Here’s this week’s items:
16. Decorate my bedroom walls.
I knew that for my bedroom, I wanted a photo of each kid behind our bed. So I picked my two current favorites and ordered prints, I love the way they look on the wall:
The simple, white frames are from IKEA. The nice thing about this is that every six months or so, I can order new prints. I can even change it to two family photos if I feel like it.
On the other side of the room, I had a papasan chair from 1994, so I finally threw it out and got a couch/chair from IKEA and put a beautiful Pottery Barn mirror (that was 69% off on sale) over it. And on the other side, I had a very very old TV holder, so that went away, too and we bought a simple, white one from IKEA. This TV will be gone when we get the new one downstairs and move that one here.
Next to the bed are the colorful bookcases I’d shown before and that’s it for the bedroom. Simple, clean, and spacious. Just the way I like it 🙂
Journaling Reads:
I’ve always had issues with the way I look. A lot of it stems from my childhood and I can tell you stories after stories about how my friends made fun of me, how I wore thick glasses, how I was the ugliest one by far, etc. etc.
And while there are several things I am stuck with, like my crooked nose or my sunken eyes, there are also a plethora of things I can change about the way I look. And recently, I decided to do exactly that. I cut and dyed my hair. I put on some jewelry I love. I decided to wear more of what I like and put a little bit makeup, just to make myself happier.
There are also longer-term things I can do like working out more so that my body is shaped better and eating healthier which is good for my skin, too. I can moisturize more and give my skin some of that water it craves. The list goes on and on.
The thing is, while I can’t be someone else, I can be the best me and I can be grateful for what I have and make the most of it and that is my goal now. I can also wear a smile more often because I think a smile is the prettiest thing anyone can wear.
This week I wanted to focus on me. I mean you. I mean I want each of us to focus on ourselves. I want us to practice some gratitude towards ourselves.
Appreciate ourselves.
I want you to think of how hard you try so much of the time. How you give it your best and sometimes you fall short and sometimes you hit the mark, but each time you try. How you love wholeheartedly. How you fill the dishwasher and empty it and do the laundry and cook and clean and put make up on and fit into clothes that hurt a little bit or shoes that hurt a lot just to look a bit better. How you smile sometimes when you want to scream. How your patience is tried day in and day out but you still give the baths, read the stories, hug, kiss and love.
Maybe you don’t have kids but take care of your mom. Or do both. Maybe you have a sick friend. Or a high maintenance lover. Maybe you work too hard at a job where you’re not appreciated enough. Maybe you study a lot and still get mediocre grades. Maybe you try and try and try and don’t always make it.
Maybe you don’t have as many friends as you’d like. Your art is not as amazing as you wish it were. You would like to read more. Eat less. Exercise. You’d like to keep in touch better. You want to write that novel already. Or take that course. Visit that country. Quit the job. Start your dream business.
You have dreams. You have frustrations. Ups and downs. Don’t we all? Even the happiest among us has hard days and the saddest among us has good ones.
That’s life. And while you work everyday to make it better for yourself. Or even while you’re wallowing in your ice cream in front of the TV, just cut yourself some slack today. Pat yourself on the back. Take the day off. Wear the comfy clothes, grab a book you love or a TV show you’ve been looking forward to and allow yourself the pleasure.
Stand in front of the mirror and take a good look at yourself. Give yourself a hug. You deserve it.
You really do.
Just for today, make sure you really appreciate yourself. I have a friend who always told me that if I said enough bad things about myself, others would start seeing me that way and I really believe her. It all starts with you. If you don’t appreciate yourself, how can you expect others to?
The following is cross-posted from the Weekly Gratitude Blog. I will post there every Tuesday and decided to post those posts here, too. For those of you who read both blogs, I apologize in advance. Some weeks the content might be different and other weeks, exactly the same.
Here’s this week’s item:
55. Put up art in the bathrooms
For the kids’ bathroom, I went with a simple set of photos I had from Burgaz:
In our bathroom, I put some butterflies (image coming).
