we bought our daughter a birch tree for one of her single digit birthdays, back when she loved trees the way some girls love puppies. we were warned at the nursery to plant and tend the birch very carefully, because, in the words of the arborist, “birches are drama queens.” here we are a decade or so later, and, to our enormous relief, our 17 year old daughter is not a drama queen, but her birch tree just started turning yellow this week, several weeks early, as a way of complaining, somewhat passive-agressively, about its treatment at our hands. it might be hot, or thirsty, or too shaded. we don’t know. we just know there’s a lot of drama.

two birch trees

saint paul, minnesota

this grid of acorns is all from the same oak tree that overhangs our rear deck. this makes them all siblings, of a sort, and so, without realizing it, i happened upon the perfect picture today, to illustrate the list i promised you yesterday–the list about all the little seeds of creativity that STILL blog has inadvertently planted over the past three years, and which have popped up in the most unexpected places.

i ended up getting a bit preoccupied today so i didn’t have time to pull together an exhaustive list, but even so, look at all of STILL blog’s little babies:

• websites
• logos
• brochures
• animated films
• book covers
• fan fiction
• daily planners
• graduate theses in design
• trend analyst reporting
• cd covers
• home textiles (bed, bath, kitchen, table and pillows)
• wall hangings
• art prints on paper, canvas, and acrylic
• stationery
• scientific presentations
• gay pride posters
• homeschooling curriculum
• magazine features
• content for online blogs
• hangtags
• zines
• inspo for oil paintings
• inspo for jewelry designers
• material for plaigerists

if, off the top of my head, i were try to populate a global map of the locations of these various projects, here are where a few of the pins would land: estonia, russia, tasmania, vietnam, australia, germany, isreal, serbia, france, canada, england, switzerland, italy, spain, singapore, south africa, and of course, the united states.

that’s what one mom, with a puggle and a camera, can do with 20 minutes a day. all those days add up to years, and all those images add up to lots of little offspring all over the world. it’s as important to look back and take a deep, satisfied breath every once in a while, as it is to keep chasing the next project. let’s all take a reflective collective breath today.

acorns from the same oak tree

saint paul, minnesota

“ok, everyone get down here!” called my husband when this palm-sized fellow meandered out from the lower level shower stall onto the bathmat at his feet. we all ran downstairs and duly admired steve’s bravery although, of course, he was never in any trouble, and this is a nearly harmless spider unless you are either a large insect or a tiny minnow. as i’ve discussed before, we are the kind of household that competes not to be the first to squish the spiders in our house, but to find the gentlest means of escorting them out the patio door. as a result, there is a very good chance this gentleman is still alive, somewhere nearby, quite possibly back in the lower level shower, where he might get to test my husband’s bravery again sometime soon.

large fishing spider

saint paul, minnesota

red is festive. red is eye catching. red is the color of popsicles and cherries and watermelon. red is the color of tomatoes. red is a summer color. summer i tell you. pay no attention to the man behind the curtain…

bits of autumn at the end of summer

saint paul, minnesota