I am trying to remember to come over to the blog and post the recent ruminations from Instagram, as I know many are leaving the service. (I myself left Facebook, yet again, last week.) I don’t think I really have a grasp on how I want to use social media anymore. I know parts of it just leave me feeling absolutely awful. I have been trying to be more intentional in whatever I post, returning to the things that really brought me joy waaaay back when in blogging dinosaur time, which means books, beautiful things, thoughtful words, and art.

The above quote, which I illustrated last week, really hit home that week. I had been wrestling with a ton of miscommunication and unkindness directed my way, and I needed to unpack it and let it go. It has ever struck me, when it comes to forgiveness, that is a life long journey. Christ was quite serious when He said “seventy times seven”- there have been incidences and people in my life that I very much thought I had healed from and had forgiven, and then something twinges, pain in the wound, and I find myself having to work through the process again, and again, and again.

As to the recent reads, I’ll just copy my Instagram post here. I do very much feel a deep post coming on about disability. I think I’ve been dancing around it for a long time, and I think I’m going to work on it privately and then bring what’s fruitful here to the blog.

From Insta:

A small library stack this week. I just finished Sitting Pretty by Rebekah Taussig (@sitting_pretty ) yesterday and tucked my thoughts into Stories. I saved it as a Highlight under Disability. I feel a blog post marinating in my brain lately. There’s stuff that I’ve been wrestling with ever since my first child got diagnosed with a life-long disease, (and then, and then!) and it’s only recently that I’ve begun to understand why it was so difficult to begin with and why there has been so much wrestling. When I read writers who are disabled or are exploring disability, there’s been a lot of “you too?!” moments that have granted a lot of clarity. Anyways, far too much for a little IG caption to explore.

I haven’t started the Austen Years by Rachel Cohen, but I think it’s going to be good. Part of the fly leaf blurb reads “Through Austen’s works, she reckoned with difficult questions about mourning, memorializing, living in a household, attending to the world, reading, writing, and imagining.” Definitely something I can relate to at the moment.

We tend to use the summer to test run new recipes for the family to tuck into the routines for the school year, and so far we haven’t hit a bad one from Instant Family Meals. There’s one for Italian Wedding Soup that is blissfully easy and oh so good.

Around the web:

I have really been enjoying Rebecca Green’s monthly newsletters, and her last two are just chock full of good stuff for creatives and artists. Check them out here and here. I’ve also been greatly enjoying Aimee Kollmansberger’s substack, Homely. Just quiet little notes each day about what’s on her heart: home keeping, homeschooling, rhythms, routines, what she’s learning. They are just little balm bouquets every day and they’ve been really encouraging and inspiring to me.