This Perfectly Imperfect Life

While I may be taking a break from the ole blog here, and writing in general, you can still find me over on the Instagram by clicking on "View On Instagram" in the right-hand column!

#READSavannah has come & gone, and I have so much to tell you, but first I have to finish wrapping my mind around it all.  A big shout-out to Marybeth Mayhew Whalen and Ariel Lawhon of SheReads for making it happen! What an amazing and inspiring experience. The people I met - readers and authors alike! If I go on there will just be too many "!!!" right now. (And please send some healing love & prayers out to Marybeth who hit a "bump in the road" so to speak on her way home from Savannah). *I already had Truly Madly Guilty, but since #LianeMoriarty was the keynote and it's her latest, I had to include it here! (She signed The Husband's Secret).

The Perfectly Imperfect Homestead. Sweet Potato Chip macaron from the bakery downtown.  I am thankful for the simple, quiet beauty of November, and for simple pleasures like a sweet treat with a cuppa tea.

A sample of blooms for the week ending Thursday, 4/23/15. It has been a crazy week weather wise, from Summer warmth to flooding rain and thunderstorms to frost and freeze watches and warnings! Most everything seems to be doing alright, although, whatever was iffy before this crazy weather week (like my 2 Julia Child floribunda roses!) may be done for, despite 2 strait nights of covering them for protection against a freeze. But, we'll see. The Weeping Cherries have been putting on such a show this year, I cannot get enough! Photos upon photos, of course! What's blooming in your garden this week?

Forsythia, bush, perennial. Pansies, annual. English Daisies, perennial. Potting up perennials on the front porch, English Daisies (left), Violas (right). More English Daisy shots, back patio, perennial. Pansy, annual. Violas, perennial. Week Ending 4/16/15. What's blooming in your garden this week?

This place! This place has my heart. Hook, line and sinker.  It's ironic - we live on the coast, minutes away from the bayshore and shore, and my heart belongs to these mountains.* Yes, New Jersey has mountains!  When we are up here, in this area, in these mountains, I am home . Or maybe it's more accurate to say that my soul is home? I don't know how else to explain how I feel when we are up here.  Sadness knocks at my heart when it is time to leave, and once back on the coast, I am overwhelmed by heartbreaking homesickness ! That homesickness is downright awful if we've been up here for more than a few days.   I struggled through snow past my knees and even up to my waist in spots to get from our camper to the dock, my favorite morning spot when we're up, but I was too exhausted given all the trekking through snow yesterday (plus a night at the Worst Motel Ever - more on that another time) and this morning just to get to the camper (because ap...

I wish I could have stood in this spot, listening to the creek and basking in the late winter sun longer... But, The Portable Homestead rascals were building a snow fort to my left and ever so inconspicuously chatting about whether or not I was trying to spy on them in their fort! (lol) So I moved along after taking this photo.  I've been feeling anything but well all week, including today, and now on top of that I feel I may be coming down with a cold or another round of strep. I have been in A Lot of pain. A. Lot. Neck to toes. My first IV session since October is this coming March 31st, but it's going to take at least a couple of sessions to get back on track at this point. But, I needed to be outside for a while today, despite the cold, and went around taking care of ice patches on the less than sunny side of The Portable Homestead. Some of the ice is so thick, the Marine will have to take of it later or tomorrow. I'm not strong enough physically, espe...

Going back to 5/24/13 when I brought Gertrude Jekyll, a David Austin rose (my first DA) home. A birthday present to myself. I couldn't stop taking photos of her!  She was coming back strong last season (2014), until a very late cold snap, and she never recovered. Debating on replacing her with another this year. I'm not sure it will be in the budget (if there even is a gardening budget this year, that remains to be seen), but I do miss Gertrude so! I think she and Julia Child would get along famously, although I'm afraid Queen Elizabeth is getting a tad put off by being surrounded by other famous women ;-)   Do you have a favorite rose you once grew that you no longer have in your garden?

Because I am missing this view so very much since being home on the coast, I am going back two weeks ago, to the bitter cold 28* Halloween morning when I sat on our dock and took this quick video. I bundled up in whatever layers I had so I could spend time here in my favorite spot, despite the cold, because our week at the camper was ending the next day.  Coming out to the dock after waking each morning and before breakfast had quickly become a morning routine during that week, and while I look forward to many more mornings like those in the future, I am missing this view, missing my mountains, deeply each day in the meantime. (I apologize for how blurry it is! It wasn't when I uploaded it but it was after posting. Click here for a clear version of the video).

November 8 I am thankful for inspiration and positive reinforcement in unexpected places at unexpected times. November 9 I am thankful for good days like this one spent with the Marine, not doing anything particularly special, but because we were together, and with friends off and on, the day was special. (And it flew by too quickly!)

I am thankful for sunsets. Their changing beauty fills me with joy every time! These are the views from our front porch earlier this evening! (Almost late afternoon really with the sun setting before 5pm). 

It has been a rough couple of weeks (scroll to previous post or click here ), and this Thursday was an awful living with disease day, but this week has also been a productive one writing wise. Usually in the morning, after I wake and before morning pages journaling and breakfast, I add my favorite moments of the previous day (or what I was most thankful for the previous day, or a goal I want to accomplish) to my happiness jar. (For the down low on happiness jars, click here  to be taken to author Elizabeth Gilbert's post).  As I was finishing up my note paper for Tuesday, 10/7, the day I had an MRI after which I was in awful pain, I wrote down "Finding books I have had on my list for some time on the bargain rack! Simplest pleasures = greatest joy!!!"  Simplest pleasures = greatest joy.   I continued writing about this in my journal. In a nutshell: Simplest Pleasures = Greatest Joy will be a new featured post here at The Portable Homestead an...