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It continues to surprise and delight me how very easy it is to find beauty when I take the time to notice it. I’m counting on all this beauty to help get me through this coming week. Please join me over on Instagram where #thingofbeautyalong is helping flood our world with the good instead of the bad. We have already accumulated over 130 posts in just three weeks, which delights me to no end. Keep ’em coming!

November 3rd Needlepoint Joint. Back Door. #thingofbeautyalong

November 4th Sky. Bursting. #thingofbeautyalong

November 5thI have the deepest respect for the Juniper tree, sinking its roots into the harshest conditions and flourishing as if it’s no big deal. #thingofbeautyalong

November 6thThis guy. My love, my light, my friend. #thingofbeautyalong

I was just realizing this morning that I have lived in Utah just over half of my life. In those twenty-two years, I have grown used to many things, and yet I do not think I will ever tire of watching the way light mingles in and against the mountains. It still mesmerizes me every single day.

Growing up in Oregon, I don’t remember light being quite this interesting. When the sun rose, it was just up. When the sun set, it gradually just grew dark. There were so many trees everywhere really that I don’t even remember watching the sun actually rise or set unless we were at the coast (which really is a phenomenal experience worthy of poetic ramblings for another day).

But here, in Utah, the sun rises in stages depending on where you are against and in the mountains. Just to the west of this picture, the sun rose almost an hour ago, and yet here, right against the mountain in this particular spot, I have the privilege of watching the sun rise against the mountains to the north while still in the shadows myself for yet another half an hour.

It reminds me of camping as a girl, that slowing down and taking the time to appreciate the beauty of nature all around me. I love that I have the opportunity to do that here just out my back door.

(Immediately after taking this picture, Maggie took off after a deer loping across the path; I was hoping it would show up in the photo…)

Today was a particularly rough day.

Perhaps it was just the inevitable lull that comes after the flurry of getting ready for and hosting two big events in our little home this weekend, but everything about today just felt harder than usual. I just felt raw and weak and anxious. And tired. Really, really tired.

Actually, I think my entire family is tired.

We are the kind of family who I’m sure many people think has our shit together. And we may have it more together than some sometimes. But, at the same time, often our lives feel like we’re spinning plates on canes, keeping our eyes and energy focused just on those plates, keeping them moving lest they all come crashing to the ground. We each do so much. And, I think every single one of us thinks we should be doing more. Each of us worries about what we’re not doing and questioning the choices we’ve made. All of the time. It’s exhausting.

And, I know we’re not alone. We are in no way unique. But, sometimes it takes recognizing that fact, over and over again, to make days like today a little easier. Everyone has their own struggles, their own anxieties and doubts, their own kind of busy, that makes some days just plain hard.

Sometimes all it takes is taking the time to look up. 

I almost missed this sky. I was so focused on filling out my planner and catching up with social media on my phone as I waited for the girls to get out of school, lamenting about my stomach hurting and about the optical shop screwing up my new glasses, that I was holed up in my car as if my world existed only within the confines of my CRV.

Fortunately, my world is much bigger than that. Thankfully, I looked up with enough time to see this amazing sky and remind myself of that.

Here are the photos I posted on Instagram in the past two weeks that didn’t make it to the blog:

October 23 
A bit of honey harvest  #thingofbeautyalong

October 24
Democracy   #thingofbeautyalong

October 26Doesn’t matter the season, this is perennially one of my very favorite spots on the mountain.   #thingofbeautyalong

October 28More Mags in the mountains   #thingofbeautyalong

October 29 Fall is just showing off now. Beauty is absolutely everywhere.   #thingofbeautyalong

October 30Spending the day baking fresh soudough bread and making pots of soup for Halloween night is one of my favorite traditions.   #thingofbeautyalong

Sometimes, a staycation is the very best kind of vacation.

So far, we’re off to a good start!

(For more description on #thingofbeautyalong, please refer to this post.)

I cannot help myself. These prolific Maximillian Sunflowers deserve another post.

Like clockwork, every year they surprise me with their tremendous growth and unfortunate timing.  I planted some seeds a few years ago, have given starts to multiple neighbors and friends, and yet every year they multiply by the hundreds. They grow all summer long, slowly and yet aggressively, without any additional water beyond the infrequent rain they receive during the arid Utah summers. They grow to heights that reach well over seven feet tall, with twenty to thirty blooms per stalk, often growing so tall and full with blooms that their stalks can’t handle their own weight, causing them to flump over pathetically.

I always feel sorry for them, blooming so big and so late. It’s almost like they’ve put so much energy into impressively growing that they’re late to their own party. By the time they bloom, it’s usually well-past anything else blooming in the garden, leaves are falling, and most years they burst open right before wind, hail, rain, or snow prematurely end their season.

Of course, this makes me love them, too. I love that they seem to spend a summer of effort in order to be my garden’s masterpiece, and yet if they just didn’t need to grow quite so big or develop quite so many blooms, they could bloom earlier and last longer.

But that’s not the way of the Maximillian Sunflower. So I will just continue to love these giants for as long as they last each year.

Maximillian Sunflowers are the final bloom of the garden, always coming into their own just before (or sometimes just during) the first storm of winter moves into town. Annually, this makes their bloom that much sweeter, to know that its beauty is so temporary before its large stalks are crushed by snow or wind or rain.

For today, though, its blooms are vibrant and perfect as if it were only an early day in September and many warm days were yet to come.

The sky always seems so much brighter after a storm, doesn’t it?

This picture was just before the sky opened up…