The Best Things in my Brain, January 2026

I’ve always been a person who loves to learn and find new things and share them with others, but these things don’t always warrant a full blog or social media post. So I’m offering a once a month, short and sweet post on the best things I learned, read, heard, or saw recently.

A quick announcement in case you don’t follow me on my other social media – I’ll be at FIBRuary Indiana in Indianapolis on January 30 and 31, 2026! If you’ve been wanting to get a look at the stationery shop products in person, be sure to stop by (plus you can pick up a show exclusive postcard and some new products that won’t be in the shop until February)!

Best Things in my Brain, Non-Craft Edition:

I love cozy (and most often British) mysteries, but I have a hard time finding modern cozies that I truly love. So it was a delight to stumble upon Murder at Gull’s Nest by Jess Kidd (almost literally, I was browsing the mystery options in my library’s Libby app looking for anything immediately available to borrow). This novel very much has a Golden Era British mystery vibe but came out just last year. It’s not a fully light read -- everyone in the novel has a traumatic past, as you might expect from a novel set in the immediate aftermath of World War II -- but the writing is truly lovely and I’ve found myself thinking about its themes of embracing who you truly are and building a life for that person for days (for better and for worse) after finishing the novel.  It’s supposedly first in a series so I’m excited to see what the next installment brings.

*The link above is an affiliate link at Bookshop.org, I earn a small percentage of any sale at no extra cost to you.

Best Thing in my Brain, Craft Edition:

I’ve made a handful of fades and gradients in knitting projects but have not yet tried one in crochet, so I enjoyed this video from Daphne Frizzle about creating custom gradients in crochet projects. She gives a lot of useful (and not craft-specific) advice on the color theory of picking colors for gradients, but also includes some crochet specific advice as well. This is also apparently the first of a planned series on color theory and I’m looking forward to the next one!

What’s the best thing currently in your brain?