Category: Gratitude Sunday (Page 8 of 12)

~ I’m once again joining Taryn over at Wooly Moss Roots in her Gratitude Sunday tradition. ~

Gratitude Sunday is a time to slow down and remember those thankful moments that graced our week. One reason I love keeping a daily gratitude journal is because it helps keep things in perspective for me. Each Sunday, I open my journal and share some of those moments with you here. If you’d like to join in, just leave a comment!

Gratitude is powerful energy. I love hearing others’ gratitudes!

***

– A wonderful visit and walk with my mom on Monday afternoon. We have both liberated ourselves from our jobs, and one of the many benefits is that we can do stuff together in the middle of a weekday! I cannot tell you how freeing that feels… how good that feels for my spirit, after years upon years of feeling like a trapped animal at either school or work.

– Not carrying the stress of my former job that would follow me around like Pigpen’s cloud of dirt, whether I was at the job or not. Putting my precious energy into my own things now. For me, not feeling trapped in any way is essential to my happiness. It feels good to honor that fact instead of fighting against it and attempting to stuff myself into the conventional box of “a 9-5 worker.”

– Consciously doing whatever is needed in the moment to raise the energy & mood of my day from bad to good.

– Using the last of the garden tomatoes (!) to make a delicious rainbow salsa.

– Working from home again. There was a 2-month break which was great, where I could concentrate on my own things rather than just on my moneymaking work. I was grateful for that break, and now I’m grateful to be working again. The work is challenging which I like, and those every-2-week paychecks through the mail are A-OK too!!

– Not needing to go anywhere on a snowy day this week.

– More purging and giving away of things not needed anymore. I love the feeling of paring down.

– Slowly regaining my taste for tea. I totally lost my taste for any and all tea for a couple months there, and I feared it was permanent! Thankfully not! I do love tea, the comfort and taste and ritual of it.

– Roasted veggies. I’m on a roasted veggie kick; they are so delicious, I can’t believe I’d forgotten about them for so long.

– A dream one night of being at an enormous incredible buffet, and filling my plate with all these wonderful things that looked delicious to me, and not having to think at all about how they would settle in my stomach! My tummy is still very finicky and I’m getting awfully weary of that. Being ever so careful about what I put into it, and the amounts… I’m so over it. The dream was so telling! No hidden symbolism there… haha!

– Eating a whole tin of smoked oysters one day, and keeping them down. Yay! I appreciate when my body accepts the nourishing foods that I like to eat. (It doesn’t always.)

– Clear streets and warm weather on a day I needed to run lots of errands on my bike. It made that day flow so much more smoothly.

– Watching such a fun movie last night, Woody Allen’s Manhattan Murder Mystery. I sure needed that — what fun!

– Hearing the sweet little birds singing outside the window as I write this. That’s a spring sound! I’m not quite ready for winter to end, but I know when spring comes, I’ll be ready. Time to begin planning the garden!! Maybe today or tomorrow…

*****

What gratitudes have graced your week?

*****

*****

~ I’m once again joining Taryn over at Wooly Moss Roots in her Gratitude Sunday tradition. ~

Gratitude Sunday is a time to slow down and remember those thankful moments that graced our week. One reason I love keeping a daily gratitude journal is because it helps keep things in perspective for me. Each Sunday, I open my journal and share some of those moments with you here. If you’d like to join in, just leave a comment!

Gratitude is powerful energy. I love hearing others’ gratitudes!

***

– A lot of down time to think and process and read and ponder and write and be inspired. Physically I felt very droopy this week from the drugs, and most of my days were spent really just lying around. But mentally I felt good, and there was a lot going on in my mind (there always is, but it was all good, positive stuff this week). Strangely I didn’t feel depressed, didn’t let it get me down, didn’t read too much into it. It was simply like, ok, this is how I feel today. I’ll just hang low and do quiet stuff. And that’s that.

– That I have the flexibility of schedule to have a really droopy week; to just allow my body to do its thing. I’m definitely on the mend and feeling that I’m pulling out of this, though not there yet. This healing process is quite the process indeed; I can only describe it as “squirrelly.”

– A beautiful, warm day with all the windows in the house wide open. That was also the day I took down our sweet Christmas tree. It was sad to see it go, but I also love how the living room feels more open and spartan now. I also moved around a couple plants which created a slightly new look. I keep wanting to rearrange our living room, but how it is now is functional in such a nice way that I don’t want to wreck that. But still, it needs a bit of new energy. Trying to decide how to change it up more…

– Freshly washed windows, inside & out! I forget what a pleasure that is.

