The sky was so soft this morning: those very specific pearly gray early-morning clouds and a pink-peach glow coming from behind the ridge, silhouetting the tree shapes while the sun lit up the facing hillside. As the sun moves around the sky with the seasons, this particular angle in our cove in spring is so gentle and inviting. The light arrives before you can quite decide where it's coming from.
The moon in a soft sky
I've been thinking about that.
The Woods Are Dark (And That's the Point)
Can we talk about the messy middle for a second? Actually, can we talk about how that phrase has been completely wrung out? Every wellness account, every creativity coach, everyone with a podcast is telling you to "sit with it." And they're not wrong, exactly. The middle IS messy. That part's true.
What they leave out: when you're in it, you're not just sitting with discomfort. You're genuinely off the path. You probably can't see an easy way back. It looks like a disaster. You start questioning whether any of this was worth it.
That feeling is real. Feelings are real and they will absolutely override rational thought if you're not watching for them. I'm not here to tell you to breathe through it.
What I AM here to say: deciding to keep going anyway - that's not a coping strategy. It's a choice. A bold one. A genuinely wild step into an unknown that belongs specifically to you, because it's your creative world you're walking into, not anything that's been charted before. Nobody has made what you're making. That's why there's resistance. That's why there's an undercurrent of something that feels a lot like fear.
The woods are dark in there. But the thing you find, the thing you’re searching for - your actual creative spirit, the work that couldn't have come from anyone else - is in those woods. It doesn't live in the clearing where everything is tidy and figured out. It's further in, in the darker places.
Working Material for the Messy Middle
Speaking of working in the middle of things - I have something for you.
Last week I released the Wild Creation: Spring Emergence Collection, a studio ephemera book built for collage, mixed media, and art journals. It's not a kit and it's not an inspiration book. It's a collection of raw studio material, handmade papers, original marks, botanical forms, textures, all made during a specific season of work in this studio and handed directly to you to cut apart and use.
You’ll find 12 original background papers (duplicated to 24). 135+ individual collage elements (duplicated to 270+). 12 short, sharp provocations from the studio scattered through the pages. Everything printed letter-size, designed to tear out and use without ceremony.
This is working material, not display art. It's for people who make things from a place that's hard to explain to anyone who doesn't already know. If you've been waiting for permission to make the messy, imperfect, completely yours work — this is what that looks like in your hands.
What's Happening Inside the Studio
This week, Walk With Me members got a full look at something I've been working out for a while: the eyes for The Good Folk, my current mixed media sculpt series. Clay, paint, and one small trick with gloss medium that makes all the difference. Members saw all six samples, the problem-solving, and how I got there.
One of Six!
The messy middle of that process — the six attempts, the failures I kept anyway, the moment something clicked — that's what the membership is for. Not a tutorial. Not a course. Just proximity to a practice that's actually in motion.
If you've been curious about what goes into making the Wights, or you just want to be closer to the work as it happens, Walk With Me is $9 a month. There are a limited number of spaces, and the people in there are the ones I check in with and write to directly.
Tell Me Where You Are
Are you in the messy middle of something right now? Or standing at the edge of the dark part, deciding whether to go in? Reply and tell me, I read every single one, and I always write back.
Shine!
Monette
PS The Spring Emergence Collection is available now on Amazon — $14.99, instant download, ready to cut up and use. If you're in the middle of something, this is working material for exactly that place. Grab it here.
PPS The morning light is pink-gold and soft and comes from somewhere it seems you can’t quite make out. The creative woods are dark and close and full of something important. Both of these are true at the same time, every single day.