Butterflies, Flowers, and Everyday Life

 We hatched our final butterflies last week. Since they seem to hatch around 9 or 9:30 in the morning I've missed them while at work -- but Michael takes videos and sends them to me so I don't have to miss out on the fun.

This is the end of my exercise walks: the reservoir at Eagle Creek:

Drew and I did an "end of summer before college starts outing" -- we didn't eat cake like Rachel and I did, we burned up calories by canoeing on Eagle Creek. 

We had some good laughs about this seemingly very tall Great Blue Heron.

I spent a total of three days at the flower shop. Such gorgeous flowers right now because Emily's in-law's are bringing in fresh flowers from their farm.

Such happiness is wrapped up in these bouquets!

While I worked on market bouquets the other talented floral designers created wedding flowers. They were so beautiful I could almost cry!

On Friday I got to help make the wedding installation on site (at our Central Library!):

Rachel went back to Purdue on Saturday and Sunday evening we enjoyed a barbecue dinner with both Grandmas present. There was local corn (thanks to James' side-gig as a corn-picker on Saturday) and local tomatoes (nothing like them!). 

Masks are our new art form around here and this week James created a dwarf beard mask for one of his teachers at school. 

My garden is just full of birds and butterflies and hummingbirds and praying mantis' right now. It's bringing me so much joy!

I also enjoyed taking time to paint our Cake Bake Shop experience from last week. 

And now we are into a new week!

Beautiful August

I'm thankful for temperate weather so far in August -- it makes for a beautiful month. 

Flower therapy Monday: I loved the candy pink colors and the bright pink wheat stalks. 

I got two morning walks in and loved this view so much I had to paint it later in the week.

David met the sign that graduated in abstentia for him from eighth grade back in July.

White peaches are my favorite! They taste like a raspberry-flavored exotic fruit. Their color is just beautiful too!

I kept up the hard work on preparing for my fall online nature journaling classes. If you haven't checked them out yet, you can find all the information here! Did I mention that I'm also blogging exclusively about nature now on my new blog "The Nature Journaler"? 

Drew is about to end his Subway career so Michael and I went to visit him. 

Thursday brought more beautiful flowers:

Friday I snuck away to my secret point with blankets, books, paints, and food for a few hours of vacation.

It was glorious!

There was plenty of wildlife to enjoy as well!

Rachel heads back to college this week so we planned a mother-daughter outing to celebrate the end of summer. We headed to the Cake Bake shop in Carmel.

This was a FUN outing: chocolate cake, macarons, and loose-leaf tea!

This is a destination not to miss!

We're going to miss Rachel! She's got to go back and work hard on that engineering degree!

And that was our week......

August, School, and How Long Will This Schedule Last?

Looking back at pictures for this week reminded me that it was a full week. As usual I was at the floral shop on Monday:

These flowers from my own garden made me happy all week sitting on the coffee table.

I got in my three walks with a neighbor. Sometimes we see exciting wildlife like deer or bunnies, always lots of birds.

We had more butterflies hatching! I can't get over how tiny the wings are when they first hatch and how big they become within an hour.

After a lot of hard work I got my new website ready to launch! And two online nature journaling classes available for purchase!

The first class will be six weeks long and will cover September/October (late summer flowers, butterflies, insects, seeds, etc). I'll be sending out videos each week and virtual nature walks as well as instructions and pdf's. My classes will also meet for discussion via Zoom each week. I'm excited!

You can find more about them here on my website.

The second class will be four weeks in Oct/Nov and cover fall foliage! Looking forward to this!

I also took photos and uploaded a bunch of products to my online shop.

I have milkweed greeting cards and milkweed giclee fine art prints. They make me happy.

I also have a brand new set of cards with artwork celebrating the historic Washington Heights community in New York City.

Thursday found me back at the flower shop with lots of flowers! AND it was the first day of high school for James and David! David is a freshman this year and James a junior. So far they have had three days of school in person! Long may this continue!

I was blessed to be served dinner by a friend one evening. The beauty and deliciousness of the food ministered to my soul, not to mention the conversation.

I think it was my week of food blessings as a total of four different friends/family sent things our way. One day at lunch my walking friend delivered green beans (incredible!) and a tasty lentil soup. Such a treat!

Friday movie night came and Michael agreed to let us watch Julia & Julie. It was good to enjoy a foodie movie.

Saturday I had the joy of creating a tea party reunion for our Sketching England group.

We had a tea party on the lawn!

And there were flowers, mostly from the garden, to decorate.

And some very beautiful food that made me happy. It was so good to see our group together again and to hear everyone's plans for the upcoming year.

James has made his own masks for school -- one for each day -- and the dragons snap on and off for easy washing!

Our monarch chrysalis' decorated our Sunday table. They make me so happy.

And now we are into a another week! (PS: It seems I should have called this post "things that make me happy"! ha ha! I could also say "things that I am grateful for")

School Begins

Another Monday of flower therapy.  It's always a challenge to take the flowers I've ordered ahead of time and find things to add to them at the wholesaler and keep it in budget! Never a dull moment.

I managed two five-mile walks with my neighbors this week. One walk was on a very beautiful foggy morning.

The reservoir looked like a July morning in Maine. 

I've been putting a lot of time and effort into creating my Intro to Nature Journaling mini course which will be sent out free to my newsletter subscribers within the next week! (If you want to subscribe, check out the form on the sidebar - be sure you are signing up for the newsletter and not just to follow the blog by email.) 

Creating the course involved a lot of videoing! 

Laura headed back to school on Thursday to begin fifth grade. She's excited to be back.

Thursday found me back at the flower shop to make 40 market bouquets and 16 bouquets/arrangements for a wedding.

The bride's color choice was stunning!

We hatched two monarch butterflies this week! Such excitement!

 Everyone wants a turn being the one to release the butterfly.

The garden is bringing so much joy right now, especially when we have magnificent skies to go with it!

Happy Monday! I hope you have a good week!