Usually in October I say goodbye to my garden for the season. I gather my last harvests. Cut as many flowers as I can before frost blackens the plants. It’s a bittersweet time of year.

June! Oh, June. What a magical month.

I’m grateful for all these late-season flowers. Not just for me, but for my garden visitors, too. Bees. Butterflies. I still see hummingbirds every day, zooming from flower to flower.

It’s hard for me to believe the days were sunny and warm and my flowers were blooming only a week ago.

When I’m planning my garden for the year I always like to consider my garden from the year before.

When I woke up on Wednesday the temperature was 43. The warmest we’ve seen this year. On my morning walk I didn’t need a hat. Chickadees and cardinals sang their delight at the taste of spring in the air.

The next day it was more than 30 degrees colder.

Wednesday morning I woke up and checked the temperature. Negative 19 degrees Fahrenheit with a wind chill of negative thirty-two. It was our second day in a row of bitter cold.

The wind shrieks a puff of snow off the roof and as I step outside the storm door shatters an icicle onto the stairs.

Back in January I wrote a list of intentions for the year. First in my journal. Then in my sketchbook. And again on a separate piece of paper that I hung in my studio. The very first intention on the list: “Live a holistically creative life”.

We’re already more than half-way into January. How have things been going for you so far?

About this time of year when the garden is at its height I begin making notes for next year. What I want to grow more of. What I forgot to grow. What I’d like to try. Today I’m sharing the first of a series of posts about some of my favorite plants to grow (and paint). I’d love for you to join in and share some of your favorites, too.

We’ve been having cold nights for a while now. We’ve even had snow. Except for a few hardy growers, my garden is finished for the year.

At the end of the season (and in truth, even during the season) I’m looking forward to next year’s garden.