Romanticising Life: Art, Books, and the Beauty of September

Hey friends! ♡

It’s been a while since I last wrote a blog post. I’ve missed reflecting on each month and sharing moments that might inspire you. This month, I have loved spending time enjoying nature, finishing my Bridgerton puzzle, journaling, reading, and appreciating the arrival of autumn. I love romanticising life: crisp leaves, conkers, picking apples from my garden, and long shadows over the grass.

As nights grow cooler, I find comfort in familiar things, like rewatching Anne with an E, my favorite show about identity, friendship, and relationships. I love this quote:

“It's been my experience that you can nearly always enjoy things if you make up your mind firmly that you will” ~ Anne Shirley Cuthbert.

I delivered my own workshop!

This month, I’ve been reconnecting with my love for all things creative. In past blogs, I mentioned helping at MK Arts for Health workshops, supporting Anne-Marie, an Artist, Curator & Creative Practitioner. My role includes setting up, welcoming participants, providing warm drinks, and encouraging everyone to try new techniques and step out of their comfort zones. I usually join in the fun too!

This time, I had the chance to deliver my own workshop (I was so nervous!). I wanted it to reflect my love for illustration and books, while celebrating the central theme of uniqueness. I combined both by creating a patchwork workshop inspired by Elmer, the patchwork elephant who stands out for his colours and represents individuality. The idea was to encourage participant to mix different colours, patterns, and textures to make their own patchwork tiles. As someone who enjoys using colour and storytelling, this was perfect to combine my passion for children’s books, fun shapes, and creative expression.

Each patch could represent a feeling, a memory, a colour — anything personal and unique. Together, these patches form a complete piece, showing how different experiences and emotions can come together beautifully, just like in Elmer’s story. To help spark ideas, I encouraged participants to choose a theme, and for anyone who felt a little stuck, I had prompts such as rainbow, flowers, landscapes, animals, joy, dreams, or any other subject that inspired them. I also created some example tiles with character illustrations (bottom left), as that’s something I personally love to draw. Here are some photos from the workshop.

Everyones incredible final patchwork tiles!

I turned my patchwork characters into little clay versions — they came out so sweet, I love them!

The 12-week workshops are coming to an end. I wanted to give a huge shoutout to my friend Anne-Marie. She is a truly radiant bundle of positivity and pure joy to be around. She encourages me to follow my passion and love for art.

I think it’s such a great thing to have someone in your life who sees art the way you do.

Here’s a photo of her with her incredible wool tiger. Isn’t it so good?! >>>

Finding peace in a library

I’ve also been rediscovering my love for reading and book design. I’m not sure why I lost touch with it, but volunteering at my local library has helped me reconnect. Milton Keynes library is one of my favourite places, and it's a peaceful space that always reminds me of my childhood. I love the decor, it’s a big painting by Fionnuala Boyd and Leslie Evans that greets you as you walk up to the adult section. Every time I look at it, I notice something new, and it really captures the old Milton Keynes beautifully.

I mostly help out in the children’s section, which is always tidy and quiet. I enjoy wandering around after I’ve volunteered and like checking the ‘just returned’ shelf in the lobby to see what others have been reading.

What have I been reading?

I’ve really been enjoying consuming BookTok to find my source of recommendations, but I sometimes fall into the trap of getting caught up in the trends. I was drawn to the hype of The Wedding People by Alison Espach; the cover instantly caught my eye when browsing in Waterstones. The simplicity of the design, featuring an abstract painting by Lavater Art, and the cover and lettering were designed by Nicolette Seeback. The story itself started well; I really wanted to enjoy it, but I felt that the subject of mental health was taken too lightly. Although it was intended to be a light-hearted book, I felt that the characters' growth seemed flat. I felt the ending was cliché!! After reading this book, I definitely took it as a sign not to fall for trends.

I am currently reading Intermezzo by Sally Rooney. I am absolutely loving it - especially the writing style, its descriptive nature, and the perspective on life through two very different siblings. I will share my review in my next blog, but if you’d like to keep up in the meantime, you can also find me on Goodreads (I’m a slow reader, so there won’t be too many updates!).

Here’s an illustration I created highlighting the little joys of October.
I hope you all have a lovely start to the month. I’d love to know what creative things you’ve been up to and how your September went!

Till next month,

🧡 🍁 Love, Janki x