My favorite photo – in the fall. Be still my heart.
Celebrating ten years of this beautiful space which has held and nurtured my heart, helping me expand and evolve.
Every time I walk through the Victorian style screen door of this 10 x 12 quaint space that sits off the corner of my deck, it feels like a warm embrace from Spirit, supporting me in what matters to my heart.
It was a thrill a few years ago when the term “she shed” and what became a trend that took off like a rocket in the media and I was interviewed about my space on a morning show out of Australia. I was also featured on Today.com and ABC.com, but best of all was the interview a local news station did. While I didn’t have the landscaping as I do now in the photo, and my deck accessories have become a bit more simplified, I absolutely loved this interview from the summer of 2015.
Little did I know this would be a trend, as I was a wee bit ahead of my time. And my little cottage in my little corner of the world has certainly seen its changes inside and out. My writing cottage was a labor of love constructed by my husband, John, and my selling of a car I loved, to help pay for the materials. All to support my love of writing which has now expanded to my love of supporting others through my oracle readings and guidance sessions.
Two children’s books, two memoirs, and a third memoir in the works I’ve written within this space. And countless women I’ve connected with around the world within this space via the internet whether to talk about writing, animals, oracle cards, workshops, and so much more…oh, what fun it has been!
So in celebration, I share this, my favorite photo of my sweet writing cottage in the fall. Most of all, I hope it inspires you to follow those niggles and nudges within your heart of what is calling you!
XO,
Barbara
Subscribe to my newsletter here for a bi-monthly digest of my blog posts, plus oracle readings, and more and/or Subscribe here to receive my blog posts as they are published.
While my writing cottage is olive-green, the green spotlight shining on it at night, decked out for the holidays, it casts this lovely magical glow. Don’t you just want to open that Victorian screen door and step inside for a cup of hot cocoa?
Since 2009 I’ve spent countless hours in this 10 x 12 cozy and quaint space my husband, John lovingly built for me. Two children’s books, one how-to book, and two memoirs have been written within these four walls. Not to mention the oodles of blog posts and newsletters too!
Speaking of books, I’m closing in on the first draft of my third memoir, I’m Fine Just the Way I Am. I hit the 100 typed pages mark today. Not that I’m necessarily basing this book on a page count. But it’s a nice marker to know in that my last two memoirs were 120 typed pages (before formatted in book layout form). Also gauging it on what I’ve written so far, the notes I’ve taken along the way of what I want to include, and the rough outline I created at the beginning, I’m at this delicious point of seeing a light at the end of the tunnel.
But don’t get me wrong… I have a long ways to go yet. After this first draft is complete, I will dive back in to shape it until I feel it is good for an editor’s eyes to read. But it feels so good to be to this point.
Today I wrote a section for the book about how I came to realize I wasn’t always honoring Gidget’s needs. Not an easy thing to admit or write about. But it’s something I came to observe about myself and my needs and felt it important to share.
Every morning, for many years, since Frankie, then Joie, and now Gidget, when I was ready to get to work, I’d tuck a dachshund under my right arm and out to my writing cottage I’d go. It was always comforting to have a dog companion with me as I spend so much time alone.
But as things unfolded for Gidget and I and the inner focus I was called to do this year because of Gidget and what she was trying to help me understand, I came to see Gidget in a new way.
This book, unlike the others before them, has been written without Gidget holding space for me within my writing cottage. I came to realize this year that perhaps it wasn’t her thing. While it was difficult at first, when I let go and allowed her to make her own choice and she more often than not, chooses not to be in my writing cottage with me.
While I miss seeing her sweet face within this space, the fun part is that when I do make trips into the house, which I do often, there are times she comes bouncing around the corner to see me. So it’s happy little reunions like this throughout the day that always make me smile.
I can’t help but think too that as women we don’t always value time for ourselves or really appreciate the importance of it. While I’ve written about, and talked about this often over the years, I’ve had much to learn too. While I don’t have kids, my dogs, have at times, filled in the gap for my emotional needs.
It’s made me examine myself more closely and has had me paying more attention to what it is that Gidget may need that I wasn’t allowing her to experience because of my needs. More often than not these days, she chooses to stay in the house while I work in my writing cottage. This past summer she chose to lie on the deck and rarely spent time in my writing cottage.
