Happy Boxing Day, y’all. It’s been a hot minute (okay, maybe two or three … or five), but here we are again with a fresh Friday roundup. I’m not making any promises about this becoming an every Friday thing just yet, but let’s see where this goes.
- Somehow, every year around this time, this same image pops up in my Facebook memories. I have no idea where it originally came from, but it feels incredibly on-brand for this weird, floaty, in-between stretch of the year. I’m officially on vacation until the 5th, and I think today is Friday … but honestly, who can say for sure?
- In food-world news, Food & Wine just released their list of 2026 food trends, and of course I fell down that rabbit hole. In excellent timing: I asked for one of those Ball Fermentation Kits for Christmas so I can try my hand at making my own kimchi and sauerkraut. Ambitious? Yes. Overconfident? Also yes. We’ll see how it goes.
- Speaking of trends, Pinterest dropped their 2026 Trends Report, which promptly reminded me that I haven’t looked at my Pinterest boards in … years. I can only assume most of what’s pinned there is wildly out of date at this point. Maybe I’ll spend this post-holiday week doing a little digital decluttering. Or at least acknowledging that 2017-me had very different aspirations.
- On the blogging front, I’ve noticed that a lot of folks have migrated to Substack or other hosted platforms since the last time I was really active. I get the appeal, but I can’t shake the feeling that for many people, that’s a risky move. Owning your own domain and your own blog means you control your content. I’ve been online long enough to remember LiveJournal, Blogger, Tumblr, Salon, Open Diary, and so many others that once felt permanent … until they weren’t. Meanwhile, blogs like Kottke, Whatever, and Smitten Kitchen are still standing, archives intact, because they stayed rooted in spaces they owned. My plan is to keep KaraCooks (and my other domains) for as long as I possibly can, even if I’m posting sporadically.
- One of my dear friends has a New Year’s Eve ritual that I’m absolutely stealing this year. As the year winds down, she writes all the negative thoughts, painful memories, self-doubts, and heavy emotions onto slips of paper. Then, at midnight, she lights them on fire, speaking intent to putting those things in the past and moving forward more positively in the year ahead. As she says, “Intention setting plus fire. It’s the best.” After the year that 2025 has been, both personally and <gestures broadly at everything> in the world, a little symbolic cleansing feels more than appropriate.
- Finally, this week between Christmas and New Year has always been my planning-and-dreaming sweet spot. It’s when I set up a fresh bullet journal (which I will absolutely neglect by late summer), tweak my budget spreadsheets, add a new tab for vacation planning, and start sketching out spring garden plans. Some traditions are sacred. That’s what I’ll be doing for the next several days. And, of course, eating more cheese.
That’s it for me this go-round. I hope everyone is enjoying this strange, slow last week of 2025. Onward to 2026!
