When I planted those first seeds many years ago, little did I know that they would outgrow my garden. For many years I dug, planted, and grew, bloom after bloom. Then I decided to try my hand at produce. That was a whole other beast! There were many triumphs and just as many fails, but oh there was so much fun in the trying! And the thing I learned to love about gardening was that there is always a Do-Over! Didn’t like the veggies you grew? Grow something different next year. Those giant sunflowers shade your entire garden? Mint overrun your blooms? Do-Overs! Those squash bugs drive you to the very end of your sanity because you weren’t as diligent as you needed to be? Only plant four Kohlrabi plants and realize you love Kohlrabi and should’ve planted an entire row? Do-Overs! No matter the problem, in the garden there is always a chance for a Do-Over, and who doesn’t love that?

Fast forward to the winter after my first growing season. I was thrilled to have grown my own little garden, but here I was in the dead of winter with nothing really to show for it. I knew I would get my Do-Over, but I really wanted to be reminded of it right then and there! That’s when the lightbulb came on. I should’ve taken more photos. Why didn’t I take more photos? 

So that’s when I decided I would take more photos with my next Do-Over. Lots of them! So many in fact, that it’s dizzying to flip back through them all. But you know what? I wouldn’t trade them for the world! I can look at those photos and remember being out in each and every one of those gardens. I remember what the days felt like, what the air smelled of, and whether the earth had had a good year or not depending on what the soil looked and felt like. I remember those blooms and plants like they’re old friends. The delicate Cosmos and their begging for me to pinch them back. The yellow Lemon Squash and how they intrigued me from the very first bud. The Mexican Sour Gherkins and their ability to climb, and how they don’t like to be left on the vine for too long or they will sour and turn black, they are quite temperamental like that! 

I was addicted! Addicted to the garden and addicted to the photographs. Addicted to a life where fast-paced turned slow and steady…you can’t rush a garden, not ever, and there’s something magical and beautiful about that. 

Fast forward several years and here we are. I am now three Issues in to my very own HomePlace Magazine. A place where I get to share those Do-Over photos and a whole lot more with you! A place where those old friends meet new friends. A place that inspires and encourages. A place that longs for a simpler time when life turned just a little bit more slowly. 

This is HomePlace Magazine. Where the small things in life are the greatest things of all! Won’t you come along on this beautiful journey with me?

The pages below are a sampling of the latest 2021 Fall Issue of Homeplace Magazine, available for purchase Here. If you’d like to purchase the first two Issues of HomePlace Magazine, Spring & Summer, click on the HomePlace Magazine tab above on my Homepage for links! 

Thislittlebirdie HomePlace is a coffee-table quality publication seeking to cultivate joy, inspiration, and friendship by indulging and sharing in a slower, more intentional pace of life. Rooted & Established in Love (Ephesians 3:17), HomePlace welcomes you home, where beauty and blessings abound.