A Book a Week – Perfectly Reasonable Deviations from the Beaten Track

My latest audiobook was Perfectly Reasonable Deviations from the Beaten Track .

My husband introduced me to Richard Feynman over fifteen years ago and I’ve been a huge fan ever since. I’ve read both Surely You’re Joking Mr. Feynman and What Do You Care What Other People Think?. I read The Pleasure of Finding Things Out and I read Tuva or Bust! which is about his last trip. I even read QED which was absolutely fantastic. There are still a few more books of his I would love to read and plan to as well.

The thing about this book is that it’s a compilation of many of the letters he sent during his lifetime. They are compiled by his daughter and the audiobook is fantastic. Well read, really really well told. I enjoyed all of it. The great love he had with his first wife, his days in Los Alamos building the bomb, his teaching days, the Nobel prize, talking about his kids and his father and his letters to his mother. I loved all of it. I was moved. It was thought-provoking. And I even laughed out loud. He was obviously an amazing man and it comes through and through in this book.

I cannot recommend it enough. I really loved every single moment of this book and was truly sad to have it end.

May 26, 2010 | Books Read in 2010, Literature | 2 comments

Daily Diary – May 25 2010

Flowers from the love of my life. They didn’t bloom yet but I wanted to capture them anyway. Tulips of all colors. Makes my heart swoon.

Today is my eighth wedding anniversary with my husband. We’ve been together sixteen years and married eight. We had a lot of different ideas on how to celebrate today but finally settled on going to the California Academy of Sciences as a family. At this stage of our lives, I cannot imagine having had a better way to honor our marriage than a day as a whole family, loving each other and having fun together. (We will go out to a fancy dinner, too, I promise, Mom, on our next date night. But we didn’t want to drag the kids to a nice restaurant. We wanted it to be fun for all of us.)

So we drove to the city and we first went into the rain forest. I even put shoes on Nathaniel in case he wanted to walk. (He didn’t all that much and he wasn’t a fan of the shoes so I took them off pretty soon after this. And his pants are all bunched up cause Jake was carrying him most of the time up till then.)

David loved the rainforest, seeing all the frogs and the lizards and the butterflies. And he liked being able to hug Nathaniel too since Daddy had put him down.

Here’s a green basilisk lizard for you.

And a frog.

We then went to the aquarium where I asked Jake to get some shots of me with the kids. I promised myself I would do that more. Even though the kids don’t seem to care much. That’s ok.

Here’s David showing Jake some fish that he saw. They had a lot of fun looking at everything.

We then took a break for some food since I knew Nathaniel was starving. And he was, poor guy, he devoured everything I gave him.

After “lunch” we went to see the penguins. Because there was no way I wasn’t seeing the penguins.

Some more food, a bunch of games, some more sightseeing and it was time to come home. David fell asleep on the way home but not the little one. He really does not like to nap in the car. I came home to the beautiful tulips and fed the kids, put them down and here we are. About to watch Glee. A wonderful ending to an incredible day.

And, of course, here’s the love of my life.

The father of my children, the owner of my heart, soul and my best friend in the whole wide world. I love you madly, deeply, and with every single part of my being my amazing husband. Thank you for choosing me. Thank you.

Note to Self:
Early in the day I watched Brene Brown’s Up Talk. Brene is an expert on on shame and shame resilience and I cannot recommend this movie enough. It’s profound. It’s really worth your time. I will likely watch it a few more times. I hope you take the time to watch it, too.

Three Things I’m Grateful For:
1. My husband. My wonderful, amazing, patient, kind, funny, truly awesome husband.
2. Our full and fantastic day.
3. My family who remembered our special day and called us to congratulate us. I thought of my grandmother again today; she would have definitely called me. I love you Omama.

Two Things David’s Grateful For:
1. Our trip to the California Academy of Sciences
2. Getting to play video games at the academy of sciences.

May 25, 2010 | Daily Diary - 2010, DPGallery | 5 comments

Layout a Day in May – The Best Part of Having Two Kids

Day number Twenty-five.

The journaling is about how my favorite thing in the world is watching my two kids play and laugh together and how David is the best big brother and loves making his little brother laugh.

Details:

May 25, 2010 | A Layout A Day in May, Layouts, Scrapbooking | 4 comments

Weekly Gratitude – Your Turn

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.

May 25, 2010 | Weekly Gratitude | 2 comments

Daily Diary – May 24 2010

Happy, relaxing day today. After last night’s LOST finale, it was hard to get up at 5 but the little one wakes up when he does and there’s no stopping him. So we woke up, we hugged, nursed, and just lay there until I felt awake which is when I started my layout. Took a bit longer to get going than usual today. But I had taken the day off so it was ok.

I pretty much lazied around all day. Read my book, surfed, etc. Then I played legos with David while Nathaniel explored everything around the room.

And in the drawers.

David and I built a lego restaurant that was on fire so the fire-woman came to put it out.

And then I made dinner for the kids while David continued to play.

A little glimpse into a life where I don’t work. Quite different, at least stress-wise. And now that the kids are sleeping, I plan to write tomorrow’s gratitude post and spend the rest of the night reading my book. I have tomorrow off, too so it’s another relaxing day waiting for me. I can’t believe there are only 7 days left in May. It passed way way too quickly.