But, really, the bathroom we use the most is the one downstairs. I mentioned a few weeks ago that I got some wonderful prints from Kal Barteski, these were the four that didn’t go up in the living room.
I am sorry for the terrible quality of the photos. There’s no light at all in that room so it’s hard to get a high quality image.
Here is a closeup:
And another:
These are also tiny art and here are the ones in Kal’s site: 45, 31, 43, 47
I adore every single one of them and they make me happy each time I walk into my bathroom.
Journaling Reads:
When I was in second grade, I took a routine test for vision at school and thought a huge E was an A. Starting that day and for the next twenty years, I wore glasses and then contact lenses and then back to glasses. I was practically blind; I couldn’t see anything without them. I remember when I was a little girl, I couldn’t get those glow-in-the-dark stars in my room because when I took off my glasses to go to bed, I couldn’t see them at all.
In 2000, I finally had laser eye surgery. It was a relatively fast decision without much research. I knew that if I read about it, discussed it, researched it, I wouldn’t go through with it.
And I am so glad I did.
It’s now been over ten years and two pregnancies later I can still see perfectly and it’s something I take for granted every single day. But I am so thankful for my eyes. So thankful that I did it. One of the first things I did after the surgery was to go and buy some glow-in-the-dark stars for my room and I still look at them every single night.
I wanted to talk a little about time today. I am a firm believer that time is our greatest asset and how you spend your time is how you spend your life.
This is such a big topic for me that, last year, I prepared and taught a class on this subject at Big Picture Scrapbooking. It was a series of exercises that allowed you to see where your time went and see how well it aligned with the things you want to do with your life. This is not about accomplishments (though those too) but about living your moments with mindfulness. Actively choosing to do the things you love.
I am often flabbergasted at the amount of time I waste in a day. The amount of time I spend checking my mail. Reading mail from advertisers or other crap that I decide to put in the trash as opposed to actual, valuable email. Refreshing the sites I visit or checking Google Reader. Facebook. Twitter. I am not even talking about the time I spend reading these sites (that time is valuable often) but the time I spend refreshing or going to the window to see if there’s anything “new.” The amount of times I walk up and down the stairs to put something in the wash, or cleaning up dirty dishes or vacuuming the crumbs my little one generates like nobody’s business. I can go on and on.
I’ve noticed that if I am having a challenging day, I waste even more time than usual. If I am tired, I waste more time. If I am angry, I waste time.
I know a lot about being busy. I have two kids, a full time job, and several ongoing commitments. So when people tell me how full their life is and how they have absolutely no time to do the things they really love to do, I know they are not telling the truth. Who doesn’t have 20 minutes in their day to take a walk, to read 10 pages of a book, to add an embellishment to a piece of art? (if you think you don’t, make sure to read this article by one of my favorite authors.)
When I created the class, it was eye-opening for me. Just to see where my time went. How I used all those bits and pieces of empty moments. It was also wonderful to make my list of wishes and hopes of how to spend my time. It helped me be more mindful and that’s something I’m constantly striving for.
So here’s my challenge for you. If you’ve been playing along with us for all these weeks, look back through your art, your words, your gratitude and pick one or two things you’re grateful for: things, people, places, etc. If you haven’t been playing along, just make a list of ten things, people or places that you think would make you happy. And then find a way to spend a little bit more time on those things this week. Go to the places that make you happy. Laugh with the people you’re grateful for. Choose an activity that brings you gratitude and vow to do it three times this week.
Just for a week. Just for twenty minutes.
I think seeing that you can make time for the things that make you feel grateful will end up making you feel even more grateful. Time is really our biggest asset and we each get a limited amount of it everyday and at least a few minutes of it should be spent doing something you love.
Something just for you.
Here’s this week’s item:
18. Put up photos of the kids in their rooms
David’s room already had some of his photos but not much art, so I now have some art and another “D”. The new art is this and this, both of which I adore. The little postcard about how great he is, is from Kal Barteski.
