Little Bits of Joy: Week Four

Happy Hallowe'en, Donut Be Afraid!

Hello, Friend,

Happy Hallowe’en! May your treats be sweet and your tricks be few.

It’s FriYAY! and that means it’s time for some sorely needed Little Bits of Joy! I don’t know about you, but I could surely use some. Tasty treats for everyone here on The Lady Party! Huzzah.

Ad for Vitamin Donuts, 1920s FDA 168 Shared PUBLIC DOMAIN WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

Donut Be Afraid!

If you, like me, are a fan of the culinary wonder that is the donut, this Baked Apple Cider Donuts Recipe from Erin McDowell of the New York Times is sure to please! Serve with hot coffee on a cool fall morning and enjoy a little dunk of heaven. No worries if you don’t have a donut pan, a muffin tin will do the trick! Cheers!

Victorian lady using an ordinary bell telephone with separate and interchangeable earpiece and mouthpiece, 1878 PUBLIC DOMAIN WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

Ring, Ring!

Have you been pining for those halcyon days before you had a cell phone grafted to your palm? Waxing nostalgic for stretching the cord as far as physically possible to step away from the fray? The folks from Tin Can have a delightful solution for you! Using VOIP and your choice of a quirky colorful faux can or a retro princess style phone, you can re-attach the cord and take some of your time and attention back in the process! Designed for kids, but appealing for anyone who wants to escape the tyranny of technology.

Van Gogh, Green Field, 1889 PUBLIC DOMAIN WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

Art Will Save the World

If you’ve been feeling stressed, and if you haven’t I have some concerns, a new study has revealed that viewing art is an immediate stress reliever. Art helps strengthen your immune system, lowers cytokines, and positively impacts mental and physical health. None of this is news to me, but the official affirmation feels timely.

Feeling frazzled? Don’t fret, my pet, hie thee to a museum! Away!

“Toadstools, Mushrooms, Fungi, Edible and Poisonous: One Thousand American Fungi,” by Charles McIlvaine, 1900 PUBLIC DOMAIN WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

Make Mushroom for Joy

Scientists have built a working computer from…this is really quite fantastic…shiitake mushrooms! If you’ve ever contemplated the mycorrhizal networks that power our forests, you are acquainted with the wonders of our phenomenal fungi. The hope is that this discovery might one day lead to lower cost, scalable, eco-conscious computing.

Yay for science!

Pillsbury Pink Lemonade Cake Ad, 1961 Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike 4.0 License WIKIMEDIA COMMONS Click Americana

Let Them Eat Cake

And finally, in the ‘this is how we do it’ files, Baker Manolo Betancur realized that his homeless neighbors went without birthday celebrations and he decided to do something about it. A Colombian immigrant who came to this country with nothing more than a dream, he has a deep appreciation for what it means to go without. For the past 12 years, Manolo has been baking and delivering beautiful cakes to the chronically homeless people in Charlotte, North Carolina where he and his bakery are located. It gives a whole new, uplifting meaning to ‘let them eat cake.’

And with that, I’m off to scare up some fresh inspiration for Margot Potter Studios. Have a spooktacular Hallowe’ekend and I’ll see you back here on Monday.

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Apple Cider Donut Fund