Now that my schedule is sort of back to normal (even if temporarily) I’ve been trying to catch up on all the reading, blogs, links, etc. that have accumulated. I saw this article on 7 Ways to Change Your Life in 7 Days. I will admit that I usually do not like articles like these. I am not entirely sure why. I do read them and often they are valuable or interesting but they just feel like snippets to me. This is all good stuff but I won’t be able to do it in 7 days. Each of these things is hard and requires a change in attitude and frame of mind. I guess what I mind is how easy the article makes it seem. So then, when I can’t actually change my life in 7 days, I feel like a failure.
Anyway. Not even the point of my post.
The part that resonated the most with me was this quote:
If while washing dishes, we think only of the cup of tea that awaits us, thus hurrying to get the dishes out of the way as if they were a nuisance, then we are not “washing the dishes to wash the dishes.” What’s more, we are not alive during the time we are washing the dishes. In fact, we are completely incapable of realizing the miracle of life while standing at the sink. If we can’t wash the dishes, the chances are we won’t be able to drink our tea either. While drinking the cup of tea, we will only be thinking of other things, barely aware of the cup in our hands. Thus we are sucked away into the future and we are incapable of actually living one minute of life.
I think of this often. Since I am a schedule based person and I multi-task often, I find myself disengaged more frequently than I’d like. I also find that just by changing my perspective I can actually enjoy life more.
For example, we live relatively close to a train station. On the way to David’s school each morning, I cross the tracks. Sometimes, I have to stop because a train is coming. Ordinarily, this would annoy me. Sitting there, waiting for the train to pass is taking precious minutes away from my life. Minutes I won’t get back.
But here’s the thing: Nathaniel loves the train. As we get close to the tracks, he always watches for the warning lights and if they are on he will exclaim with joy. “Choo choo” he will yell. And just in case we weren’t clear he will name each of us and do it again. “Mommy, Choo choo. Didi choo choo!” he’ll say. His excitement is intoxicating.
So now when I get close to the tracks, I find myself hoping for the train to come. I know it will bring joy to my boy and it’s infectious. The funny thing is, even when Nathaniel is not in the car, seeing the train pass will make me think of his happy cheering and I will smile. He has completely transformed this particular experience for me.
While doing the dishes might be an inapplicable example for me, I have been thinking more and more about paying attention, being present, changing perspective. Enjoying life as it happens, regardless of whether I have control or not. (Because more often than not, I don’t.)
Especially when it comes to my family. Letting myself bask in their small joys. Sharing tiny and huge moments of laughter. Taking the time to listen. To kiss a boo-boo. To give a hug. To not feel like my time is too precious for the ones I love. For the ones who bring me the most joy in life.
I’ve been thinking about all this. Every moment of every day is really what life is about. Enjoying this very moment as it happens is what life is all about. Enjoying the train. Enjoying the dishes. Enjoying the small moments.
Because there are a lot more of those than the big ones.
This layout is for Write.Click.Scrapbook’s November Gallery. The theme is to scrap “I Remember When…”.
I just love these photos so much I had to scrap them!
Journaling Reads:
I remember the day your dad and I finally decided to have another baby. We were both working hard and unsure it was the best time but we knew David would like a brother and that we didn’t have too much time left to put it off. As I look at these photos of the two of you playing together, laughing and crying I am reminded again that it was the best decision we ever made.
Details:
David says:
I gave this story five stars because I liked how the fiery eye was mysterious and cool.
I liked that there was trick with the statues and even after they figured out the right statue, it was still not in there. I liked that the real one was buried.
I liked the part where Jupe broke the chair to be able to get out and save his friends. And I also really liked that Jupiter buried a coin so that he could find the spot with a metal detector when they came back at night. He’s so clever!
The best part was how the guy from the temple paid Gus a lot of money for the eye and how Gus gave some of it to the investigators and some of it to the car company so they could keep using the Rolls Royce.
