So we started our day with a delicious breakfast at the local cafe with Levent. And then there was hugs good-bye. walks at the park, naps, and lots of playtime. I will just leave you with some wonderful photos from our day.
I’ve also finished my Week in the Life project. Still only digital. I will post all my pages soon. I need to go to bed now.
Note to Self:
Despite the fact that I’ve struggled to accomplish things last week and I had no time to catch up this week, I am feeling great about things in general. I feel like the sense of peace I so wished I always had is finally here and covering me like a blanket.
And it’s as amazing as I hoped it would be. I feel a sense of calm, belonging, and contentment. (I think the word contentment is underrated. Being content sounds like settling, but I think feeling satisfied about one’s life is exactly the perfect way to be. Knowing that things are good, loving what is. I think that’s the key to happiness.)
Of course, I still have a million things I want to accomplish and many times I feel frustrated, insecure, sad etc. but overall, I feel much happier, much more grounded, and a consistent sense of peace in my life. And I want to write this down so I can remember it forever.
Three Things I’m Grateful For:
1. I am grateful for a stroll around the neighborhood, taking photos and enjoying nature.
2. I am grateful for a day of rest and relaxation and enjoying both my kids, watching them play and giggle together. Nothing better than that.
3. I am grateful for spring. This morning, as we left for breakfast, the sun was shining, the birds were chirping and I just felt a deep sense of peace. Peace was my word for 2009 and it looks like I have finally achieved it. For that alone, I am deeply grateful.
Two Things David’s Grateful For:
1. Getting to have a croissant and apple juice for breakfast.
2. Going to the park and getting to play. And for Nathaniel’s new duplos. And wii time, too.
Happy Birthday Nathaniel!!!!!!!
Today my little boy turned one. A whole year. I cannot believe how fast time passes. As Grethen Rubin says, “The days are long but the years are short.” Yes, indeed.
Little boy started the day really early. So we both went down for a nap around 8:30 and woke up around 10:30. The night before, right as I was nursing him for bed, he started doing peek-a-boo back at me. It was and still is the most hilarious thing ever.
He doesn’t always get it right but he does it with a lot of joy and we both laugh like crazy.
When he woke up from his nap, he was really happy and giggled wit his dad for quite some time.
After we got prepared, we walked down to the little park in our complex and set him up in his chair and put his hat on (left from David’s first) but he wasn’t all too fond of it.
A few of our neighbors came over to celebrate with us and brought their little ones, too. We then sang to him and cut his cake.
A little chatting, some eating, some playing with the babies and we were back at home, going down for the second nap. After which, we drove to SFO to pick up my childhood best friend (and first boyfriend) Levent who happened to be visiting Las Vegas from Istanbul for a bachelor party and took a detour to come visit us. We drove into the city with him and did touristy things like Lombard street, Pier 39, and driving around.
After that, we came back home, put the kids down and Levent and I went to In’n’Out burger, drove to Google campus, and then came back home to chat until we were both too tired. (Sadly it was only 11:30pm, we’re getting old.)
All in all, an absolutely perfect day!
Note to Self:
I was worried about today and how overwhelmingly busy I thought it was going to be. I generally like my weekends to be completely free, let alone booked to the rim. But I kept telling myself to have faith. Both of the plans we had were for wonderful events with great people.
And we were lucky the whole day through. The weather shone. People showed up to Nathaniel’s party and they were kind, sweet, and happy. We felt overjoyed and lucky.
Seeing Levent again was such a rare luxury and then to get to spend a day in city that we don’t visit nearly often enough, yet another total bonus. And then I get to spend some alone time with my friend and chat honestly and laugh and be happy.
What more can someone ask out of a single day? Sometimes you just have to have faith.
Three Things I’m Grateful For:
Three Things I’m Grateful For:
1. My little boy’s birthday! He’s such an incredible person and has brought so much joy into our family. We are truly blessed to have him. Happy birthday my amazing son.
2. Levent coming to visit us. I hadn’t seen him in over 3 years and I am so glad he took the side trip to come spend a few hours with us. We love you!
