criticism & what makes you an artist
I received a critical comment on social media a couple of weeks ago. It happens when you share online, and after over 15 years of posting, I’ve gotten used to it and generally have a healthy perspective. Most of the time, I can shrug off the comment. It’s from a stranger on the Internet, and […]
madame mére
I finished yesterday’s post about the Uffizi portrait gallery with a bit of a cliffhanger. I didn’t include the setting, though. This was at Isle of Palms a few weeks ago. Several extended family members live near Charleston, so we visit them (or they visit us) while we’re there. So, my aunt interrupted my story […]
my favorite part of the Uffizi Museum
We are back in Florence, Italy, in today’s blog post, but this story will circle back to Charleston and then to my house in a beautiful, serendipitous story about art. It started with my favorite part of the Uffizi Museum. Let me start off by saying that I loved most things about the Uffizi. The […]
four things | sixty-eight
I didn’t get a Four Things post written last week. There was a lot of catch-up to do after being at the beach for ten days, and my work days just got away from me. As I shared at the beginning of this year, my business is also evolving, and I’m still figuring out how […]
A visit to Charleston, SC
As it so happens, our anniversary has fallen on the boys’ Spring Break the past few years. That means we’re at the Isle of Palms to celebrate, with access to some amazing dining just over the bridge in Charleston. Jeff and I love finding great places to eat, and we spent a lot of time […]
Spring Break Paintings
Painting really is like any other skill or strength-based activity. If you step away from it, even for a few days, there is a bit of dust to knock off when you get back to it. For this reason, I wanted to try to fit in some painting while I was at the beach. Not […]
shell collection competition 2026
The jokes, comments, and ribbing about the shell collection competition started happening the first afternoon we arrived at our rental house on Isle of Palms. I walked out to the beach for our first visit of the vacation and found a small pale gray whelk at the base of the sign at the beach entrance […]
shelling diaries 2026 | part three & “whelk graveyard” map
You can read my 2026 Shelling Diaries Part One HERE and Part Two HERE. Jeff jokingly said we should bring shovels to dig in the whelk graveyard, but then he actually found some decent sand shovels in the garage of our rental house, so it wasn’t really a joke anymore. We were going to visit […]