Comments (7)

By Lindsey, May 6, 2012

~ 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!

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~

- Accomplishing so much in the garden this week. I feel so on top of it and so caught up — that’s a really great feeling. There’s always more to do — always! — but at least I’ve gotten a lot of critical stuff done this week.

- Lots of moneymaking work at the moment; it does feel good to be earning money. And yet still feel like I’m in charge of my life and not constantly feeling like I’m stuck under the thumb of a boss. I’m very, very, very thankful for this setup.

- The paradise-like weather we’ve been having.

- My Honey. He always puts a smile on my face, no matter what!!!

- Sometimes, just the fact that a day is over is reason enough to be thankful. And that sleep is the best reset button there is, and that the next day is a brand new day (and often much, much better!).

- The company and companionship of the people I love.

- Lily of the Valley. Oh gosh, that scent.

- Closing my eyes and inhaling the old-fashioned grape scent of an iris, the kind just like in my best friend Sonja’s backyard. That particular scent is powerfully associated with the really wonderful times we had goofing around together in her backyard in the summertime while those irises were blooming. It is one of the scents associated with being light-hearted and completely carefree — two things that haven’t quite been present in all of my days of late, ha!

- Finding a local source for Pu-Erh tea since my two usual sources have been out of it for a while. Cause I miss that stuff when it’s gone!!

- The slower pace I’ve been forced to adopt. I broke my baby toe three weeks ago but didn’t know it was broken until I finally went to the doctor this past week. I have to say, though, how nice it is to move more slowly. I don’t normally move very slowly. But I’ve found that the day feels much calmer and more in control if I just simply move slowly, even if I have a lot I need to get done. (And I’m also thankful that a broken baby toe is not incapacitating!)

- Baby squirrel antics. You simply would not believe how cute they are. I’ll post more photos, but here are just a couple from the other day. The babies are getting big!

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What gratitudes have you collected this past week?

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Comments (8)

By Lindsey, April 29, 2012

~ 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 really wonderful bike ride today with my Honey. I needed it — and enjoyed it — so much!!!

- Having a second bike to use as a backup, after I got a flat tire a block into our bike ride. I don’t know why I get so many stupid flat tires!

- Beginning to harvest some beautiful produce from the garden! This week, radishes and arugula.

- Gorgeous weather on my birthday, garden time, tea & a nap on the grass under the lilacs, feeling great, a delicious dinner with family, a sunset stroll with everyone, the most thoughtful and wonderful presents (!!), awesome birthday cake, relaxing & not doing any have-to’s — how much better can a birthday get?! I loved it.

- My mom’s beautiful homemade-with-lots-of-love birthday cake!!

- Time with loved ones. It’s what life is all about, in my eyes…

- Lots of synchronicities lately. I see them as confirmation that I’m where I’m supposed to be, which helped a bit in the face of lots of fear and overwhelm this week. It was quite a roller coaster week, with wonderful highs and awful lows.

- Finding nettles.

- My aunt and her honey visiting this week — it was such a nice visit!!

- The weather allowing for lots of outside time.

- Laughter. Thank goodness for laughter, huh!

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Comments (5)

By Lindsey, April 22, 2012

~ 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!

***

- Our neighbor squirrels have BABIES! Two of them, we think. You just really can’t get much cuter. I feel privileged to be so close and be able to watch them! They live in the attic of the house right next door to us. Pictures hopefully coming soon…

- Gardening this week. It felt really really good. And was just what I needed.

- Being outside in my garden in the warm glow and long shadows of the evening sun.

- Lilacs scent while I gardened all day! Lilac scent in our apartment! Lilacs by my head while I sleep! What a gift scented flowers are, huh!

- Good music, played loudly, on great speakers. Sometimes it’s just what’s called for… something that’s bigger than you are, to drown out your own thoughts… and all that’s required is to listen and enjoy.

- Spare energy for hand stands!! And the satisfaction of getting better and better at them, the more I do! What fun~~ There is such joy in moving my body like I used to as a kid!

- Accomplishing lots of moneymaking work, which always feels satisfying.

- Having that moneymaking work valued so very much by my bosses.