3. Honestly, today I am truly grateful for my life.
Two Things David’s Grateful For:
1. Visiting San Francsico. It was his first time driving down Lombard and visiting the pier. He got to ride on Levent’s shoulders and he was thrilled.
2. Nathaniel’s birthday. The party wasn’t really great for David as there was no one his age but he was patient and well behaved. And he surely enjoyed all of Nathaniel’s gifts.
This is done with the January A Million Memories Kit.
Journaling Reads:
And now you’re crawling.
Since David never crawled I had no idea what to expect. I thought maybe you might not crawl either. Part of me knew that would make things much easier since this way you’d stay put in one place. But part of me wished you would.
And now you are.
And you’re so fast, too.
Off you go exploring everywhere. Finding the tiniest specks of paper or thread on the floor. Making your way around the house just to get to me. Now you know how to get around and you cannot be stopped. It’s so cute to watch you.
How your legs are taller than your arms so you wobble a bit. How you can get from one point to another in milliseconds.
How much you love having this little bit of independence. Nathaniel, I am so glad to share this milestone with you and so thankful that I am around to see it. I cannot wait to share all the next ones, too.
Here’s this week’s items:
54. Decorate the staircase landings.
On the way from the guest room to upstairs, we have these huge landings (or whatever you call them) and I had no idea what to put there. They are really tall and I do not have a ladder that can reach there so I couldn’t hang anything and after a bunch of thinking and organizing, here’s what we ended up with:
Here’s how it looks when you’re downstairs, walking up:
and a painting I hung on the wall below. It’s of two mosques.
and here is a closeup of the left side with a glass vase and long long flowers:
and on the right side we put two candles with holders and a clock and a small flower for some color:
That’s it for the stairs. Next week is my bedroom.
I bought tulips again. I need to buy tulips every week.
And day 5. Today was challenging for me. I took most of the shots with my little camera while we were out and about. After we picked up David, we went to the grocery store to get Nathaniel’s birthday cake and a bunch of groceries we needed.
It was a long trip and the kids were wonderfully behaved but by the time we got home, we were all starving. After the kids ate, I made myself food again. Asparagus this time and some Mediterranean salad I’d bought at the store. It was all delicious.
Jake came home early and took David to Chuck’e’Cheese for the first time. I’m told it was fun but we won’t be repeating it anytime soon.
Today was David’s Wii day this week cause tomorrow is a hectic day. While he was out, Nathaniel wanted to eat the remotes and got really mad at me for not letting him.
And since I hadn’t done a good job today, I asked David to smile for me so I could get a good shot of him for the day.
Not the best but I’ll take what I can get. I’ve already done the pages for today. Since my friend will be here tomorrow, I am guessing tomorrow’s pages will get done on Sunday but I am happy to be caught up because it’s much easier for me this way.
I am feeling apprehensive about the weekend. Even though it’s not really a lot, I feel like there’s a bunch of stuff going on and I am going to be so tired. I feel like I need to relax and let it go, I am stressing well in advance and likely it will be wonderful.
Note to Self:
I am so grumpy lately that it’s almost unbearable to me. I have these terrible headaches and jaw-aches (i have TMJ) that are driving me crazy. I am unproductive all day long but have a growing todo list and thus refuse to go to sleep and rest and yet I don’t actually do anything when I am up. I am mean to everyone around me. And my bad mood is only generating more bad mood for me. I don’t know how to get out of the cycle. I think it’s likely hormonal but it still sucks and I want to figure out how to snap out of it. Getting caught in these cycles is one of the most frustrating things to me and if I could build a toolset of how to get out of them, I think it would be a lifesaver.
Three Things I’m Grateful For:
1. I’m grateful for my life. Despite the fact that I’ve been feeling more down and introspective and unmotivated than usual, I am still fundamentally feeling happy. This is a huge shift for me. I cannot tell you what an amazing gift that is.
2. I often send emails to reach out to people I like to help. I might read that someone needs technical help or something else that I know and I will email them and offer to help. Sometimes people take me up on it and other times, they ignore me. Today someone gave me the opportunity to help and I am grateful for that. It helped me as much as her.
