oxygen

 April has been a beautiful month in so many ways, but also a hard month.  I'm exhausted!  And somehow I feel completely depleted and defeated and poor and hopeful and rich all at the same time.  Leave it to life to be complex and surprising, every day.  At the beginning of the month, I was so stressed that I couldn't take a deep breath... my lungs just wouldn't expand quite enough.  But the past week or so I've been able to enjoy delicious lung-fulls of air.  If nothing else, good old oxygen will keep you going!

redbud branch

Just finished painting this redbud branch.  I love how the emerging leaves are an orange-tinged green.  It is a beautiful afternoon, still and warm, with a soft blanket of gray clouds promising evening rain showers.  

my brother

I don't know how people live without brothers, or with bad ones.  Somehow I got a really, really good one who can make me laugh even when I feel terrible, and who is willing to come balance on a banister and hang up my shop sign after already working a long day.  Thank you, Trey!