- Sitting outside with tea, in the fresh morning air. I’m liking that new ritual a lot.

- A birthday package in the mail from my sister — I can’t wait to open it! I don’t think the excitement ever wears off of seeing a package dropped off by the mail man, around birthday time!!

- Feeling that it’s an accomplishment that I’m here to celebrate another birthday (coming up soon). That sounds dramatic… (I don’t like drama) …but it’s the honest truth. I’m so glad I’m here for this birthday.

- My loved ones.

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What are some gratitudes from your week?

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Comments (3)

By Lindsey, April 15, 2012

~ 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!

***

- The warm glow of late afternoon sun in our apartment. My favorite time of day in this place…

- A bike ride after work with F, to take care of some errands. It was really nice to be riding bikes together again, especially on a beautiful afternoon — 78 degrees!

- Rain! We got rain this week. It’s been so dry and warm here, the rain was really needed. And the smell! It’s been so long since we’ve all smelled rain!

- My Honey… he’s so caring and tender.

- Drinking high quality tea. It makes such a difference. I drank some supermarket-quality black tea this week and it made me appreciate the good stuff even more.

- Being my own boss. Being in charge of my own days. Creating each day with my own hands!

- Several days of really amazing energy!

- Taking advantage of that boundless energy to get a ton of stuff done that had been weighing heavily on me. What a relief.

- Antibiotics. Geez, that should really be first on my list. And on every single list that I write!!!

- Riding through the rich neighborhoods and observing what happens in a yard when money is no object! Beautiful…

- Errands on weekdays, when stores aren’t very crowded.

- No library books, not much reading. I’m liking that a lot right now. More time to think… reflect… be…

- The way my cat quietly reached over and rested her hand on my jacket cuff while I was taking a nap next to her on the grass.

- Lilacs!!!

- Watching Lost in Translation, one of my favorite movies, the other night; it cheers me up every single time I watch it. It was just what I needed that night, when I was feeling really rough from my medicine and just completely worn out from the previous days.

- Watching some old Dick Cavett shows with F; the Groucho Marx one was great!

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What have you been grateful for this past week?

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Comments (2)

By Lindsey, April 8, 2012

 ~ 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 glorious weather! Punctuated by a couple of strategically timed snow days, when I had lots of moneymaking work to do and was glad not to have the temptation to be outdoors.

- Artichokes.

- Meeting F and his co-worker friends for lunch. It always cheers me up

- A clean bathroom! It’s been so long…

- Shopping at the thrift store, and finding treasures. It’s like panning for gold, kind of! I found a couple treasures for my mom, too. She’s been wanting a juicer & a citrus juicer. While I was at the thrift store, I saw a nice juicer & matching citrus juicer, for only $5.99 each! I called her up when I got home and she flew down there, arriving 2 minutes before closing, and bought them! They work perfectly and are really quality, probably from the mid 90s when they made stuff a little better than they do now; one of them is actually made in Spain. So she now has two awesome juicers for only $12!

- The extra spectacular redbuds this year.

- The beauty of the neighborhoods at this time of year when everything is blooming!!!

- Smelling apple blossoms in the moist morning air! Oh my gosh.

- Spur-of-the-moment plans. Those are the best!

- Doing lots of handstands on the grass; they’re fun and it feels so good to move my body again… after so long of feeling way too crummy to do any such thing, and not having the energy to move in any “unnecessary way!” Ha!

- Getting the tomatoes into their walls-o-water.

- The full moon shining in the kitchen window while I did my moneymaking work at night. Sure beats working in a cubicle!

- Being outside a lot. It’s so vital for me.

- A sweet bike ride to the store and back with my Hubby yesterday. I love those simple pleasures so much.