3. Grateful for a full but exciting weekend with birthdays, best friends, and hopefully some rest.
Two Things David’s Grateful For:
1. Legos are still on the top of his list.
2. Jake came home early today and took him to Chuck’e’Cheese. It was a blast for him.
So here are some pages I did this week.
This wasn’t the best week for my art journal but I still completed some pages.
I first tried to sketch a face but it went badly and I got all frustrated so I covered the page with fabric and just added some tags for the journaling. Not great but I actually don’t hate it.
The back has a tree I made with oil pastels. Just had fun without thinking too much.
The next few sheets already had a lot going on so I gesso’ed the text so I can write over it and left it at that.
This house was inspired by Beth Quinn‘s art in Artful Blogging. i’ve had some mica lying around for so long so I decided to finally play with it.
For the next spread, I just sketched. I need to practice like a thousand more hours.
And finally, I took a small model from Warm Fuzzies and cut and stitched this little bird on a branch with her nest. This, too, isn’t nearly as magnificent as the original inspiration but it was fun to make.
And that ends week 4. Let’s see how next week goes. Hopefully better.
Our theme for April is nature.
The journaling reads:
Most people love roses or fancier flowers like orchids. But I am a tulip girl. Tulips are my choice of flower for any occasion and I love them in every single color. I’m not choosy, as long as it’s a tulip.
Over the years, I’ve thought a lot about what makes tulips so special for me. I think it’s because they open so wide and I love how the inside of the tulip often has a completely different color from the outside but it’s even more magical. I have never had a tulip that failed to bloom. They come closed, and over time, they open wide and show their inside surprise and then even as they wilt, their petals take on this velvety color that makes me fall in love with them all over again.
The only thing I don’t like about tulips is that they are not in season all year long. Maybe others think this makes them that much more special but I am not one of those people. I would be happy if I could have fresh tulips in my house all year round withut ever having to worry about how expensive they are.
This is a snapshot of my neighbor’s plant.
Here we are on day 4. I took a lot of photos today. As promised, I tried to get myself in more shots. I used my little camera, gave it to David, and tried taking photos with extending my arm. I even used Photobooth.
Can’t say any of them came out so well, but I still am happy I have them. I also snapped some of Jake and Nathaniel.
And here he is playing with the Tivo remote. Seriously his favorite thing to do.
And here he is, after finishing his teething biscuit. I gave it to him so he could be quiet during my phone meeting. He made a mess, of course.
Then we went to pick up David and he got to play in the playground for a bit and even got to go into the office and play with the trains. I love watching them play together.
Since our CSA arrived yesterday, I got to have a super healthy lunch. Salad, carrots, cucumbers, cheese, vinegar, and oil. Zucchini with onions and a little cheese. Two slices of bread. Preparation time: 8 minutes. I don’t know why I get too lazy to do this everyday.
After another failed nap attempt, and a bunch of work, we took a short walk to the park with our neighbor Sara and her son Matthew. Nathaniel did this funny thing where he kept raising this one leg and would not put it down. I couldn’t tell why but he seemed to keep doing it.
David ran around and fell a bunch of times and picked flowers for me.
We then came home for dinner, some play time, and bed.
Well I am off to do today’s pages.
Note to Self:
Here are some things I’ve come to realize about the week in the life project:
– It only works for me if I actually get to work on it everyday as the day happens. Even a day later, I cannot remember much anymore and I definitely lose enthusiasm for capturing it.
– I need to take more portrait shots, if I want to use the baseball card pockets. My shots always tend to favor landscape.
– I need to focus on each day’s writing. I can’t remember everything and I’d love to have a focus or two daily so I can capture those things and have a well-rounded set of journaling cards for the week. Trying to do that from here on out. Still 3 more days left.
– I am loving how the digital bits have turned out so far. Still not sure if I will print it out. Trying not to make the decision yet. The good thing is, I can get it printed anytime.
Three Things I’m Grateful For:
1. I am grateful for the week in the life project. I love the fact that I am capturing so much of our daily, ordinary life. I know it will be even more meaningful years from now.
