hope they get big quick so the rabbits don’t see it as their own salad bar!

Hopefully, with the sun finally coming out, the garden will do well. Enjoy!

If you have comments or questions, please email me directly at maryjkisner@gmail.com.

Blog Update June 2, 2025

Hello Readers!

It appears the automatic spammers have found my website. What started as a few inconvenient “comments” that made no sense or were written in another language has exploded into 25 to 50 “comments” every day relating to old posts or no specific posts. Occasionally, I hear from one of you about a specific post, so I have to be careful to check the expanding list so I don’t miss your comments! From this point forward, I have turned OFF the comment feature on any future posts.

However, I do love to hear from you…it reminds that maybe someone is actually reading the posts or trying to make something similar. It is encouraging! I usually post a partial story on Facebook with a link to my website and some of you just comment there. I enjoy that also!

So…if you want to comment on anything I’ve posted, please just send me an email directly and I’ll see it right away…maryjkisner@gmail.com. Thanks!