snowy day

For much of last week I was down sick, but honestly, I wasn’t even upset about it.

Morally I couldn’t take any more time off of work on my own (since I’d just gotten back to work after my little Christmas vacation), but being passed out with a beautiful sweaty fever for a few days forced me to take some real rest time. Which I really needed. Mentally and physically, I just hadn’t been spending enough quiet time with myself, and I had really been starting to miss it. If I’m being honest, I feel like I’ve been in go-mode since October, and although a lot of positive things have happened since then, I just haven’t had the time to simply allow myself to calm down. Or even process everything that’s happened.

So cue the 12-hours of sleep every night, lazy days, and wasting time while rotting — unshowered — on the couch with a weird feverish rash all over my body (Mom said it was nothing to worry about).

I had the sickly excuse to do absolutely nothing, while feeling no real guilt about it.

Well, okay, there was just a little guilt, since I kept continuing to fall behind on portrait orders that should’ve been out in the mail before the end of 2023. And I might’ve had a small illness-induced breakdown where I cried over never being able to catch up on anything in my life ever again.

(it was very pretty)

But then I emailed my sweet and patient customers, and let them know that I was dying ill on the couch, and after that, I was able to really enjoy being an absolutely useless slug.

Then, in the midst of it all, we were finally blessed with the first real snow of the season.

Imagine: a glorious, lazy, sticky snow that lasted all day, and brought a multitude of birds to our feeders…this is what I wait for during every single one of our New England winters.

So now, with my fresh reminder that I need to keep my very important me time™, I removed the Instagram app from my phone (you guys all know how I feel about social media, and I can never stay active on it for too long. The temptation to actually go the whole way and delete my entire account this time is strong), started getting re-inspired on Pinterest, pulled out my sewing machine, and finished a project or two that have been sitting around my room for months.

It feels so good to have some inspiration flowing again, and for once in my life, I feel like I’m kinda succeeding in attempting to balance work, personal life, and my own hobbies and creativity.

Can I make it last?? Who knows.

But there’s one thing that I do know, and that’s that I misidentified this juvenile male red-winged blackbird as a female red-winged blackbird. An understandable mistake, I think.

The true birder of the family corrected me, and pointed out the bar on his wing, which will turn a vibrant orange in the years to come.

The more you know.