2. I am grateful for our quick walk around. I need to get out and into the sunshine more often. And be around other adults more often, too.
3. I am grateful for my family. My husband. My kids. My parents. My sister. My nephews. I have so much and I am so thankful.
Two Things David’s Grateful For:
1. Making ice cream at school. They used a “magic liquid” David tells me.
2. He got to have a little bit of chocolate ice cream today and he loved it.
I finally structured my week in the life and thought I might as well share it with you in case you like it, too.
I am still sticking to just digital for now. This is all photos and words and it’s strongly inspired by Ali, Wilna, and Cathy. I know Ali’s templates are for sale and I highly urge you to buy them as I am confident they are much more professionally done. Ali’s beautiful handwriting alone is worth it. I also am inspired by and adore Ali and love that she shares so much so freely so I hope you buy from her to support her.
Here is what my four-page spread looks like. I tried to make it 3 but then if I ever wanted to print it, it wouldn’t work, so four it is:
So in the download, you get all four pages as individual templates and then the journaling cards separately. I take a lot of landscape photos so I wanted to make space for them in my layout which is why there’s room for four extra on the back page.
You can download it here: My Week in Life templates.
You are welcome to play with these as much as you want and use them anywhere you’d like. You are NOT allowed to sell them ever. You don’t have to but I’d appreciate a link back if you do use them.
This is part of a weekly digital download series. They are posted every Thursday. You can find all of the ones that were posted here. If you like my downloads, please click here and give me ideas/requests for 2010. I would like to continue this feature but I am not sure I can come up with enough ideas on my own.
I absolutely loved The Art of Racing in the Rain. I loved every bit of it. I loved that it was from a dog’s point of view but that it wasn’t contrived or cute at all. It was so beautifully written and the metaphors were wonderfully weaved in. The story, while sad, is wonderfully told and it’s so easy to empathize with all of the characters. I don’t even care for car racing but I still really enjoyed every single moment of this special book. I had so many quotes I wanted to highlight but my stupid reader crashed and lost my bookmarks.
“To live every day as if it had been stolen from death, that is how i would like to live. To feel the joy of life, as Eve felt the joy of life. To separate oneself from the burden, the angst, the anguish that we all encounter every day. To say I am alive, I am wonderful, I am. I am. That is something to aspire to. When I am a person, that is how I will live my life.”
I cannot recommend it enough.
And another shot from San Francisco.
Here we are in day three and I am still snapping a lot of photos. Not coherently and not all are going well but I am having fun with it. I am not documenting as much as I should but I am also trying not to give myself a lot of should and musts. This is why I was never able to do this before so I am trying not to talk myself out of it this time around.
I am still heavily unmotivated. Maybe hormonal? Maybe lack of sleep? Maybe meaningless? How about I document some right now?
My beautiful, handsome boy. Doesn’t like to get out of his pajamas. He wakes up and starts playing with his legos pretty much immediately. It takes me a few minutes to nurse the baby, change him, check my mail, and wake up enough to make food for the kids. So David gets a mix of Oatmeal (Cinnamon Roll) and Cream of Wheat (same flavor). He doesn’t know about the cream of wheat but once I mix the two, he eats it just fine. I put it in for iron which it has a lot of. Nathaniel gets to have a slice of bread, a banana, and some cheese (right now it’s white cheddar but he likes gouda, too.) While they eat, I empty the dishwasher and fill it up. I then check some more mail, etc.
Nathaniel is really into his water right now. He usually eats all of his food pretty quickly and then waits for me while sucking his thumb. He makes loud noises occasionally to ensure I don’t forget that he’s still sitting.
After breakfast, we all get to sit around and play. I read some of the blogs I follow or if I am feeling super-ambitious, I might do an art journal page. I will often check my work email, reply to anything urgent, etc. David plays with his legos or he draws. Nathaniel crawls around the room and chews everything he can get his hands on and then more. He’s still not walking but he likes to get up a lot and practices it often.
