This is a periodic blog feature I call “grace notes.” It occasionally captures my jottings of incidental gratitude. My hope is that this practice will make me and you more aware of the constant flow of amazing good we are perpetually steeped in, which we are surrounded by all the time. It is here only asking to be noticed and amplified.

So now I am furthering my ongoing goal of appreciating such a continuous, overflowing abundance of random good. I’ve taken photographs of some of them with my iPhone, which you can see in this post.

So let’s start this gratitude list with:

• Being home! I’m so grateful for all our adventure and travel in the last six months, but I’m also glad to be home in my slippers, puttering in my studio, doing deep spiritual study, and getting back into expansive routines.
• I’m grateful to be cooking again after so many delicious meals out– you can see the many wonderful ones from the last month in this post.
• I’m grateful for new pastels and cleaning up old ones, for a fresh new start with my materials.
• I’m grateful to have gotten to see both daughters this month at our nephew’s terrific wedding and our niece’s baby’s baptism. I’m so glad we love our nephew’s new wife, and that we got to meet our niece’s new baby too. I’m grateful for safe, smooth travel, for magnificent art in airports, and for the new recycling bins in the air ports that are also sorting out organic material to compost. I’m grateful that with all that exposure none of us got sick. I’m grateful our younger daughter got some red cowboy boots while in Texas. I’m so very grateful I genuinely love my husband’s extended family like it is my own.
• I’m grateful for some new clothes and for the terrific shop I got them at in Maine. I’m grateful for other shopping I did in Maine; Christmas gifts came together effortlessly for me while traveling, so thinking about that is off my plate. I’m grateful for new half-price cashmere here as well, and the God-nudge that told me to go when they happened to be on sale.
• I’m grateful for my husband’s gorgeous gardens, his bumper crop of squash, his expanding the peony bed, his gorgeous zinnias and dahlias. His parsley and thyme is so robust and healthy! See in the photo how big his parsley leaves are in my hand! I’m grateful also for his genius with our lemon tree, which we just brought in from being out all summer. That little meyer lemon tree has eleven lemons on it!
• I’m grateful for our farmer’s market and for our CSA (community supported agriculture); you can see our last haul of the year from them in the photo near the bottom below.
• I’m grateful we are not in drought conditions, although raining every weekend (twelve of the last 15, including the last eight consecutive) is a bit much. I’m grateful the trees are starting to turn, although about a month late.
• I’m grateful to have had a peaceful resolution to a very close bear encounter alone on a walk, and I’m grateful such a happy, healthy, bounding bear can thrive in the wilds of my local park.
• I’m grateful to have had the time and materials to learn a couple new monoprinting techniques for collage. I’m grateful for my artist journals, and the treasure trove that is the internet when you want to learn something.
• I’m grateful I got to see a life-sized chocolate moose (literally) while I was in Maine; see a photo below.
• I’m grateful our nephew had a nice anniversary trip with his wife.
• I’m grateful a friend had a fundraiser for someone who lost their home in the fires on Hawaii, and that the event met her financial goal.
• I’m grateful for three workshop teaching opportunities I’ve agreed to in the new year.
• I’m grateful for our dedicated band of church members, who have just entrusted to me the role as Chairman of the Board, as well as part-time First Reader. I’m grateful for everyone’s willingness to serve, and that without exception, we are a loving, supportive community.
• I’m grateful to know that when a problem rears its troubling head, there is another way to look at it, a divine perspective, which can get us back on track.
• I’m especially grateful for the book Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, by Mary Baker Eddy.
• I’m grateful to be asked by the Congregational church to speak to them again in November, and that we’ll be discussing spiritual authenticity.
• I’m grateful for my book group at our local bookstore and for those participants active involvement in our town politics.
• I’m grateful for having my paintings in two national shows and one international show this fall. I’m grateful show season is mostly over and its time to paint more!
• I’m grateful for my husband’s earnest podcast audience, and for all the folks that listen to his heart and scholarship on The Bible Speaks to You every week.
• I’m grateful for getting the scrapping sound under my car fixed for free.
• I’m grateful for all my artist friends in Maine. It was such a boon getting to be there with them five times this year. I’m grateful I have our plein air retreat next June to look forward to.
• I’m grateful I’ve gotten into the habit of putting up an Instagram/Facebook “story” each day.
• I’m grateful to be getting calendars ready to sell to you all! I’ll blog about it in early November. Meanwhile, I’m grateful it is such a longstanding fun thing to put this year’s artwork in calendars for next year. Each year I sell more and more of them, so I’m grateful you like them as well.
• I’m grateful for pumpkins, nail clippers, posca pens, wet-strength tissue paper, and for homemade English muffins (shown in photo) from Ross’ Bread. I’m grateful for new flannel sheets, for Uppercase magazine, for buttons, for bringing flowers to church each week, for my air fryer, for whales, for my favorite brand of avocado oil potato chips, for cute green houses with red shutters, for plushy friends, for Spotify, for cool sculptures, for fried oysters, for water reflections, for fancy mushrooms, for playing cribbage with my husband most nights after dinner, for audio books, for the fact that my husband does the laundry, for our water filter, for late afternoon sun, for ceiling fans, for date nights, for gorgeous lighting on clouds, for prisms, for toilets, for ripe pears on cottage cheese with salty peanuts, for our clergy association, for endless creative ideas, for patience, kindness, and devotion.
• I’m grateful for each and every one of you dear blog readers, who make this site possible with your attention, sharing, asking questions, commenting on posts, and financial support. You are the best. Thank you so much for being you and being open to amplifying good with me.

Tell us some of your grace notes in the comments!