It appears that I have bathed in dirt and have tracked mud through the newly cleaned kitchen... Oh well...

I tore out all of the corn, cucumbers, zucchini, pumpkins, and potatoes... I don't think it was quite time for the potatoes yet... but I had allowed the plants to wither in the heat and I didn't want the spuds to rot in the ground... I only got about 13 pounds of mixed sizes and colors.... Ill do better next year (as i always seem to convince myself)...

I've got tons of Christmas speckled beans on the vines and noticed several yellow brittle wax beans (i think?) on its vines this morning... Still just the one scarlet runner bean which i cant recall if i mentioned yesterday....

Now i just want to close my eyes...

I have to go to a dinner with two young ladies and an equally aged fellow (equal to me that is) this evening... These things frighten me to pieces. Social anxiety rears its ugly head often in my life... Its my main struggle. Prevents me from living fully most times... A debilitater of near epic proportion. I am a confident person. At least as far as who I am is concerned... But my social abilities are quite another sad sad story. debilitating, what a rough word. But my anxieties are nothing less.... paralyzing.

I get sick of it. But drudge on. what else can I do?

ITS RAINING! well, not any more... but I sat out on the front porch and enjoyed knowing the plants were soaking it up! Our 2 year old neighbor was out running around in it, in just a diaper and matted down curly hair... it was delightful!

We've canceled corn chowder for tonight to have dinner with my parents instead.... but my stove is almost overflowing with a huge pile of corn :)

My hair is soaked with sweat, but i harvested all of the corn from the garden... along with the days ramekin full of raspberries and a handful of volunteer cherry tomatoes.... for lunch I made the best frittata with potatoes, kale, onions and scarlet runner beans (ive gotten only one pod so far- (frowning)... only the onion wasn't from the garden.... i don't know if its the heat in combination with no water or if its just time, but the potato plants seem to be dying back pretty heavily.... i think tonight or tomorrow ill fork up whats there....

Days like this make me not really care that i dont have any friends....

I need a bath...

And my feet are asleep... ha

Even though I felt as though i could fall asleep all day yesterday, when it came time to lay my head down... it still took a couple hours and I woke up several times throughout the night. Im still tired today. Its like i have mono or something... Anyhow, i got up at a reasonable time again today, so hopefully ill do better tonight.

Im planning out a recipe to make corn chowder out of the 10-15 ears of corn we have left on the plants out back. I cant wait to eat it. And i should have enough to freeze some for winter. Not much, but some... Then if i can battle the heat later in the week i plan to rip out many of the older plants and send them to the compost bin... If i can get on the ball and set up the lights in the house i can get fall crops started indoors to plant out in august. Who knows though, with me.... well i can almost say it wont happen.

ohk, my feet are asleep. So thats it for now.

I dragged myself out of bed at 9:30. I realize its not early... but since ive always had such a hard time falling asleep, anytime feels early to me. I keep meaning to work on some new ideas in clay, but i just want to crawl back into bed and shut my eyes... I keep thinking that if I just get up at a regular time each day, maybe Ill start to fall asleep earlier as well... So here's hoping. 

All of the windows are a blur of condensation. It rained only slightly this morning... Which did nothing but add to the humidity and heat. At least Its cloudy so ive been able to open the curtains up here. I hate sitting in the dark every time I come upstairs in the summer...

I just stretched out on the cold wooden floor so me feet would wake back up. I really need to put the desks back together so I can get this computer off the floor... I do use it a lot less now though. Which is certainly a good thing...

I seem to be having less and less energy each day. I wonder why that is. Maybe Ill try only eating vegetables today and see if that helps...

Also, Unbeknownst to her, I was encouraged by Margaux to start work on my longest running idea to make series of  tree identification books and a woodland plant identification book. It would be only of the species living in "my" woods. Its something Ive always wanted to do... I want to take nice photographs of each trees leaves and nuts/seeds/bark during each season of the year and compile them into a book. The photos would be set up sort of botanical illustration style. With a backdrop of blue gray linen. I would hand stitch the names on little cotton tags to pin underneath each variety... I really should get started. I imagine it would take at least a year if not two... 

My favorite trees by the way are river birch, sycamore, willows, and many varieties of oak...

I'm sitting cross legged in front of the computer. Its still sitting on the floor. I took apart the desks for the renegade show back in june and have yet to replace them.... so my feet and legs fall asleep every 5 minutes or so and i move around until i feel something in them again... We leave the curtains up here closed all day in the summer to keep out the heat. So its pretty dark. i just opened one a bit and can see that nice golden color of the late afternoon hitting the ugly cedar out back.

I just got off the phone with my dad. I had been sitting here scribbling budgets and fretting as usual. we don't make much money. but we make enough for me to be happy (except on budgeting days)...anyhow, id gotten myself off task. i was just supposed to budget until the next paycheck but somehow ended up trying to figure what my income has been so far this year as a newly self employed artist.... I need to make $6000 a year to equal what i was getting at the nursery....

so my dad called and i ran my mouth a million miles a minute and he managed to make me feel better. He's good at that.... Stephen should be counting out a cashier cause its the end of the day for him at the nursery... it'll take him a half hour to get home from Stafford to Fredericksburg... I love him. Ill be happy to see him. We were going to have yard sale tomorrow morning but this heat wave is so ridiculous ive canceled it for the 3rd or 4Th week in a row... but that's some stress off my back. I promised my dad id spend an hour tomorrow making things. I need to keep my promises. but im a mess. that's one thing i know for sure...

I suppose if i want people to read this that i should punctuate and divide huge blocks of text into paragraphs. Unfortunately i don't talk in full sentences or paragraphs... this is how it comes out... with ellipses where i take breaths....

that's all for tonight.

So, once again ive left something unfinished. This blog was supposed to hold me accountable. But it, or I, failed. Not that failure is always bad. But since this space didnt work out for its original purpose.... im going to start over here. Here ill be true. Here ill try not to hold back. My other blog is just pretty. This should be real. With nothing held back....

I've been working on this with a mechanical pencil...

While im at work.

So, I started in on a zinnia.

Then quickly gave up when I couldn't locate a pencil sharpener...

Luckily its from a photo, so I can pick up on it later.

I know I used to lean heavily towards the B's,

But I was trying out some H's.

Not my favorite...

I definitely should have waited for sharp pencils 

before working on those tinier bits...

Oh well.

Im not all that proud of this one...

But I am determined to post everything that I draw.

The head is horrid.

Maybe I should just stick to flowers?