- The most wonderful Easter day I had today. My parents went to brunch while I opted not to (the buffet would have been torture I’m afraid)… and instead I had such a sweet time alone. I’ve been feeling pretty inward…reflective…quiet lately, and easily scrambled too, and this glorious Easter morning spent alone was just… right. I also gave myself the ‘day off,’ so I stayed up past 11 last night to complete and send off some time-sensitive moneymaking work, so I wouldn’t have to worry about it today. Today’s rule was no moneymaking work, no to-do’s to accomplish, no garden work, no garden planning, etc. Just a day to be outdoors and enjoy. I moved through it at a leisurely pace. I walked slowly. It was amazing. I felt more relaxed than I have in so long! I packed some nice food, stopped at the bagel place to get a cinnamon raisin Easter Bagel, and had my own little brunch under the apple blossoms at my parents’ house while they were gone. And then puttered around outside. I couldn’t help but transplant some little lettuce, beet, and turnip seedlings to space them out better, but even that was at such a relaxed pace that it didn’t feel like work at all. We took a leisurely family walk in flip-flops around the park in the perfect evening. And Hubby took a long bike ride and stopped over on his way home! From start to finish, I enjoyed this gentle day so much.

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Did you have a special Easter?

What are some of your gratitudes this week?

*****

Comments (3)

By Lindsey, April 2, 2012

~ 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!

***

- Such sweet comments from the wonderful people who visit my blog! THANK YOU!

- Lunch outside on a restaurant patio this week, with my Honey and a couple of his co-worker friends. That was so nice.

- Not needing to ‘live’ next to the space heater, hah! This warm weather has been wonderful.

- Discovering Mt. Vikos brand Haloumi cheese; a new obsession! (Their feta is so good too.) And equally thankful that my stomach… which is slowly healing… can handle it better than it would have a couple months ago! Yay!

- Tabbouleh, my continuing obsession. (I still need to share that recipe… [Edit: here it is: Classic Tabbouleh])

- The smell of hyacinth. One of my Top 3 Favorite Smells Ever. And even better, having a couple of stalks of it here in our kitchen; it’s so heavenly! And so ephemeral…

- Getting a difficult, nebulous (moneymaking) project completed!

- My sweet Hubby. My sweet Parents. My sweet Cat. My sweet Neighbor, Margaret. I am surrounded by such loving and wonderful people, I am just so lucky.

- How much F. makes me laugh! I love his sense of humor.

- Dreams, for making it clear when I need to back off on what I’ve got going on in my life. When I’m overwhelmed, I have scary dreams where I’m trying to escape a tornado or a tsunami, or am drowning. These three themes recur whenever I need to hear the message to “slow down.”

- Returning unread library books… one concrete step toward simplifying and de-overwhelming myself.

- Making time to just sit and journal… to think through and reflect on what’s transpired with this massive illness. Wow… lots to think about, and work out in my mind… it feels good to journal it… to process it… to integrate its many, many lessons…

- How incredibly good and normal I’ve been feeling… oh my gosh. What a blessing… I can’t even express it.

- Being barefoot in my garden.

- Being outside this weekend. I absolutely needed it.

- The quietude over at my parents’ house. At our house, there is constant, unrelenting traffic noise since we live next to a busy street. At times it drives me berserk. So to give my ears a rest feels soooooooo good.

- Getting so much awesome stuff done in my garden this weekend, with gorgeous weather to boot! I feel really really good about what I accomplished.

- Seeing so many newborn worms in my garden soil! They’re really teensy and cute.

- Doing handstands around my parents’ yard, just like old times. I was amazed that after 2 days of hot weather and hard labor in the garden, I was still energetic enough to be spending energy ‘carelessly’ on handstands! Truly amazing… (I hope Murphy doesn’t hear me saying how good I feel…)

- The smell of apple blossoms in the air as I ride my bike. What a special time of year! (They’re blooming 3 weeks early this year!)

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What have you felt especially grateful for this past week?

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Comments (6)

By Lindsey, March 26, 2012

~ 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!

***

- The pretty weather.

- Being out in my garden, just me and the soil.

- My loved ones!!!

- Unlimited paper and pens, so that I can write as much as I want. Other eras in history may not have provided this luxury!

- Journaling to help ‘verbalize’ and make some sense of the heaviness and vague, non-specific sadness that pervaded the week. I’m starting to cogitate on this past year and am recognizing that being so gravely sick was much more… traumatic, I guess you could say, than I realized. I feel that this illness was an ‘exit point;’ I had to choose whether or not I wanted to continue to live. Finally I decided that I did. But the illness kept worsening, and there were many nights where I didn’t know if I’d still be alive in the morning — and I deeply feared that I’d made my decision too late. And when you’ve been holding things like that, and so much more, in the palm of your hand month after month… I dare say it affects you.