Reading a book a week with my six-year-old son David is a weekly project for 2011. You can read more about it here.
jake
I’d say a quieter week for Jake. Though he still went into the city several times to have meetings. We also went to David’s school for Nathaniel’s interview (for next year) and went out to a social even in David’s school. So overall, I’d say it’s still been a busy week. Running around, getting work done, having a few date nights and getting a lot of work done.
karen
This was a long week for me. Besides my parents being here and my wanting to spend a lot of time with them, I felt really ill all week between my allergies and jaw aches. I just didn’t feel right all week. I ended up going to bed around 7:30 almost every single night. Even the 10-hours of sleep didn’t make me feel better. I’ve also been way off my schedule which often stressed me out so I am assuming all of that together didn’t help. However it was wonderful to have my parents here and I am really really sad that they are already gone.
david
David had an excellent week at school and at home. He got to have a wonderful Halloween where he got to be venom (black Spiderman). He played a lot with my parents and got to eat out way more than usual. He got new legos, books, toys, and even a new desk for his room which he’s very excited about. He’s been doing great at school and reading every single night like a champ. We’ve already started thinking about our 2012 project together, too. I am so excited for us to do something crafty together.
nathaniel
Nathaniel also had a wonderful week. He had his first Halloween at school and he was a dinosaur. He got to go on a little parade with his class and loved going trick or treating in the neighborhood. He did ok during his interview, too. At first he was all shy but then he opened up and I am hoping it went well for him. He really got attached to both my parents and I am not sure how he’ll handle it tomorrow when he realizes they’re gone.
Here are some of my favorite captured moments from this week:
There was a lot of reading in our house all week:
and Nathaniel made sure to be a part of it too:
the boys loved sitting with my dad and doing their thing.
I finally snapped a shot of Nathaniel right before he went to school:
I snapped a few shots of the boys in the backyard on halloween.
david was the black spiderman (venom) and Nathaniel was a dinosaur (david’s costume from when he was 2.5).
Nathaniel wasn’t a huge fan of the hat and did a lot of this all night.
but he was super-cute with it on:
all the kids in our complex met up at the part to go trick or treating. My two boys took a moment to sit and hug each other.
David even gave Nathaniel a kiss.
Nathaniel spent playing a lot this week while I worked.
he has this new thing where he puts his hands together behind him. He’s so cute.
He’s been super-happy lately, too.
David, too.
Lots of posing.
and laughing.
and a ton of sitting together with the grandparents which was definitely my favorite moments.
and I’ll end with a tickle-time shot from today.
And those are some of the moments from our week. All in all, a truly wonderful week. Hope yours was, too. Thank you for your patience with me this week. I hope to be more responsive and post more this week.
Us Right Now is a weekly project for 2011. You can read more about it here.
Sorry to be inundating you with giveaways and random talk about things to buy. However I know many of you who read here have found me through Big Picture Classes and so I wanted to let you know that I have a new workshop that’s opening on December 1.
This is a workshop I wrote and taught in 2009. When I wrote Finding Your Way last year, it was as a response to the Layout a Day I did and how it changed my life. I wrote the course after my scrapbooking process was transformed. This class was the other way around. Writing this class actually changed my life. It made me take a good, hard look at how I am spending my time and what I want to be doing with my rare and precious minutes in my day.
Here’s part of what I wrote in the description for the class:
“You will never find time for anything. If you want time, you must make it.”
On the surface, this workshop is about time. Specifically, about how you spend your time. But, in reality, it’s about so much more than that: reclaiming time to use it as you WANT to live your life.
If you ask me, time is the great equalizer. We each get 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. That’s 1,440 minutes, every single day. Let’s say you sleep a generous 8 hours a day; that still leaves you with 960 precious minutes every day. How you spend those minutes adds up to how you spend your life. Don’t you want to spend those 960 minutes doing the things you most love doing?
“Realize that now, in this moment of time, you are creating. You are creating your next moment. That is what’s real.”
This is an unusual class for a few reasons:
- There are 4 week’s worth of lessons but they will be spread over December and January to give you time to observe the holidays, take a break, and still be able to go through the lessons.
- I think it’s important to do this class in December-January time-frame because it’s a common time to make resolutions and I think this class will transform how you make resolutions.
- The class is mostly exercises that involve tracking, thinking and brainstorming. And then making resolutions/plans. There is a minibook but if you don’t have time to create that, in my opinion, the biggest value of the class is doing the work, not the minibook.
- This class will be open all of 2012 with monthly check-ins from me to ensure you (and I) stay on track and can address issues that creep up throughout the year.
I can promise you that if you do the work, this class will change your life.