I’ll admit this took some getting used to on my part. I had to sit with my feelings of not feeling rejected, and I while I do miss her being in this space with me, more often than not, my heart feels good in honoring her space and what she needs. And in turn? It makes me appreciate all the more of what it is I need too.
Thank you, as always, for being part of my community here. I’m so grateful!
My writing desk and over-sized chair where I meditate and also like to read.
For about three weeks I kept pushing aside the yearning I had to re-arrange my writing and creative cottage. This 10 x 12 space that sits off the corner of my deck and feels like a giant hug each time I walk through the Victorian screen door.
Earlier this spring I purged what I no longer needed in this space as I believe when we discard what no longer serves us, it allows for new creativity to come into our lives.
But it had been awhile since I re-arranged the furniture. There are only so many ways in which I can position all the pieces, but this feeling of moving things around kept beckoning.
Sunday and in the wee early hours, lying awake in bed there was this voice again, Time to move things around in the cottage. And what followed next I struggled a few hours with (though in reality I’d been giving thought to this for a long time). I heard that it was time for me to also let go of some of my Frankie photos and memorabilia. I felt some resistance, but I promised myself I’d take it into consideration.
Later in the morning after procrastinating for a time, I answered that intuitive call and out to my cottage I went to begin the task of making it anew.
I have a tall free-standing bookshelf, my writing desk, what I call my analog desk (where I do my daily oracle readings for myself and where I create in my art journal), an over-sized wicker chair with matching ottoman, 3-drawer side table, and a chest on wheels. My petite gas stove stays permanently fixed in the northwest corner. It’s quite a few pieces to have contained in this small space, but somehow I manage to make it all work, even though it has its limits on what I can do.
My analog table where I work on art journaling plus each morning after meditation pull an oracle card (or two or three!) and journal.
I moved some pieces onto the deck so I could more easily move other’s around. Then I took down all the photos of Frankie and the memorabilia I had on two of the walls. From there I decided what would stay and what could go, but not before taking a photograph of what I was letting go. Two went into storage downstairs and one I put on the wall in the living room, while five other remain in my writing cottage. This feels right.
Over the years I’ve been making shifts away from my identity solely being about my life and my work I’d done with Frankie and disabled dogs. It hasn’t always been easy, but I remind myself it’s because of Frankie and then Joie, and now Gidget, that I am who I am today.
I have no doubt Frankie and Joie are happy, and blessing me from the other side, that I continue to spread my wings and learn to fly in new ways. As for Gidget, well, she was another pivotal marker in guiding me to this new space of acceptance. That story is yet to come and what I am in the throws of with writing a new book.
Part of my letting go of some of the Frankie items was that over three years ago I set the intention to open to the wisdom of all animals, which I owe to the dogs in my life for all they taught to me. And so one-by-one (unlike two-by-two with Noah’s Ark!) I’ve been bringing other animal totems, photos and images into this place I hold so sacred. Animals that have come into my life via guided meditations, in the wild, through animal readings, and those I just feel drawn to for some reason or another.
Looking around my room as I write this now I realize all the different critters that surround me! There is, dragonfly, wolf, mouse, owl, ladybug, birds, horse, musk ox, butterfly, donkey, dolphin, pig, whale, turtle, salamander, deer, lion, tiger, leopard, flamingo, frog, giraffe, squirrel, snake, cat and dragon. They are now, along with my dog friends present and past, with me as I write and create.
A cozy spot for a guest to sit or a place to collect magazines and books to read.
The past, and those items attached with it, I know, not always easy to let go of physically and emotionally. But when we lovingly and gently let go, while blessing all of it for helping shape us into who we are, not only is that a gift that stays with us always, but it then opens a new channel of opportunity for more gifts to find us.
After everything was neatly in their new places, I burned some sage as a special ritual to clean out of the old energy so new energy can take hold. And I must say, I do feel a refreshing new energy today as I write this post. Ahhhh, yes!
My symbolic corner of courage and strength.
And so this lovely jungle it is in my writing and creative cottage anew, I find myself quite content, and ready to continue to walk this journey that I alone can only walk.
