Today’s Top Ten Tuesday topic from That Artsy Reader Girl asks what we plan on reading for the autumnal season:

1. Pumpkinheads by Rainbow Rowell and Faith Erin Hicks
2. Wayward Son by Rainbow Rowell
3. Erin Morgenstern’s The Starless Sea
4. The Art of Theft by Sherry Thomas:
5. Sherry Thomas’ The Magnolia Sword: A Ballad of Mulan
6. Daisy Jones and the Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid
7. Dreyer’s English by Benjamin Dreyer
8. Bruja Born by Zoraida Córdova
9. Mary Robinette Kowal’s The Calculating Stars
10. On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong

How about you? What are you hoping to read now that it’s fall?

In addition to buying books and yarn, I got some other things done this weekend.

Yesterday, I spent some time at the H Street Festival, patronizing a couple of the businesses over there and running into some friends who’ve moved back to the area this summer. And today, Sarah and I went over to Union Market for a little while to get a snack, catch up, and browse in the bookstore.

I also did some reading (Susan Orlean’s The Library Book), bought food at both the grocery store and the farmers market (we’re nearing the end of corn and peach season, but ginger and paw paws, which I only buy for Rudi because I think they taste like banana, are both coming into season), picked tomatoes at the garden, and made a tomato tart and corn on the cob for supper.

And, as a bonus, while I was at the garden, the sound of a concert at one of our local parks wafted over, so I was able to catch the tail end of that, too. (Usually, it’s in July, so I stopped checking for it, once summer had progressed.) It was a nice way to conclude the summer season. (Temperatures: please take the hint and pack up your highs in the 90s! Jeans season should be here!)

How was your final summer weekend?

I did a little shopping today.

The yarn was a splurge when I decided that since the bank has closed earlier than I’d expected it to (and I couldn’t get a roll of quarters to do laundry), I could stop by the yarn shop across the street. They’d recently gotten in a nice assortment of self-striping Havirland Pax Sock. The colorway is The Final Girls (all the Halloween-themed colors seemed to be named after horror films).

The books and cd are all second-hand via the used book sale from my local branch’s Friends of the Library. As a bonus, some of the books were free because I joined the Friends. Most of them I wouldn’t necessarily have bought if they’d been new, but I’ve been on the holds list for The Wedding Date and would have borrowed Christmas Bells toward the holiday. And if I don’t like them, I can donate them back to the library and some other schmuck can buy them next time.

Happy Saturday to me!

Rudi’s heading out early tomorrow morning for a cycling event in West Virginia, so I’m on my own for the weekend. Here’s what I hope it includes:

• Chatting with friends.
• Perusing the library book sale. (Also, trading some overdue materials for what’s come in off my holds list.)
• Sleeping in.
• Taking in the H Street Festival.
• Finishing my shawl.
• Procuring quarters for the laundry before the bank closes.
• Harvesting tomatoes and planting more fall greens at the garden.
• Getting started on a fall apartment cleaning.
• Hanging out with Sarah on Sunday.
• Painting my nails.

What are you hoping to check off this weekend?

Three beautiful things from my past week:

1. A little girl of about four, wearing a pink bike helmet, races a corgi puppy up a set of stairs in the park. “I won!” she exclaims.

2. My job is near a mid-week farmers market and I have been celebrating by buying raspberries, which are back in season here.

3. Our library got DVDs of The Librarians, so Rudi and I have been able to resume watching the series.

How about you? What’s been beautiful in your world lately?

I realize I’m giving you a lot of light content recently and I’m sorry about that. The new job is a lot, mentally and emotionally, and I seem to spend a lot of my downtime napping. I assume I will build up a tolerance in the days to come and will be able to resume having a life. This week is already better than last in that I haven’t had to cancel all evening plans to nap instead, but simply fall asleep when I am home. So, maybe next week?

Anyway, this shot, taken yesterday evening, is from the balcony of The Anthem, one of the concert venues on the Wharf, looking out over the Washington Channel.