i’m sure you have noticed that although we have been back in the states for two weeks, i have continued to post some photos that i shot in a surge of last minute adrenaline as we were packing up in france to come back home to minnesota. partly, i wanted to document as much as i could of a place i so dearly love. but also, i knew i was coming home to a frozen landscape with an overabundance of brown twigs for the next two months. and i also knew i would need a few days to get back into my STILL rhythm. it took a few days longer than i thought, but i think i’m finally there. or should i say here? i feel fully present in minnesota again, and suddenly i can see.

winter milkweed

saint paul, minnesota

we’ve been home for a couple of weeks, but i am having a hard time getting back into a really productive creative routine. i have been preoccupied taking care of a backlog of “administra-trivia” that got ignored while we were away. things like doctors visits, orthodontic consults, deferred home maintenance, etc. but, if i am perfectly honest, i have also been preoccupied with feathering my nest. it feels good to be back among my things, organized in a way that makes sense to me, and that fits how we live our lives. as comfortable as we may feel in france, we are still renters there, which is not the same as being in your own space, among your own books and kitchen gadgets. so i have been reveling a bit in my role as returned mistress of the castle, putting her domain in order. no, the measuring spoons go there, dear. no not there . . . there.

abandoned nest

autignac, languedoc, france

yup, i know. a heart on valentine’s day is not very “still blog.” but if mother nature makes it, can it really be sappy? well, like it or not, i present you with amour-en-cage for valentine’s day. i hope you have a full and loving one. my husband, steve, is a tax preparer, so we will be celebrating with a dinner in front of the fire after his seventh client of the day leaves around 7:30 PM. and then we will very romantically fall dead asleep.

love in a cage (physalis peruviana)

autignac, france

after our first 40 degree day of the new year, i am feeling the first ragged melting of winter that will eventually result in the puddles, and burst buds, and daffodil shoots of spring. i know there are several snowfalls to go. and some more below zero weather. but i can see the other side from here. land ho.

thistle seeds

autignac, france

my son has discovered action movies, which means he’s working through die hard and bourne and the marvel and dc comics superheroes. he is 13 and just starting puberty and enjoys unmoved he can make himself appear about the tension and violence in these movies. he simultaneously enjoys how unnerved these movies make his mother. but then he watched the movie alien, and then the relentless and terrifying sequel aliens, whose monster looks a little like this octopus. and one night i woke up and there he was in bed with me, in need of a sidekick to help him fight off the aliens in his head.

octopus

mediterranean sea near valras, languedoc, france