I have been a little slow at posting this summer. It has been a pretty exhausting summer in many ways, with personal battles, and so I’m choosing to give myself a lot of grace. I have learned a lot in the midst of it, and I know that God has been working all things for good. I wanted to just share some updates on all kinds of fronts, as there’s been a lot going on over here on our little homestead.

The first thing to share is a garden update. The last two summers I didn’t plant a garden because we have clay soil here and I wasn’t having great success with it. We did a big yard reno last summer/fall when we were getting our house ready to list, so my husband built 6 big raised beds and we installed them in the garden area with some landscaping to finish it off. I decided to just let the kids take over the garden beds since I wasn’t sure when we would be moving (I figured we would have moved by now!), as I thought it would be a good learning experience for them. And wouldn’t you know, we had an absolute bumper crop this summer, so I am currently swimming in zucchini and squash. The last few days I made 2 zucchini loaves, 5 dozen zucchini muffins, and some beef zucchini soup. That used up about 3 zucchinis and I think I have around 20 left to use! So I’m going to have to get creative or be that lady trying to give zucchini to everyone.

The next update is school. I can’t believe summer is almost over. I think we will start back at homeschool around September 5th. My oldest two boys are in 7th grade this year, which is really hard for me to believe (they are 13 months apart, so it’s just a lot easier having them in the same grade and doing the same work). Then my third son is going into 1st grade which is also crazy, and my fourth son will be joining along for some preschool as he is turning 5 beginning of next year. And my 2 year old will keep us all entertained as we go. My oldest boys have been doing online school the last two years, which makes keeping up with everything a lot easier for me. We had a beach day today and it was crazy busy, everyone must have had the same idea to get some fun in the sun before school starts again.

A few weeks ago, I took some time for a little day trip by myself as my husband spent almost three weeks away this summer helping out his uncle, and I was just needing a day off. I went to a local arboretum and enjoyed the peace and quiet. I was going to do some watercolor painting but walked all the way to the pond and realized I forgot my water jar in the car. Gah! But, I have all these inspiration photos, so some painting of the pretty pond can still happen at some point.

I have sadly not been painting much lately, even though I am just working through the last module of my mentorship program and am supposed to be working on making some masterpieces. It has been a really good experience though and I feel like I have a lot more direction going forward. I will probably have to rewatch all the videos at some point. I have been working on lots of parts and pieces in the meantime though. I’m working on some tiny embroidery squares for collage, and I finally got my hands on some wallpaper sample books (woohoo! been trying to find some for years), and so I’m planning to do some cutting tonight and work on some Matisse-esque collages. Speaking of collage, since I have been repurposing so many old books into journals, I have an abundance of old book signatures sitting around, so I have been working on a huge series of old book page collages. They have been so fun to do, and I’m thinking I may offer some of them for sale in my etsy shop when they are finished.

And a quick update about inspiration. I think my inspiration has come almost solely from books lately. I found some really beautiful books at the thrift store and they have been sparking all kinds of creative ideas. One of my favorites is a DMC cross stitch book from 1993 (I think), which has surprisingly modern designs in it, considering its age. I am loving the cross stitch patterns, how geometric and colorful they are, and wondering how I can incorporate that into future work. It may even be fun to color in my own pattern on some graph paper to use in a collage or art journal.

And last but not least, my art journal spread for the week:

Thanks for stopping by!