After that, David gets dressed (all by himself), I change Nathaniel, shower, get dressed and we’re off to drive David to school. In the car, we generally chat or I listen to one of my books on tape. Right now, I’m listening to Easier than you Think. I much prefer non fiction. After we drop him off, we come home and I put Nathaniel down for his nap. Some days he struggles and other days (like today) he’s so tired from being up since 5:48 am that he falls into a deep sleep. While he sleeps, I finally get to have my breakfast, which is coffee, graham crackers, and Dairy Milk chocolate (and some water). I also do work sometimes with TV, sometimes with music. I try to accomplish a lot during this time since it’s often my quietest time in the day. Around 11:30, I get Nathaniel and we go pick David up from school.
When we get home, I prepare lunch for all of us. Nathaniel gets veggies, yogurt, oatmeal and water. And then some pear or strawberries or apples. David gets to have green beans and meatballs. If he finishes quickly, he also gets some fruit of his choice and sometimes bread or yogurt. I have lately been eating a cheese sandwich with one slice of salami. If it’s CSA delivery day (Wednesdays), I get to have a fresh salad with carrots, etc.
And while we eat, we often chat with my Mom and Dad. It’s around 10pm their time.
As they continue eating, I do work. After lunch, they get to play for a while and then I put Nathaniel down again. I drink another coffee, David plays, and I do more work. Today, Nathaniel refused to nap so after a long while, I gave up and decided to take a short break to do chores. So I folded all the laundry that had been piling up for too long a time and Nathaniel took the opportunity to destroy my books. He also loved playing with the hangers.
After all that, some more playing time, and more work for me, it was dinner time. Nathaniel got some oranges, strawberries, yogurt, cheerios, and a few pears. David go to have a half of cinnamon raisin bagel with cream cheese and some yogurt. And some pears, too. Jake came home around then and we were all so happy to see him. After he went running, we finished up the food, and headed to the bath. Two kids washed, teeth flossed and brushed, numbers 1 and 2 in the toilet, and it is officially bedtime.
While I nursed and dressed Nathaniel, David picked our book for the night (here’s Nathaniel wanting to “explore” it by mostly destroying it.) and even though A Visitor for Bear is the most recent favorite, tonight we read Please, Baby, Please. Short and sweet. We were running late.
And then Nathaniel went to bed (and complained of course) and David, too, but he got to read some on his own. About an hour later, I went up to ask him his two things and he was already in bed with the lights off. He told me his two things, we said our goodnight words (Goodnight, sweet dreams, I love you with all my heart, I’ll see you in the morning) and I tucked him in.
I went back downstairs, made myself my third cup of coffee and here we are.
how’s that for documenting? my boring, predictable day. I love it.
Note to Self:
I spent a long time thinking about a Week in the Life today and whether I was going to do it or not and how. I love what Wilna, Cathy and Ali are doing. Simple words and photos. But four pages a day is 28 pages for the week. Plus the front and back makes 30. That seems like so much ink and photo paper for something I can keep on the computer. I don’t know why I am feeling frugal suddenly but it feels huge suddenly, enough to make me not want to do it. But I also felt sad and bad walking away from it, so I decided I am going to it fully digital. And once I am finished, if I still feel like pinting it, I will decide then.
Another thing I noticed is that I need more photos with me in them. I tried to put my wide-angle more today but didn’t do a good job. I will try more tomorrow. This is something I am not too good at, as you already know.
Three Things I’m Grateful For:
1. I have been listening to “Gives you Hell” still and it makes me so happy. I am grateful for the amazing power of music.
2. Despite the blah’ness and lack of motivation, I am still feeling so happy about my life and I am grateful that I’ve been able to appreciate my life so much.
3. I found out today that one of my best friends from childhood is coming to visit me on Saturday. I cannot wait to see him!
Two Things David’s Grateful For:
1. He said he’s still so grateful for legos 🙂
2. And very grateful for Daddy and that he came home early today.
Catalyst One Hundred and Ten is: How would you describe yourself as a child?
Thoughts:
As a little kid I was mostly quiet and pensive. I tended to sit by myself, preferred reading over anything else and it wasn’t until my mid-teens that I became more outgoing and friendly. Even though most people would say I’m extroverted today, I’m still that quiet and pensive girl on the inside.
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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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