Monthly Archives: August 2026

The Product of Productive Chaos

August 7, 2026art, bookmaking, VideoBlaugust 2026, flip bookwitchyrichy@gmail.com

Yesterday, I posted a picture of my workspace as I finished up my butterfly flip book. I promised a walkthrough and I knew, because of the interactive nature of the book, it needed to be a video. Hope you enjoy the tour:

Here is a tutorial video from Melina Pylant:

A production note: I have made lots of videos in my life so I know even the shortest of shorts can be a challenge. But, as you can tell from my YouTube channel, I haven’t done much video production recently and had a general sense that it had gotten easier despite knowing that online creators spend many hours making it look effortless.

After trying multiple ways of anchoring my phone and not being satisfied with the results, I pulled the CZUR scanner off the shelf. I haven’t used it in so long that after blowing off the dust, I had to install the software. But, I was up and running pretty quickly. It took two tries mainly because I was determined that the last one was the last one.

Productive Chaos

August 6, 2026art, Making, PhotographyBlaugust 2026witchyrichy@gmail.com

I am participating in Blaugust 2026 and determined to post every day even if it is past my bedtime.

I spend a good part of most days in my studio making some kind of art or craft. For the past few days, I have been working on a flip book. When I start a project, my workspace is open and clean, but over time, the materials and tools related to the project begin to pile up. I call it productive chaos because I generally know where everything: there really is some method to the madness. I have been working in the studio for several years now and each time I do a reorganization, I get more organized. Tools I use regularly are within arms’ reach; current paper choices get stacked nearby.

This book is mostly done so the papers and tools have been tucked away once again. I just have to decide what to add to the back. Then I plan to do a video walkthrough, something I have not attempted before. All thanks to Blaugust 2026!

A messy desktop with paper, punches and pens

Buc’ees Boycott, Anyone?

August 5, 2026News, Of InterestBuc'ees, Ohiowitchyrichy@gmail.com

Want to know why people hate corporations? Because they do things like sue small businesses whose names and logos happen to be based on a beaver, a common animal in the United States. In case you missed it, mega convenience store Buc’ees is suing Beaver’s Mini Mart in Beavercreek, Ohio, because they, wait for it, use a beaver in their logo. It might, says the huge corporation whose parking lots often have 800 spaces, cause confusion. Evidently, confusion is a big concern for Buc’ees as they also sued Mickey Mart because their moose also looked too much like their beaver.

Seriously? Beaver’s Mini Mart has been a fixture in Beavercreek since the late 1980s, long before Buc’ees left Texas. Their logo may be slightly older but at the time it was connected to one store a very long way away from Ohio. Folks in Beavercreek are understandably worried as, not surprisingly, lots of businesses in the town include beavers in their branding. Protests are underway.

My Blogging History

August 4, 2026blogging, communityBlaugust 2026witchyrichy@gmail.com

For those few who follow this blog, you may have noticed an uptick in posts. I made a decision that I needed to either blog regularly or give it up. The algorithm heard me and presented me with Blaugust 2026, a daily blogging challenge held each August that has been around since 2014. The original mastermind, Belghast, died earlier this summer, but the community is continuing on.

Today’s prompt asked about your first blog. Hmmm…it was at least 20 years ago or more and was probably created with Blogger. I used the tool to create newsletters for several state-wide grants.

I was pleasantly surprised to find the blog for Virginia’s Community of Learning. It accompanied the larger Community of Learning, a collaboration between several education organizations started in 2000 to help teachers grapple with this new thing called the Internet.

As for personal blogging, I suspect there was an early Blogger version, but I pivoted to WordPress pretty quickly, using it as a web publishing tool under my own domain. In this inaugural post at Simply Karen from September 21, 2004, I mention two personal blogs being combined into this one blog. Hence the name: In One Place.

During graduate school, I decided I needed a stand-along blog to accompany an independent study in media and media literacy. The current blog was born in 2006.

I maintained both blogs until January 2023 when I decided I was going to use Simply Karen for daily photos. That plan did not pan out, but I did move my active blogging to In Another Place.

As with many technologies, I have been involved with blogs since they appeared. I remember that at the start, blogging was meant to be a way to connect people. Bloggers linked to other bloggers and commented on their ideas. That is part of the impetus behind Blaugust. Not just writing but connecting, a throwback to the original intent of the tool. Easy to publish writing that connected to a larger community. It seems as though connection is still a focus but in a more commercialized way, with SEO and ad revenue playing a larger role. But then, I suppose that is the story of the history of the Internet.

I would like to believe old fashioned blogging can still play a role. Welcome Blaugust 2026!

July Reading

August 3, 2026books, readingCanva, LibraryThingwitchyrichy@gmail.com

I have been seeing lots of fun collages of book covers showing what people read during the month and decided I needed to make one for July. Not surprisingly, I headed to Canva where I found a plethora of reading tracker templates. They all made it easy to copy, paste and resize the book covers that I already had saved in my LibraryThing thread.

I like this but would like to include a little more data. One template included five stars that could be filled in. I also want to add a headphones icon to indicate audio books. I usually listen to one or two each month. I think I can make the book covers into links. And, I recognize that it is not at all accessible. I have listed the books below this post and linked to their pages on LibraryThing.

There’s always next month!