My four things this week – Blooms, “I’m farming”, little by little, and rainy day painting…

what I’m reading

I received the most beautiful book in the mail this week – French Country Cottage In Bloom, the latest book by Courtney Allison.  I’ve known Courtney for years, since my early days of blogging, and I’ve loved watching her bring her incredible styling and photography to books.  I own all of them and love looking through them, especially for ideas for styling flowers and tables.  She is brilliant at both, and that brilliance is undoubtedly on display in this book.

what I’m watching

Clarkson’s Farm Season 4 is now available!  This is one of our favorite shows on TV.  It is funny, heartwarming, and a realistic look at the difficulties of making a living for local farmers.  I enjoy watching how earnestly Jeremy and Lisa work at farming and running a business, even if they don’t always get it right.  They are willing to test out ideas even when others are shaking their heads.  I also love how the show highlights young farmers like Kaleb and Harriet, who have an insane amount of knowledge about tractors, farm animals, crops, and how to fix and build things.  It really is impressive.

This show champions the plight of the small UK Farmer, and Jeremy uses his platform to support his neighboring farms who are struggling under overregulation, rising seed and fertilizer prices, and weather, among other issues.   He highlights those, acknowledging he’s a newcomer who doesn’t depend on the success of his farm for a living.  Jeremy and his “cast” are also hilarious together.  I was telling Jeff I don’t know if they could’ve gotten it more perfect if it were an actual casted and scripted sitcom.  Some shows are lightning in a bottle, and this is one of those, in my opinion.

As a warning, if you’re thinking this is a great show for the kids, Clarkson’s Farm does have a TV-MA rating.  There is liberal use of the f-bomb among other words and some raunchy humor about farm animal reproduction.  I do wish they would clean it up a bit so everyone could enjoy this show, but the redeeming qualities outweigh the negatives for me.

what I’m loving

“Little by little, a little becomes a lot.” – Tazanian Proverb

This quote has come to mind as I’ve been working in the garden during the flurry of spring activity.  It’s amazing what can be accomplished in an hour or even 30 minutes.  On beautiful days, I often work outside for several hours in the evenings, but on busy days or when the weather is finicky, giving the yard just a little bit of time can eventually add up to big changes.

Whatever you’re working on, keep going, little by little…

what I’m working on

We had gorgeous weather early in the week, so I spent as much time outside as I could.  The rain came in on Tuesday afternoon, though, and finally passed this morning.  So, I’ve been taking the rainy days to make soup and catch up on some commissioned pet portraits.  Here are my two most recent pups…