Note to Self:
One of the things Karen mentioned during the retreat was to spend one hour a day playing with your kids. Where playing means not doing anything else and doing whatever they want. So today. I did that. I told David we could do anything he wanted. He had some trouble coming up with something at first but then he decided to play legos. We sat on the floor and built things and talked and had so much fun. And I think when we were done, he was genuinely happy. So was I. It was great to have some time just for us. I want to make a point of doing this more. Anything David wants. Just for a bit. It’s hard being a kid and being told what to do all the time, so I think it’s nice to give him some time everyday where he gets to make all the decisions and knows that he has 100% of my attention.

Three Things I’m Grateful For:
1. Playing with David and Nathaniel today.
2. A quiet, relaxed, happy day.
3. A beautiful, touching card from my wonderful husband.

Two Things David’s Grateful For:
1. playing legos with mommy.
2. daddy! he’s so thankful for daddy so often that it makes me happy.

May 24, 2010 | Daily Diary - 2010, DPGallery | Leave a comment

Layout a Day in May – And Though Now It’s Really Gone Forever

Here’s today’s layout.

And Though Now It’s Really Gone Forever, I will Remember.

Journaling is about how Nathaniel had this funny crawl where he didn’t bend his knees and now that he’s walking it’s gone forever but thanks to this photo I will get to remember it forever.

Details:

And here goes day twenty-four.

May 24, 2010 | A Layout A Day in May, Layouts, Scrapbooking | 5 comments

Crafting with David – A Banner for Amore

This week’s craft was super simple but very important. My mom turned 60 on Saturday and we wanted to do something for her for when we were going to Skype. Our initial goal was to make hats but we couldn’t do it with what we had at hand, so we decided to make a big banner.

We picked some paper.

And lined up our stamps.

And then stamped away.

see? there he is

and here it is finished. simple but gets the job done.

and here it is hanging behind us when we’re chatting with her.

we love you SO MUCH Amore!! HAPPY HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

May 24, 2010 | Craft with David | Leave a comment

Daily Diary – May 23 2010

Last night I went to bed at 6pm and woke up briefly at 7:30 and went right back down at 8:30 and slept until 4am when David came into my room to blow his nose (it was dark and I didn’t realize until the morning that his nose was actually bleeding when I woke up to find a bunch of blood on my sheets.

Then Nathaniel woke up briefly after, and thus began our day. I hugged my kid for a while and then did my page for today. Nathaniel went down for his nap and took a long one, look at him when he wakes up. He’s all pink and I love it.

And then he decided to turn the TV on and off for fun. He’s really good at that.

We spent the rest of the day watching movies. We’re both exhausted so it was really the very best way day to spend our day and add to that some delicious goat cheese sandwiches and I was in heaven. And now we’re watching more TV and I can’t wait for Lost finale tonight and I am off work for the next two days so it’s more of this. Yes! I need the relaxing time, I need the rest.

oh and HAPPY BIRTHDAY Aksel and Jeff, I love you both so much!!!

Note to Self:
I’m listening to Rework and one of the things they talk about is the need for focused attention. I was thinking I need to do this more. One thing at a time. Set the kitchen timer and just focus on one thing fully. Hard with the kids but when Nathaniel is napping and David is at school and when they are both sleeping. There are chunks in the day where I could do this. And I need to do it more often. Regain some focus. It’s worth trying isn’t it?

Three Things I’m Grateful For:
1. I am grateful that I finally got some rest and I need more.
2. I am grateful that my husband sat with me all day and we watched movies and laughed with the kids and I am so peaceful now.
3. I am grateful for Layout of the day. I’ve learned so much in the last 24 days.

Two Things David’s Grateful For:
1. Legos. He’s still playing with the legos like crazy.
2. Daddy.

May 23, 2010 | Daily Diary - 2010, DPGallery | 2 comments

Layout a Day in May – A Boy and the Chair

Here’s #23.

details:

May 23, 2010 | A Layout A Day in May, Layouts, Scrapbooking | Leave a comment

Daily Diary – May 22 2010

I am exhausted. I can barely hold my head up. I have so much to say but no energy. None.

So I’ll just say. HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOMMY!!! I LOVE LOVE LOVE YOU. Here we are videoconferencing and singing her happy birthday.

And David playing the wii.

And Nathaniel playing too.

I have much to say. More coming tomorrow, I promise.

Note to Self:
Today’s note is simple: I need to get more rest. A lot more.

Three Things I’m Grateful For:
1. I am grateful for today’s retreat. More soon.
2. I am grateful to be home and about to go to bed.
3. I am grateful for my life. For every bit of it.

Two Things David’s Grateful For:
1. wii day!!
2. getting to go to my friend’s birthday

May 22, 2010 | Daily Diary - 2010, DPGallery | Leave a comment

Layout a Day in May – The Joy of Play

Today’s layout is a sneak since it’s going to be posted at the A Million Memories blog in a week or so. I will come back and post the full one then. (Edited to add: now it’s up so here’s the full layout, which is a scraplift of the amazing zarah.)

details:

May 22, 2010 | A Layout A Day in May, Layouts, Scrapbooking | 2 comments

52 Things – Put up art in the bathrooms

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.

May 22, 2010 | 52 Things in 2010 | Leave a comment

« Newer Entries  
  Older Entries »