Sun streams in through the window and I curl up on a comfy chair in my studio, a book balanced on my lap.

Sounds nice, doesn’t it?

In reality…

Today’s Sips of Inspiration conversation is with my long-time blogging friend Karen Lowry Reed.

Today’s Sips of Inspiration chat is with Laura Bray. Laura is an embroidery artist living in the Pacific Northwest.

Today marks the half-year point for Sips of Inspiration, but instead of going ahead with my next interview, I wanted to do two things.

First I want to revisit my WHY. And second I want to check in with you, my dear readers.

I am so grateful you are here!

This month’s Sips of Inspiration interview was really fun for me. Today I’m chatting with Laura Ashton who is also a gardener and botanical illustrator.

I’m delighted to be sharing another Sips of Inspiration interview with you today. This month’s conversation is with Ishrat Khawja. Ishrat hand-dyes beautiful yarns in her home in the UK.

I’m back with another interview, the second in my monthly Sips of Inspiration series.

Today I’m chatting with Melanie April Houten.

How are you holding up? What a week it’s been over here. You, too?

My feelings are up and down. My energy is up and down. I’m giving myself leeway and taking things one day (sometimes one moment) at a time. It’s all we can do, I think.

Escaping into the world of a book always seems to help.

A couple weeks ago I announced I would be interviewing artists in a new monthly series. And today I’ve released the first installment!

I am so excited to finally be sharing a project I’ve been working on for a while. First in the dreaming stage, more recently in the DOing stage.

And today with an official announcement.

It’s been a while since I’ve shared a hodgepodge sort of post. Most of the time I only share inspiring links in my monthly Joy Letters*, but there’s no reason not to share some here once in a while, too (like Dana does with her Lovely Things posts).

I’ve been feeling so inspired lately. My garden is providing me with abundant painting ideas, but more than that, it seems everywhere I look I see beauty and find encouragement from people who are living authentic, creative lives.

My friend Ruby recently wrote a blog post about reclaiming the word creativity and it got me thinking. To be honest, it fired me up. I love discussions like this. I love thinking about and talking about creativity. I wrote a response to Ruby on her blog and then I thought I’d take my thoughts and craft them into a blog post of my own to extend the conversation.

You may have noticed that I'm posting on a Tuesday instead of my usual Friday. I'm working on sharing some shorter posts between my regular posts. I'm not sure how often I'll do this, but it's fun to experiment and try some new things in this new space.

And speaking of trying new things, I've been contemplating starting up another interview series. What do you think? Do you enjoy reading interviews with creative women who are living their dreams?

Starting this new blog has been so energizing. Although a fresh start wasn't my intention when I moved to blogging on my website, it's been a surprising consequence. The thought of having a fresh space to craft into whatever I want has filled me with ideas. I'm excited to share some new posts with you. But first I wanted to talk a bit about blogs and blogging.