– Remembering to smudge the house with piñon incense on a regular basis.

– The library, and how you can check out books that sound good online, but then turn out not to be. I love how it’s risk free! See it, hate it, return it!

– That I share my life, and home, with such a sweet and wonderful person. I love my F! ♥

– A bad dream that contained an important reminder. I have a lot of bad dreams, and always have. But then again, bad dreams often have the most important messages.

– Ordinary days, where everyone arrives home safe and sound. After Sonja died, I never took that for granted again.

– A sweet afternoon visit to mom & dad & my cat yesterday on another gorgeous shorts-‘n-t-shirt day. Visiting, puttering around, snacking, doing outside stuff. Then later after dark, soaking my feet in hot water at their kitchen table and resting, while smelling my mom’s delicious cottage cheese dill bread baking in the oven!

– Feeling happy 🙂

– Randomly picking up my half-read book from many many months ago, and finishing the whole thing today! The information in it was really pertinent, and I love the satisfaction of finishing a book. I also thought it was interesting how today was the day I suddenly felt inspired to finish it. Sometimes I put a book down and don’t pick it back up for a long while; that’s totally okay with me because often I have to evolve in myself a bit more in order to fully appreciate and digest the information contained in the rest of the book.

– Our space heater. I love how I can sit really close to it and be warm, any time that I’m chilly.

– How our kitchen looks at night, after stringing some Christmas lights in the recesses above and below the cabinets. I do love Christmas lights… perhaps they’re not super classy, but they add such a warm glow.

*****

What gratitudes have graced your week?

*****

~ I’m once again joining Taryn over at Wooly Moss Roots in her Gratitude Sunday tradition. ~

Gratitude Sunday is a time to slow down and remember those thankful moments that graced our week. One reason I love keeping a daily gratitude journal is because it helps keep things in perspective for me. Each Sunday, I open my journal and share some of those moments with you here. If you’d like to join in, just leave a comment!

Gratitude is powerful energy. I love hearing others’ gratitudes!

***

– More snowfall! We woke up one morning to the scene above!

– Accomplishing projects, and beginning new ones I’ve wanted to start for a while.

– Thankful again for the good insurance I have. Saw the statement this week for my night and day at the hospital — $7,640!!!! INSANE. I’m so thankful that I received the much-needed care there, but didn’t have to fork over that crapload of cash.

– That the doctor, lab, and pharmacy are so close to our house. I’ve been over there more times than I can count this past year, and it has been such a huge advantage that they’re so close, since we don’t own a car. And I’ve become such a frequent flyer at the lab that they know me, and we catch up on what’s been goin’ on each time I go there. The people there are so nice.

– Being exhausted after a long day and wanting to just vege out in front of the TV, and then having three of my favorite shows come on in a row — Globe Trekker, Rick Steves’ Europe, and New Scandinavian Cooking! That was really fun.

– Sitting on my ‘balcony’ in a tank top one warm and sunny afternoon. (Then waking up to snow the next morning!)

– The library.

– Making snow ice cream, and its ever-so-familiar flavor from my childhood!

– Snowy, cloudy days, for the way they make me feel like hunkering down and digging into projects I’ve put aside for so long.

– A mid-day bath on a snowy day.

– A wonderful lunch out at a vegetarian restaurant with my mom and her childhood best friend who was turning 65 that very day! I had a vegetarian Reuben sandwich made with portobello mushrooms instead of meat. It tasted so close to the real thing! My stomach is still really touchy, and even though I crave Reuben sandwiches, I can’t eat them. But my stomach was good that day, and I could eat this vegetarian one!

– Being home and therefore having the private space to weep if that’s what comes up. Now and then, I will all of a sudden miss my best friend Sonja so intensely that tears well up. Other times, this illness gets the better of me and I just need a bit of a cry-n-release. I remember those things happening while I was at work, and I would wipe my eyes, stuff the feeling back down into myself, and hope a coworker wouldn’t walk into my cubicle at that moment. Now it feels good to just address the feeling as it comes, shed a few tears, and quickly and quietly release it.

– Catching some of the Red Green Show last night before going to bed. My parents and I used to watch that religiously, and I haven’t seen it for so many years. Funny!!! Especially the earlier episodes.