Here is the sign up link: Click here
If you’re on the fence and waiting, I urge you to take it because I may never teach it again. I often have people email me after the deadline passes and I feel terrible telling people that it’s too late. I don’t want to offend anyone and you certainly don’t have to sign up but I wanted to be upfront about my schedule.
If you have questions about the class, don’t hesitate to leave me a comment or email me. I will gladly answer any questions. I try to only teach classes that I feel strongly about so I have no problem giving as much information as you need to decide one way or another.
I am giving away one seat in my class today. Like last week, I will ask for suggestions for other classes you might like me to teach so I can decide what and if I will plan classes for 2012. So just leave a comment. I will leave comments open for a week and announce the recipient next Friday (November 11). If you’ve already signed up for the class, you can still be eligible to win and you’ll just get a refund so don’t worry.
You should know all the links to my class are affiliate links and I might get a tiny cut if you click through my site to sign up. And before I leave, I also wanted to mention that I participated in the 12 Days of Christmas class as a teacher. I will tell you more about that and do a giveaway in a few weeks.
I won’t lie: having visitors hasn’t done wonders for my weight-loss or even stay-healthy plans. Most significantly, I’ve been drinking coffee. Not the crappy, powdered thing I was drinking at home, but the stuff you buy at Starbucks. So while I am not worried about getting back on the 6-coffees-a-day wagon, I am still irritated at myself for drinking so many of these in the last two weeks. I’ve also eaten out more than usual and while I try to make healthy choices, it’s harder when you eat out often. All this made me appreciate our quiet lifestyle even more. Oh and it didn’t help that I am hormonal at this very moment.
Since November is here, I upped the running to 2.1 miles a day. It’s going ok but I am not reading much during running anymore and, instead, I watch movies or instructional videos for the classes I am taking. It makes the time go fast and helps me forget that I am running. I haven’t made progress on the trainer front but it’s still at the top of my list once I get myself organized.
I completely forgot what the scale said last week which is why the weight is n/a again. I promise to pay better attention this time.
and here’s this week’s card:
Healthy for Life is a weekly project for 2011. You can read more about it here.
And here’s the next Komtrak page:
The full text reads: Today is a new day, it is yours to fill.
I used acrylics on this page.
I wanted it to look like sun was coming up over the mountains but alas, I can’t say it turned out the way I imagined. But still…
And here’s the next Komtrak page:
The full text reads: Life is short, forgive easily.
I used acrylics on this page and some pan pastels.
And here’s the next Komtrak page:
The full text reads: Follow the path of joy.
I used acrylics and lots of stitching on this page.
And here’s the next Komtrak page:
The full text reads: There’s always rain before a rainbow.
I used acrylics on this page and lots of stitching.
I am creating multiple art journaling pages a week for now. You can read more about it and the book I am using for these pages at the top of this blog post.
I wanted to read Divergent as soon as I saw it on the Goodreads newsletter. I am not sure what pulled me to it but I kept thinking about it. And I was worried that when I finally get my hands on it, I might not actually like it.
But I did.
I got into the story from the very beginning. I liked the voice of the main character and the others, too. I liked the plot. I liked the pace (well at least until the end when it just seemed to go way too fast). I just really really enjoyed it and I am now looking forward to the next books by the same author. Especially since I hear this is a trilogy.
Yey for another new author I love. Oh, and, I found out that the cover art was done by an old friend of mine. Which made me love it that much more.
Here are the sketches from last week. All of these use Fabel Castell Pitt Pens and watercolors. Most of the ones this week aren’t so great but I just keep doing anyway.
Sunday:
Monday:
Tuesday:
Wednesday: ( I especially dislike this one.)
Thursday:
Friday:
And Saturday:
I get some of my ideas randomly, others from other people’s photos, some from my photos, and some from pinterest. So far, so good.
Daily Sketching is a weekly project for 2011. You can see a detailed post on my steps here.
If you’ve been reading here for a while, you’ll know that I am very organized and scheduled. I like my life like that. I get comfort and joy from the repetition and task completion. At home and at work, I like getting things done. Even small things like returning an email gives me joy.
And the opposite gives me great discomfort.
When I know I have something due, I cannot sit still. Ask anyone who’s ever worked with me; I’m the first person to deliver my assignments. I was the kid who came home and did her homework right away (assuming I hadn’t already finished it at school.) It’s one of the main reasons I wake up early to exercise and sketch. It gives me the time to get my things done. When I get a DT assignment, I pretty much do it right away. Even if it’s due two months from now. Sometimes, I get heads up that a request is coming down the road but I don’t know the details yet and it drives me insane to know I will have something due but I don’t know enough to sit and work on it immediately.
