Just a week ago, I spent the last few days of my "away time" with my sister and best friend, Denise. As with most of the country, it was "stupid hot." No other words for it.

We spent a great deal of time just rocking on her back deck, beginning our days with cereal and coffee or tea, and ending them in the cooler night air and sharing a glass of wine, curled up in our chairs and chatting about everything and nothing. I could just see these flowers from where I sat, and the bright colors made me smile.

Today brought temps in the high eighties, and I've felt like moving for the first time in days. I'm determined to scale down my stash in the art studio; I could not use all my stuff if I made art 24 hours a day for the next year! And, so, much of it will find a new home elsewhere, and I'm keeping what I truly love and what I know I will use. Whatever stays needs to fit both those categories, but I imagine I'll do another purge in a few months. I still have an abundance of goodies, but I really do need to get a grip on my "stuff," art room and otherwise. I'm promising myself that I'll live "lighter."

More time tomorrow for the destashing, and I suspect the next day as well. I often watch our Alex, busily moving the same objects to a new spot and then back again. Lather. Rinse. Repeat. When I realized that we basically occupied the same page here, I had to giggle. Right now I'm at the stage where it looks far worse than when I began, but I'm focused on a path right now. There's art to be created, photographs to be shot and edited, journals to be made and written in. And, I can't really do any of it well, when I'm struggling to find what I need. I have a list of goals, and this is my first. It's the least pleasant of all of them, and the one I'd rather skip right over. When I get overwhelmed, I retreat and read a bit, or allow myself some fun time reading a few blogs or editing a few pictures, then, back I go. Several trash bags have been dumped, others filled for a Goodwill run. And, I'm thinking I may just journal in a bit!