– Hanging low yesterday, watching some cooking shows, doing some art, just being together with F, doing separate things yet still hanging out together. A nice day.

– Seeing my folks today, and my cat!

– Going out to the garden today and discovering fresh green oregano beneath the dead leaves! I love it fresh on Greek salads — especially from this plant, which isn’t as overwhelmingly potent as other fresh oregano I’ve tried.

*****

What gratitudes have graced your week?

*****

~ I’m once again joining Taryn over at Wooly Moss Roots in her Gratitude Sunday tradition. ~

Gratitude Sunday is a time to slow down and remember those thankful moments that graced our week. One reason I love keeping a daily gratitude journal is because it helps keep things in perspective for me. Each Sunday, I open my journal and share some of those moments with you here. If you’d like to join in, just leave a comment!

Gratitude is powerful energy. I love hearing others’ gratitudes!

***

– Snowfall yesterday! Oh how I love the snow. (See how pretty it made the trees look this morning?) I visited my parents yesterday, and took a nap on their bed, all warm and cozy and wrapped up in fleece blankets. And when I awoke, it was snowing! I get a deep feeling of contentment in my soul when I’m warm and cozy indoors while rain or snow falls outside.

– The feeling of practically buzzing with excitement and inspiration lately! I have no idea why it has come on, but what a wonderful and jubilant feeling that is! I love it.

– Feeling like this illness has unearthed a beautiful bubbling spring within me, full of all sorts of wonderful things and creativity. Sort of like cracking open a geode — you have to take a hammer to it in order to reveal the beautiful crystalline shapes hidden inside. It’s so nice how good and bad always go together; with the good always comes bad… but perhaps more importantly, with the bad always comes good!

– Slowly getting our house cleaned up and organized and purged. I’ve felt quite good this week with good energy (that is HUGE!), and have really felt inspired to get our house looking better. I’m tired of having so much stuff in it.

– Crossing lots off the ol’ to-do list this week.

– Being outside with my hubby one night, taking photos. It was so frigid but it was really neat to be out and about together, doing something different.

– Writing a New Years Manifesto — something I’ve never done before. A manifesto is a declaration of intentions… how you want to live & be… things you want to keep in mind throughout your days, weeks, months. I like how it reminds me of the priorities I’ve set for this moment in time.

– That I don’t have cavities, but just some tooth sensitivity. A couple months ago I started getting zinging pain in a couple of teeth when I’d eat something sweet. I thought, Great, cavities are just what I need right now. So during open enrollment for insurance, I was struggling with whether to enroll in dental insurance in case I did have cavities. I happened to mention the situation to my mom the day before the paperwork would have been due, and her advice really surprised me and made me feel so much better! She said “cavities, no, you don’t usually get cavities there… it’s probably just sensitivity from receding gums. Try getting some of that sensitive toothpaste. And dental insurance… I’ll tell you… it’s really not worth it. It’s a racket, and I cancelled mine for this coming year.” So not only did that help me make up my mind about the insurance, but it saved me a bunch of money, and she was totally correct — all I needed was a $3 tube of sensitivity toothpaste!!! It’s so nice when things turn out like that.

– And in a similar vein, I’m really grateful that I followed my intuition to keep my health insurance after I quit my job nearly a year ago. That was a *very* smart thing. I sure have been usin’ it this year, oye!

– Airing out our down comforters on a warm day. And freshly washed bedding! Love that.

– A really nice day yesterday. Went out to have a late lunch with my parents, and we ended up lingering for a long time at the restaurant, listening to the great music, talking, eating, and watching the snow falling outside. It was a sweet time.

– F. hooking up some speakers that have been lying ‘dormant’ for years. I had a sudden thought to hook them up to our TV during a wonderful Gershwin concert on PBS. We needed an adapter, so yesterday F went out to get one, and by the time I came home, the house was rockin’ with THE most incredible speakers I’ve ever heard!!! What a treasure we’ve had right under our noses! And since the landlord wasn’t home, we flipped it to the Mexican MTV channel, cranked it up to a nice obnoxious level, and danced. Ohhhhh did we dance! How great that felt! I can’t wait till the day we don’t share walls with anyone.

– Some new (thrifted) wool sweaters to keep me warm!

– Thrift stores!!!!!

*****

What gratitudes have graced your week?

*****

*****