I don’t do well with a todo list that’s piling up. I don’t do well with deadlines looming. With people waiting for a reply.
Alas, that’s how life’s been for the last ten days or so. My parents are here and I am trying to balance time spent with them with time spent getting work and chores done. And, bless them, they do give me a lot of alone time but I find myself mentally and physically tired so I don’t accomplish much when they are not here. So now, I have emails and comments that have been unanswered for days (if you’re one of the people who’s waiting for a response, I am deeply sorry and I swear I will get to it soon.) I have layouts that are scheduled for soon. Not to mention my own personal projects that are not being tended to.
And all this is making me slowly unravel.
This morning, during my journal time, I told myself that this was a lesson in learning to sit with discomfort. There are times in one’s life where we have to be in situations that are not pleasant but we can’t do anything about it. We can’t solve it, we can’t fix it, we can’t even make it go away. We just have to learn to be present with it. And I believe it’s an important skill to have. It will help me become a more patient friend and partner and mother. Learning to just sit with it instead of controlling it (which is definitely my default behavior.) I told myself that it’s an exercise for me to see that if things wait and pile for a week or two, life doesn’t end. I can still catch up. People will forgive and understand. The most important things will all get done when they need to and life will be ok. Sometimes we have to trust that things will work out.
So, I am learning to sit with discomfort. Guilt, shame, frustration. I am facing them and practicing. Paying attention to the feelings and being present with them. To what it looks like for me. So that I can learn. So that I can recognize it when it’s here again. So that I can grow and become more patient. With myself (and others.)
It’s not pleasant.
But I’m working on it.
for this week, i just used a simple background but amazingly I forgot to take a before picture and didn’t realize it until it was too late.
So….
here is the left:
here is the right:
And here’s the filled page:
Simple but still nice.
Weekly Art Journal is a weekly project for 2011. You can read more about it here. And you can find out more about the weeklong daily journaling here.
Today I am very honored to be a part of Balzer Design’s stencil hop using the Crafter’s Workshop stencils Julie designed. The ones I was specifically sent were the three face ones below. They are called Ava, “Edith and Maude”, and Summer in the order in which you see them. (Click on the photo to go to Crafter’s Workshop’s Stencil page)
Those of you who’ve been here a while know that I am crazy about faces so when I got these I was ecstatic and started creating immediately. Here are some of the pages I made:
This first page below uses the Edith and Maude stencil as well as Wonky Circles, Flower Frame, Chevron ones and it’s all pretty much done with acrylic paint. The text says: Remember to always be true to who you are because you’re perfect just the way you are.
The next page is also using Edith and Maude and I just added a birdie to her hair. I used the Leaf Frame and Triage stencils, too. I used pan pastels, acrylics and watercolors. It says: You already are what you hope to be.
I then used the 6×6 Edith and Maude stencil to create the following page. This is almost all pan pastels and it also uses the Circles in Squares and Wonky Circles stencils. The text says: Don’t hesitate, stand out from the crowd and be you.
Once I started using them, I just couldn’t stop. Then I used Ava to make this next one. Pan Pastels to use the stencils and watercolors to color the face in. The text reads: Believe in your dreams even if no one else does.
And finally, I only had Summer in a 6×6 but I really liked it so I decided to use it by giving her a body. Once I stenciled and colored it, she looked sort of sad and I’d had a rough day so I decided to write: It is ok to feel broken. You are not alone.
And there you go. I hope this shows you some of the variety of pages you can make with these amazing stencils. I love being able to quickly add a face to my art journal pages and I love the emotion and meaning they bring with them. If you find drawing portraits on your own intimidating but still like to have them on your pages these stencils are fantastic starting places. You can use them as much or as little as you like: only as a guide or to create the whole face just as is. I cannot recommend them enough.
Here are the people participating on today’s hop:
• Jen Cushman
• Jill Sprott:
• Karen Grunberg: you are here 🙂
• Paula Gilarde
• Julie Fei-Fan Balzer
I highly encourage you go see their incredible creations. Huge thanks to Crafter’s Workshop and Julie for giving me this opportunity.
And thank you so much to you for coming to visit me!
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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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