New Flowers ....

I adore flowers! I can't get enough of them. If I don't have them growing in my garden, I have photos of them as my desk top background, or my cell phone wallpaper.

 I love this season of the year when I can bring armfuls -- even those that grow wild -- into my house for inspiration. I love this little bit of phrasing from one of my vintage books - Happy Homes and the Hearts That Make Them (1889),

"Bring one of the commonest field-flowers into a room, 

place it on a table ...

and you seem to have brought a ray of sunshine into the place.

There is a cheerfulness about flowers....

They are a sweet enjoyment, 

coming as messengers from the country, and seeming to say, 

'come see where we grow and let your heart be 

glad in our presence."

I paint with fabrics, threads, and vintage elements, assembling them in layers to create fantasy flowers inspired by nature...

F

Worth Asking....

I waken to this thought nearly every morning ..."There are two types of people in the world: those who wait for something to happen, and those who make something happen."  ... Which are you?

From death comes life....

We have an old lilac bush -- one of my favorite flowering trees in the yard. It breathed it's last a year ago when the remaining blooms were clearly stunted of growth. When fall came, we talked about the need to cut that dead tree down. No value anymore. It can't produce life, that dead tree.

But, interesting... I can see it just outside my studio window. With the hot summer days, my window is open most of the time A racket drew my attention a few weeks ago. Glancing out to see what might be happening, I discovered some sweet little song birds vying to be first to build a nest in a little bird house still hanging from the branches of that dead old lilac.

Their song has accompanied my days since, as they happily raised their little family in that shelter from both heat and rain.

 Dead, but in death, bringing forth new life! And at the base of that tree, beauty!

I want to SEE life ... to choose to notice the beauty instead of the decay. There is enough dead and dying in the world, and the news carries it all. But, I choose to look today for life ... and thank the Giver of that life!

When things don't go the way I hoped...

...I try to look for the blessing instead of the frustration. Today it rained. No, it POURED! I had planned a photo shoot -- outdoors, in the best light. Instead, rain, rain, clouds and more.

Just a patch of sunlight in between the lowering thunderheads. So, I went out to the gazebo to bring the chairs under the cover of the porch. Passed the chickens in the chicken coop...

They came racing to see what I was up to. Curious. Not impacted by the rain. Just being. Just simply enjoying being chickens.

What a simple little lesson. In the midst of the storms of life ... just be!