Pumpkin Sunrise

Oh September thank goodness you are finally here.  September hasn't been one of my favorite months because it tends to be hot and summery.  However, September leads to October and I am all for that month!  There were a couple of cool mornings this past week with low humidity that hinted of fantastic weather to come.  Yesterday the humidity was back and I hid inside the house doing my crafts. My September goals are quite minimalistic.  I want to read, knit, work on my artistic skills and journal.  For quite some time I was reading a lot in June and July but August was not a reading month.  I don't have a reason but I can reset and focus.  I want my sketching and watercoloring to improve and the only way that can happen is to do it more than once a week.  Do you get into ruts?  You know, the kind that you do everything else but what you really want to do.  I'm not sure why I sabotage my own goals.   My journalling and keeping track of what is important is helping immensely.  

The landscaper guys finished up their work yesterday afternoon.  Frodo and I are thrilled to have a bit of peace and quiet.  The backhoe would make a certain sound whenever it hit the ground and that made Frodo believe someone was knocking on the door.  He exhausted himself from his on again off again barking.  He exhausted me.  Whenever the equipment was humming and droning, Frodo thought there was a thunderstorm and shivered in fear sitting next to me looking at me with worry. Of course, whenever someone is working on your property you can't help but watch or catch a glance whenever you pass a window.  That is why nothing got done around here, I couldn't concentrate.  Yesterday I just gave into the fact that I would be distracted and went with the flow.  We are thrilled with our boulder wall, a little sad that it faces the woods and we cannot stare at it lovingly from our windows.  However the amount of fill and topsoil they added to the corner of our property should be the s

The boulder wall construction has begun!  The landscaper guys arrived on Wednesday and ripped out the old railroad tie retaining wall.  The plan is to move the wall away from the pool to the edge of the property before it slopes down the steep hill.  This will give my husband more area to move the riding lawn tractor around.  Also maybe just maybe the boulder wall will stop the earth from going away from the pool.  That is the plan. Yesterday they were dumping boulders which sounded like thunder to Frodo so I had to console him.  Lots of love and patience. Our zucchini plant is taking over the bed!  So far all of the plants are surviving and no one has nibbled on anything...yet.  Our gardening tends to be lax in that if a critter wants to nibble, we let them nibble.  It's much easier to not fight Mother Nature. My creative process has been ebbing on the low side these past few days. I am down to two knitting projects in my knitting bag and want to finish them before I start somethi

What I'm grateful for this week: -mostly sunshine instead of cloudy days -starting a creativity tracker in my planner before the pandemic never knowing how much it would be a big help in my days and my motivation -hitting a fine rhythm with daily cooking and weekly menu planning -the start of sketching out our summer outings outdoors and many picnics to be -modern technology and how it weaves a thread of togetherness -all the knitting! -Air Conditioning(!) -a brand new frisbee for Frodo to put in the pool and then bark at it -the upcoming landscaping project around the pool and replacing a retaining wall -rediscovering our traveling county library and ALL the books I want and curbside pickup. (this is a game changer for many desired books) -clean kitchen floors for now -big salads  -new to me salad dressings -ideas of challenging myself in artwork, both sketching and watercoloring -you-tube and all the artists who post information regarding watercoloring and sketching -for all the

I don't know about you, but January was glorious for me.  The quiet days slipping from one to another supported lots of creative time for me.  I hope February is just as good.  Around here we have no snow and after three days of sunny skies we are back to clouds and dreariness.  Thank you for your compliments on the hat and mittens I made the preschooler.  I started the bear hat last night. I am having some issues with my right thumb hurting (too much knitting on double pointed needles).  I should give the hands a break....should.  But I really want to knit!  The RA doc thinks it's mild OA, I think it's a flare up and it will go away eventually. If you remember last year my RA doctor retired (boo) and now I have a young doctor.  I saw her on Wednesday for a six month recheck, I am slowly forgiving my old doctor for leaving me.  This new one wants to re-diagnose me and so every time I have routine bloodwork every three months done she adds a few other tests. I lo

sweater body finished, onto the sleeves! Yesterday I decided to pull out my paints and paint on watercolor paper.  Lately my artwork has been daily sketching with a little bit of paints on drawing paper.  I love the fastness and the ease of mental  low pressure when I do a daily sketch. I pulled out a new paint set that I received from Santa and I sat at the table with high expectations of great artwork about to be produced by me.  Sadly, I made a hot mess of it.  I was disappointed and frustrated. felix cardigan cast on Of course I will not share the picture!  I almost ripped it out of my watercolor sketchbook but then I thought, 'where is the learning if I don't have documentation of my progress?'  You see, I LOVE to flip through notebooks and see my progress.  The progress isn't linear nor is it beautiful but it's there when I show up day after day.  I capture shadows or a blend colors just right. I have my very first sweater (mint green!) that I

I finished the first hat out of four hats for my adult kids.  Three more to go (assuming my math is correct ha ha).  I made a mistake when telling you about this hat, the pattern is the March hat  and it is a free pattern as well.  I have no idea why I thought I was knitting the October hat... Of course I cast on the second hat immediately. This week my mind is in a 'hurry hurry hurry' mode, so I'm counteracting my frenzied thinking with 'slow down, slow down, slow down' mode.  It isn't easy for me,  but I've been successful in my slowing down. I celebrated my birthday (yay!) and I was graced with phone calls from family and friends not to mention many birthday cards in the mail.  I am truly blessed!  Every day this week, my priority was to enjoy whatever I was doing while doing the task.  I fail on Babysitting Tuesday for some reason working one day a week tires me right out and makes my intentions waver.  My daily goal is to get all of the

Happy November!  This month is my favorite because it's my birthday month.  I've been reflective this past week on two quotes I ran across while toodling about on the internet.  Both have had me coming back to them again and again. a dr. who reference First quote: "The happiest people don't have the best of everything, they just make the best of everything" -Oprah Winfrey. Do I do that?  Do I make the best of everything?  I'd like to think that I do.  But I'll be honest, in spite of my 'positivity' on this blog, I do have a dark side where I get jealous or envious of others.  My main jealous notion is of people who have family living in the same town.  Gah, I want that. I get pea green with envy, and it can at times consume me if I let it. Here is the thing, when I'm jealous, I'm miserable and my worst self ever.  Being jealous is a choice and not a fact.  So I work at my thoughts and feelings.  I work to focus on the p