We also hung this awesome painting my friend Nicholas had gifted David a few months ago:
In Nathaniel’s room, I changed the bedcovers (which were 12 years old.) to something happier. This bed will eventually move to David’s room when Nathaniel moves to David’s bed.
He already had a bunch of art on his shelves, so I added some photos of Nathaniel that I love.
And here’s the other.
That’s it for the kids. I love seeing these shelves now. I also hung my photos outside their room in the hallways. Photos from San Diego, Turkey, Santa Barbara, Northern California, etc. Love seeing them when I walk upstairs.
Journaling Reads:
They say life is in the details.
I don’t often take good care of my body. I don’t put on sunscreen when I go out. I don’t put moisturizer before bed. I often don’t take my makeup off before I go to sleep. Yet, despite my neglect, my body is really good to me. It tends to put up with all the abuse I give it. My feet carry my ever-fluctuating body without complaining.
A few months ago, I decided it was time to give a little back. So, for the first time in ten years, I went to get a pedicure. I wanted to pamper my feet a little bit. And pamper, I did.
What I didn’t expect was how much better the whole thing would make me feel. Seeing the little bit of color on my toenails, feeling the smooth skin, and just getting a quiet hour to myself made me happier than I would have imagined.
I don’t wear open-toed shoes very often so I am the only one who gets to see these toes but I don’t mind. They are for me, really. And each time I catch a glimpse, I smile.
The greatest part of this project for me has been the fact that I sit at the end of each day and think of three things I have to be grateful for. Most days it’s not hard but sometimes it is. I also love that Lori and I picked themes. I use them as my focus for the photos/words cards I create that month. Each theme is not equal for me. Nature was really easy cause I can think of much to be grateful for there and this month’s theme, Body, is exceptionally hard for me. Partly because I have so many issues around that topic. Partly because I don’t appreciate much of anything about my body. Either way, the fact that it’s our theme forces me to look harder, look deeper. And the thing is, with practice it gets easier.
As I did my first two pieces for this month, the last two pieces came a lot more easily. It works the same way with gratitude in general. Because I am doing these everyday, I pay more attention to my day. I notice things. I actually feel the gratitude while it’s happening and not just afterwards. I think it’s common to look at a memory and remember the bliss, the joy of that moment. We’re pretty good at blocking out the bad and remembering the good after the fact. But, often times, I tend to get lost in the moment and not appreciate it a lot while it’s happening. This project has allowed me to be more aware. I am really grateful for that.
This awareness also makes me more joyful and realize how amazing my life is. Of course, I have my challenges, my down days, my issues. But, all in all, life is amazing. I have so much to be grateful for and I take time to revel in that regularly now. I focus on the gratitude. The joy. I really try to. The thing with happiness is that thinking you’re happy makes you feel happy. At least I think so. And the awareness this project has raised in my life allows me to live each moment with more joy, with more gratitude, and with so much more happiness.
Honestly I think this is the best gift I could have ever received.
Thank you, Lori, for asking me to do this with you. And for those of you who are “behind” or who wish you could do this, too, it’s really, truly never too late. I swear. Just start today. You will love every moment of it.
The following is cross-posted from the Weekly Gratitude Blog. I will post there every Tuesday and decided to post those posts here, too. For those of you who read both blogs, I apologize in advance. Some weeks the content might be different and other weeks, exactly the same.
Here’s this week’s item:
15. Decorate my living room wall.
I’ve been dreaming about this project for a long time. I have this huge wall in my living room that was itching to get filled. I knew I wanted to put a lot of small prints there and I knew they were going to be from etsy but I spent a long time putting it off. When I finally bought all my prints, they then waited another few months for my mom to arrive and help me hang them.
I intended to hang them all next to each other but that wasn’t so easy and as they ended up being all over the place, I decided I liked that better so here we are. I couldn’t get a photo without glare as I have so many windows in this room so I got a few closeups and I will list each of the prints.
