I sit in the garden and watch the robins taking turns on the nest in the birch tree. The nest is perched in a crotch of branches high above my patio. It doesn’t look very secure, but I’ve watched it hold tight when its windy. One robin swoops to the branch and the other plunges away. A few minutes later they switch. And switch again.

Last week I wrote about how making time for doing nothing, for rest, and for savoring the joys of summer is important for well-being and creativity.

And then a funny thing happened.

“Summer afternoon — summer afternoon; to me those have always been the two most beautiful words in the English language.”

—Henry James

Ah, summer. Here in Wisconsin summer is well and truly here.

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.

I talk about JOY a lot. The word is up there in my logo. It write about JOY in my blog posts. I describe my paintings with the word and when you sign up for my newsletter I send you a set of Joy Lists as a thank you. On top of that, I call my newsletter a JOYLetter.

This week I painted bleeding hearts with the paint I mixed last week.

It’s lovely to be working with flowers from the garden again. But it’s also been a bit frustrating trying to get back into a groove of art-making and gardening and all the other stuff that life demands.

It’s another rainy day today. Last week I wrote about making time for the garden, but since then I haven’t been able to spend much time outside. It’s been too wet and cold.

I’ve been thinking a lot about patience. I’d say I’m a fairly patient person.

I haven’t yet gotten around to painting more tulips. I’ve been a little busy. But also standing firm against overwhelm. I’m determined to take my days slow and to enjoy the spring. Oh how I love this time of year. The relief from winter. Being able to play with flowers and dig in the dirt.

Over the past week I was painting tulips. I’ve painted tulips before. Even earlier this year from a grocery store bouquet.

This time I was so excited to be working on a painting with flowers from my garden. The first time this season.

I came back from a trip to Seattle at 2 am on Wednesday morning and since then I’d been struggling to get back into the swing of things.

That is, until I realized that I could let go of the pressure to do, do, do and give myself time to rest and readjust.

I’m taking a little break and soaking up some inspiration.

I hope you are taking time to savor life’s joys, whatever you might be doing. Even on an ordinary day we can find things to celebrate.

Today I’m taking over the Carve Out Time for Art Instagram account. I’m so honored to have been asked to share my day with that creative community. Carve Out Time for Art was created by Marissa Huber and Heather Kirtland and this is what they have to say about it:

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.

Today is my birthday. I love birthdays. When I was a child my mom always made them so special. I guess I never let go of the joy of celebrating my day.

Spring might be on its way (according to meteorologists it’s already here), but it certainly doesn’t feel like it in Wisconsin. Does it feel like spring where you are?

When I’m planning, I write blog topics for the week on my calendar, often scheduling the whole month at once. Sometimes those topics will be crossed out or directed with arrows to other weeks. Because inspiration supersedes planning, sometimes a post will bounce from week to week to week before I finally get around to it and then sometimes by the time I sit down to write the post, I can’t entirely remember what I wanted to say.

Somehow January has come and now is almost gone. Are you feeling on top of your goals or is overwhelm starting to settle in?

The other day I realized that although I had ideas for what I wanted to do in the coming year I hadn’t sat down to plan anything.

I’ve had a lot of thoughts swirling around in my head this week. I’m going to try untangling them here, though perhaps they might get messier in the process. I’d love for you to jump in with your thoughts, too.

Happy New Year!

I love this time of year. The feeling of being a bit out of time. The chance it gives for reflection and planning. It’s hopeful. Energizing. Anything feels possible at this time of year.

Reviewing a whole year is a hard thing. Once you sit down to do it you realize how slippery a year can be. How difficult to contain with words or even photos.