September was a month of creating, refining, recovering, and sometimes deciding that something simply wasn’t working the way I hoped it would.

The Healthy in Heart September 2026 update includes new publications, two new educational series, continued growth in our Sabbath Table Gathering, changes to the newsletter, plenty of work behind the scenes on RISE & REPAIR, and even a little crochet.

It also included about two weeks of downtime thanks to a virus that just would not quite leave.

That is part of building Healthy in Heart, too.

Not every month goes according to plan. Not every idea needs to stay where it started, and not every project is finished when I think it is. Sometimes a book gets put down because I can no longer overlook problems with it. Sometimes a journal I’m actively using gets rewritten because actually living with it shows me what needs to change.

And sometimes the plan gets interrupted because your body says, “Nope. You’re going to bed.”

Here’s what has been happening behind the scenes at Healthy in Heart this September.

Healthy in Heart Newsletter and Community Updates

Our weekly Healthy in Heart newsletter continues to have a wonderfully engaged readership. Even the quietest newsletter of September had a 28.9% open rate, which tells me that many of you are continuing to make room for Healthy in Heart in your inboxes and your weeks. Thank you.

I also made one change to the newsletter itself this month.

The Logitarian Pattern Detective Challenge has been removed from the regular newsletter template. I still love the idea, but the newsletter wasn’t the best home for it. Instead, Pattern Detective challenges will be moving to the Healthy in Heart website and social media, where there is more room for people to discover them, participate, and share.

Meanwhile, our Sabbath Table Gathering continues to grow into a remarkable little community. We now have people joining us from New York, Alabama, Louisiana, Kentucky, North Carolina, Texas, and even Israel.

Every week, people who might never have met otherwise sit down together across hundreds—or thousands—of miles to talk about Scripture, ask questions, share what they are seeing, and welcome or close the Sabbath together. Watching that community take shape has been one of the sweetest parts of Healthy in Heart.

Psalms of Trust Released in September

On September 1, I released Psalms of Trust: A Scripture Memory and Meditation Workbook Through Psalms 13–24.

This project continues the journey through Psalms by combining Scripture meditation, memory work, reflection, and activities designed to help us spend enough time with the words to actually notice them.

And the series is continuing right on schedule.

Psalms of Refuge: Puzzle Workbook Through Psalms 25–36 publishes October 1.

New Fermentation and Menopause Series

September also brought two new ongoing educational series to Healthy in Heart.

The fermentation series launched September 6 and publishes every Sunday. Fermentation has become a fascinating rabbit hole around here, involving everything from kefir and cultured foods to experiments with different bacteria, techniques, ingredients, and fermentation times.

Beginning October 1, fermentation recipes will also start appearing on Thursdays interspersed between other recipes, giving the practical side of the series a home of its own.

Then, on September 14, I launched my menopause series.

That series publishes every other Monday and will continue through February 1. Menopause affects far more of the body than most of us were ever taught, and I wanted to create the kind of series I wish women had been handed years before reaching this stage of life: practical, curious, research-minded, and willing to talk about the symptoms nobody warned us about.

Reading The Sabbath Breaker—and Knowing When to Stop

I started reading D. Thomas Lancaster’s The Sabbath Breaker this month, expecting to finish it.

I stopped at Chapter 5.

As I worked through the book, I developed concerns about the way portions of the biblical text were being handled. Eventually, those concerns became significant enough that I wasn’t comfortable continuing as though they were minor disagreements.

So I put the book down.

My review, including the specific reasons I made that decision, publishes September 30.

Healthy in Heart has always been about examining ideas rather than simply accepting them because they come from a respected author, teacher, tradition, or community. Sometimes following an argument carefully means discovering that you agree with it. Other times, it means knowing when to stop.

September Didn’t Exactly Cooperate

For roughly two weeks this month, most of my plans took a back seat to a virus that simply refused to pack its bags and leave.

It was one of those illnesses that seemed to keep hanging on just enough to interfere with everything. There were days when work slowed considerably and others when it stopped altogether.

I don’t particularly enjoy enforced downtime. There is always another article I could be writing, another book project waiting for attention, another experiment I want to investigate, another row I could add to a crochet project, and approximately seventeen new ideas trying to get my attention.

But bodies have their own schedules.

So part of September was spent doing considerably less than I had planned—and allowing recovery to be the work that needed doing. Although, if I am completely honest, even in my sickness, I was still researching…I can’t seem to help myself.

Looking back at everything that still happened this month, though, I’m reminded that a productive month doesn’t necessarily require thirty productive days.

RISE & REPAIR Is Still Being Repaired

There is something slightly amusing about actively repairing a journal called RISE & REPAIR while using it.

I have continued working through the journal myself this month, and that real-world use has already resulted in two significant rewrites.

This is exactly why I wanted to use it rather than simply edit it from a desk and declare it finished.

A prompt can sound perfectly reasonable when you write it. Then you encounter it on the day you actually need to answer it and discover that it doesn’t quite do what you intended.

So RISE & REPAIR is still being edited, tested, rewritten, and refined. It will be finished when I believe the experience inside the journal matches the purpose behind it—not simply when the manuscript technically reaches the last page.

Crochet and Creative Projects at Healthy in Heart

Because apparently books, articles, newsletters, fermentation experiments, journals, and weekly gatherings are not enough, there is also crochet.

Kelsey’s Park It & Enjoy the View Long Sleeve Shirt went live on Etsy this month.

And She Who Welcomes the Sun, my temperature throw, continues to grow. At the end of September, she has reached 25 rows, measures about 8 inches long, and stretches an impressive 63 inches wide, large enough to cover a King Size bed.

There is a very long way to go, but that is part of what I love about projects like this. A single row doesn’t look like much. Twenty-five rows begin to tell a story. Eventually, all those ordinary days become something you can wrap around yourself.

Subscriber Appreciation Giveaway Update

I also made a simple change to the Subscriber Appreciation Giveaway.

Going forward, if a winner does not claim a prize, the prize will not be redrawn. We’ll simply move forward to the next month’s giveaway.

These gifts are meant to be a fun way of saying thank you to the people who follow and support Healthy in Heart, and keeping the process simple makes it sustainable.

October’s Subscriber Appreciation Gift will be a signed copy of Psalms of Rooting.

Coming to Healthy in Heart in October 2026

October is already shaping up to be another full month.

Psalms of Refuge: Puzzle Workbook Through Psalms 25–36 publishes October 1, and fermentation recipes begin rolling out on Thursdays the same day.

The next installment of In the Author’s Life, Carrying the Message, publishes October 4.

The menopause series will continue every other Monday, while a brand-new Herbs & Supplements series launches October 19.

And, somewhere between all of that, I’ll keep working on RISE & REPAIR, adding rows to She Who Welcomes the Sun, experimenting in the kitchen, gathering around the Sabbath Table, researching the questions that send me down unexpected rabbit holes, and sharing what I discover along the way.

September has reminded me that progress doesn’t always look like finishing things.

Sometimes progress is publishing something new.

At other times it is rewriting something you thought was finished.

Sometimes it is moving an idea somewhere it has a better chance to grow.

Occasionally, it is putting down a book.

Rarely it is recognizing that your body needs two weeks more than your to-do list needs you.

And sometimes it is simply adding the next row.

That is what September looked like at Healthy in Heart.

Here’s to seeing what October brings.