Summer 2021: Life in Photos, Settling In

Greetings, Internetlings!

Tobias , the animals, and myself are settling in nicely to our new headquarters and home. Our new pup, Jadzia, is learning basic obedience and training and is doing very well! Our older dog, Bullett, has never been happier with a yard and fellow canine companion after eight years of living in cramped apartments in the city. Eowyn and Jadzia are getting gradually more comfortable with each other every day. Eowyn is doing well managing her space and comfort zones (especially with all the recent changes), and is a patient, good sport when Jadzia decides to run at her with all that crazy, in-your-face puppy energy.

I am working on putting together my studio, which is clearly a marathon and not a sprint. Same goes for the rest of the house as we’ve been extremely busy this summer. It’s just flown by! I hope to savor every day of the season that I can. I especially need to get going on my pollinator garden, I hope to have more updates on that soon, but of course everything is a clean slate at this house when it comes to any landscaping and gardening so I figure each year will be better for it following this first one.

My butterfly season was small, short, and sweet due to the fact that we moved. I started my season by bringing in a few eggs from a visit to Madison and then whatever I found on my milkweed here. I only lost one, and released 18 of them.

In August we went on our annual trip to Wisconsin’s Northwoods. We missed out last year due to the pandemic, so it was so good to be back at the lodge. This was Jadzia’s first trip, and she did so well with the car ride and both dogs were very well-behaved for the most part. Jadzia went on her first hike which ended up being a bit longer and more rigorous than expected due to the fallen trees on the paths from the recent storms, but she handled it like a champ.

A week after vacation, we added a 16-week-old black kitten to our family and named her Umbra. She is also a delight, and it only took a few days for her and Eowyn to become introduced. Now Eowyn has someone who can play with her like a kitty, and we gained another sweet furry creature in our family that we love so much.

I mentioned that our July was busy. Tobias put out his 2nd book, we launched our podcast to the public, and we went to our first conference (Haunted America) since February of 2020. As awesome as this ride has been, we wouldn’t complain if things slowed down a little come this fall and winter. We are trying to savor the fleeting summer days we have left.

Lastly, I’ve been very bad about posting to my plant instagram and Youtube. Have I mentioned it’s been a chaotic summer? Anyways, I am actually in the process of registering my pollinator garden as a Monarch Waystation! I’ve changed the direction of my plant instagram to focus on it. Follow it here, and for houseplants follow my personal instagram.

It’s a tough feeling mourning summer and wanting to cherish these warm, sunny days but also being excited for autumn and the goodness that comes with it. I’ll just go with the flow, I think! I did plant mums outside already, though!

Until the next seasonal update,

~Emily