- Making time to do a mandala. I haven’t done one in a while; it was really satisfying.

- The wonderful scent of paperwhites while I go about my work in the kitchen!

- Cabbage and potatoes cooked in corned beef broth. So delicious!

- A spur-of-the-moment walk in a new neighborhood with my mom one beautiful day; it really helped turn the day around.

- How impossibly good food tastes when you’re starving!

- Good news, from whoever, and about whatever. Good news in general is so nice to hear, isn’t it!

- The kindest of words written to me and spoken to me this week from people I love.

- Lying outside in the sun.

- F. accomplishing a huge bike ride yesterday — and that the weather gods smiled graciously upon him. (And then laughing about how whereas most folks might pack energy bars for a snack, he packs a friggin’ steak! Hehe! I love it.)

- Surprise blossoms on the peach and plum trees that I grew from seed!

Peach blossom

A single blossom! Cute!

Plum blossoms

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What have you felt especially grateful for this past week?

*****

Comments (3)

By Lindsey, March 18, 2012

~ 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!

***

- Wonderful warm weather all this week.

- A hot shower and cozy pajamas after a hard and satisfying day’s work in the garden.

- Being outside a lot this week. That really fed my spirit.

- Tabbouleh! I’ve been eating tons of it. Seems like each week I have a new obsession with some type of food that I can’t get enough of! Luckily it’s always something light and nourishing that my stomach and body both really like.

- Toasted homemade sourdough bread, pasture butter, and homemade concord grape jam — seasoned with hunger. That is heaven!

- Remembering, again and again, to make adjustments so that I’m enjoying my life from day to day. Remembering to “take my pleasure seriously” as Charles & Ray Eames said (thanks to Aja for that quote!). Otherwise my too-sensitive psyche gets overwhelmed and I find life becoming too much — and if I don’t wanna be here, that’s no fun.

- Solar cookin’ again! Made oil-free “french fries” and quinoa this week.

- Seeing Venus and Jupiter travelling together through the sky.

- Giving my honey, F., a body rub; we had both had a really difficult day and it felt just as good to give a body rub as it hopefully felt to receive it.

- My immune system successfully fighting off a cold that I was sure I was coming down with. That was awesome!

- Hanging out one-on-one with my dad.

- Harvesting the first tender chives of the season.

- F. getting tomatoes and parsley to feed my tabbouleh fetish.

- The wonderful, wonderful loved ones around me!

- My tomato seedlings growing heartily in our kitchen window, right next to me as I sit at my computer…

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What gratitudes have graced your week?

*****

Comments (2)

By Lindsey, March 11, 2012

~ 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!

***

- Feeling good and accomplishing so much in the garden this week! Feeling much more caught up and on track with everything that needs to be done out there.

- Having the time to work in the garden. How wonderful to be able to go over on weekdays and work in the garden instead of being tied up at a job.

- The $1 produce grab bags that our local health food store puts out. Sometimes the produce is still almost perfect!

- Making applesauce with delicious $1-bag apples.

- Free produce scraps for our compost heap!

- Beautiful weather for working outside this week.

- All of my loved ones!!!

- Taking control of a day where I felt melancholy and in a funk, and turning it around into a wonderful day. I love it when I can manage to do that.

- Remembering to have patience by repeating to myself, “That’s okay, I can wait” — and feeling a calm come over me when I say those words. While waiting for a slow car to make up its mind, “That’s okay, I can wait.” When I’ve just missed the bus and have to wait for the next one, “That’s okay, I can wait.” And while waiting for my body to heal more and more, I’m trying my best to say “That’s okay, I can wait.” (That one’s harder!)

- Roasted vegetables without any oil; both my body and taste buds like them better this way. I love roasted vegetables so much!

- Napping outside in the sun yesterday. Bliss. With the sun warming and relaxing my body like that, I felt like I was soaking in a hot spring!

- Going to a “sound bath” of crystal bowls, gongs, and didgeridoos with my mom; that was fantastic! What a cool experience.

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What gratitudes have graced your week?

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