Here’s a faraway shot to give you a sense of the space. There will be a much larger TV coming very soon which is why the left side is open space.
here’s a closer shot of the wall:
When I was trying to decide what to put on here, I wanted all of the images to be happy and full of love. I wanted them to be fun and uplifting. A few months before I bought the rest, I had bought six prints from Kal Barteski whom I adore. Two of them were for this wall. This is one of them:
And the elephant in this photo is the other:
Here are the links to the two prints: Tiny Art 104 and Tiny Art 91
Other pieces you see in the above image are these lovely giraffes, trees one and two(not in this photo) from Stephanie Fizer, Mistletoe kisses, and the awesome boy chairs.
After I bought Kal’s prints, I saw Marisa, who is one of my favorite artists, put up this set of postcards and I bought them as soon as they were up. So now I had all the colorful art I wanted. I went looking for some blue and green and quieter images that made me fee happy.
I fell in love with all of the trees in Once Upon a Paper but finally settled on this clean, green one.
I bought several postcards, too. One of which was this love one.
I adore angels which is why I bought this top right print called Angels the minute I saw it:
And another one was this little girl (I love this artist.) Another print I don’t have as closeups is My umbrella which has incredible texture. And finally, I have a postcard that says you are so loved in green. Since loved is my word for 2010, I thought it was only fitting.
On the opposite wall, I hung this wonderful painting by Picasso that I adore:
And that’s it for the living room. More next week.
Journaling Reads:
I am not one of those glowing pregnant women. I have nine months of morning sickness and I feel overwhelmed and tired most of the time. Despite that, I know that I am incredibly lucky to be able to have children without problems. I am thankful that my body is able to create and support life. It’s something I never take for granted and when I feel bad about my stretch marks, all I have to do is take a look at my kids and remember how they got there and how they’re worth it.
This month’s theme, body, is a hard one for me. I have so many issues with my body and I often find it hard to see anything to be grateful about. Which I guess makes it a good theme for me. Today, I wanted to share a blog post I wrote back in 2001 which I think still applies.
I was always the ugliest child among my friends.
The girls in my group were nothing short of drop dead gorgeous and they’d make sure to remind me of the difference in the quality of our looks. Ever since the time I heard a guy mention how I was the only ugly person they hung out with, I couldn’t look myself in the mirror without the word ‘ugly’ sprinting to my mind.
About two years ago, I cut my hair. I’d been growing it since the fifth grade and it was weak and difficult to manage. Since then, I cut my hair maybe twenty times. I dyed it to dark brown, auburn, orangish red, dirty blonde, deep red and now I’m once again trying to become blonde. And I’ve decided to start a peace process between my face and me.
Now I stare at the mirror for a while and try to see what my face tells me. My eyes remind me of my dad. They are a light brown with darker tones on the edges, a sign of my middle eastern heritage. The little lines on the corner of my eyes are getting deeper: a sign of my increasing happiness. I see lines across my forehead, a sign of my continuous worrying. When I smile, thick lines form around my nose and a tiny dimple appears on the left side of my face.
I have nice teeth. I never had to wear braces and they’ve always been straight. My face has somewhat grown into my large ears and my haircut mostly hides how much they stick out. Even my nose says something important. It’s a symbol of more of my roots, Jewish ones. The purple marks under my eyes insist that I don’t get any sleep no matter how many hours I may lay in bed. When I’m sad, my eyebrows curl up in the weirdest of arches. My hair reminds me that I’m learning to let go.
I’m learning to look at myself and see something besides ‘ugly’. I see my family, my background, signs of my happiness and characteristics. And I smile.
I think I’ll keep this face, even if it is ‘ugly’. It’s mine.
What does your face tell you about yourself?
The following is cross-posted from the Weekly Gratitude Blog. I will post there every Tuesday and decided to post those posts here, too. For those of you who read both blogs, I apologize in advance. Some weeks the content might be different and other weeks, exactly the same.
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projects for twenty twenty-six
projects for twenty twenty-five
projects for twenty twenty-four
projects for twenty twenty-three
projects for twenty twenty-two
projects for twenty twenty-one
projects for twenty nineteen
projects for twenty eighteen
projects from twenty seventeen
monthly projects from previous years
some of my previous projects
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