five-a-day: the path to healthy mind

my very disciplined and responsible friend britt of have fun do good fame tagged me for a meme started by mindapples: what's your five-a-day?

i'm supposed to list five things i do a day to keep my mind healthy, and then tag five more bloggers.

i have always struggled with discipline and having a healthy mind-body routine. one of the healthiest times of my life was when i was practicing yoga & meditation daily, attending contact improv dance classes, exploring all sorts of mystical connections in poetic and spiritual texts, hiking a lot and making art. that was before the internet, marriage, child rearing and bad knees. not that i think any of that is a good excuse to be the slacker that i've become.

so to be honest, i don't have five routine things that i do. sure, i take a shower (usually), which i quite enjoy. i cook and eat a fairly balanced diet, which keeps me happy most of the time. i sleep, which is oh so necessary. i read blogs, which i find inspiring because a lot of them are written by disciplined people who accomplish things daily. and i hang out with my loves, dan, tashi, the cats. but really i think i need to make this meme into five things i strive to do daily. and think of it as a new years resolution of sorts.

1) exercise. be it yoga, walking, swimming or belly dancing, exercising daily helps tone the body, prolong life, and refresh the mind. i do exercise. but not daily. especially since i have felt ever so fragile in my pregnancy. but i've been walking a lot more lately (as my recent flickr pictures of farm animals and sunsets might prove), yesterday i received my prenatal belly dancing dvd ordered from amazon, and just last night i did some yoga.

2) read books. how can i call myself a writer when the book on my nightstand is gathering dust? i do read. a lot. but i go through phases where i will devour one book after another (or several books at once) followed by a phase of doing nothing but surfing the internet and watching late night tv. i am currently in the latter phase. i did just move. it's been a pretty major upheaval of the daily routine. so i hope to soon get back into reading, at least before bed, because reading sharpens the mind and develops one's use of the language. and who wants to be dull and speechless?

3) meditate. it is something i once did daily. there is nothing like it really. sure one can meditate while cooking, playing an instrument, or taking a walk, but i'm talking about sitting meditation, where you sit on the zafu with legs crossed, and focus on the breath. all things arise and disperse in those empty moments. in a world full of grasping it is really healthy to practice letting go.

4) write/create. let's face it, i've been struggling with having a writing habit for more than half of my life now. if i can't manage to write every day, i would like to at least create, be it a collage, a bit of embroidery, a still life with charcoal, or a photograph. i feel most fulfilled when making art. as our new space takes shape, i'm getting there!

5) loving. i do love daily. but i don't always express it. it would probably be easier to express if i got my five-a-day in.

i think i'll start now.

oh, and i tag:

blissblog
noddyboom
green kitchen
the attached feminist
northnode astrology

a distant fuzzy fantasy of handmade somethings

the holiday spending has begun. our subaru needs a brand new radiator and i've received two parking tickets so far this week. i wonder what will be next. 'tis the season to be broke.

i've been perusing the sweet holiday crafts popping up on the crafty crow. there are some great ideas for a secret elf gift exchange like the one coming up in tashi's classroom. what on earth does a fifth grade girl make for a fifth grade boy? i think the string art trees are pretty cool myself.

i'm thinking it would be fun to make tashi one of these since, now that her room is big enough to have her bunk bed assembled, she has chosen to sleep in the top bunk every night. our cat luna has taken a particular interest in batting around tashi's hearing aids when left out on the bedside shelf. i'm sure i could figure out the pocket tidy without a pattern, but if anyone knows of a pattern, please do share!

so my frame of mind is slowly, lazily, shifting to handmade, though the move has thrown me off a bit when it comes to feeling organized and energized. but i'm contemplating it, and hoping to strike upon some inspiration. . .

the great countdown begins

happy december! i am so terribly behind on any kind of gift gathering and/or making this year. it is what it is.



today i have a huge amount of time to myself. tashi has a playdate after school, which adds hours to my day. of course, i've already wasted a good part of it, poking around the internet and sending out emails.

my big goal for today is to deal with our office/guest room. it is the last remaining vortex of chaos in the house, aside from the garage. my other goal is to take a walk.



pictured below is a lovely vietnamese hair stick my friend mara sent me as a blessing token for my pregnancy. it's so delicate and precious.



i hope you are enjoying the first few days of december, and remembering to breath deeply and avoid walmart.

vacation is the life for me

it was a quiet thanksgiving for dan, tashi and i. but we feasted as if we were having a party for twelve. our local free range turkey turned out perfectly golden and moist. the stuffing, the cranberry chutney, the sweet potatoes, the vegetables, all grand. i added too much milk to the mashed potatoes, and it seemed that perhaps the gravy was thicker than they were. but it was all good never-the-less.







we usually have our feast in the early afternoon, which i prefer to waiting until night time. that way the cooking is over with, and there is time for relaxing by the fire, walking, a film, a game. we did all of that. the walk especially was nice. we met a very friendly horse neighbor. he ambled on over to us, let us coo at him and stroke his nose. we fed him grass from outside the fence (evidently much more tasty than the grass inside the fence) and gazed into his deep, long lashed, eyes. i am so thrilled to be living near horses.



the cows are very shy, but curious. i love how individual each is.







and the sunsets, they can't be beat.





yesterday we took a nice drive up the shenandoah valley, lunched in luray, and then entered fort valley within the two arms of the massanutten mountain. it is a valley within a valley, so to speak, a rather mysterious zone. it was a beautiful meandering drive that ended all too quickly. we traveled south on the outer west side of the mountain and then took a side trip to the woodstock tower. it was a bit hazy out, but the panoramic views were worth it.







after that we had our annual visit to the green valley bookfair, about as much as we will venture into shopping on "black friday." we stocked up on a huge load of bookish surprises for a quarter of the price. if you live in the area and have not visited the book fair, it is well worth the journey, especially if you have a child that is a voracious reader.

today we will be going into downtown charlottesville to sit at the holiday market. we are selling some handmade items by tashi's fifth grade class (& parents), a fundraiser for a couple of class trips on the horizon. come on by for beautiful glass bead bracelets, kite paper stars, beeswax luminaries, and some original textile work!

grateful day

i am grateful that there is no longer a fortress of boxes in the middle of tashi's room.









and i am of course grateful for tashi herself, and her little brother on the way.

i am grateful for sunlight, streaming through windows. nourishing rain. beautiful snow. and wind that reminds us of a fragile balance.

i am grateful for a wonderful new home, a wood stove, the forest and a full refrigerator.

i am grateful that my husband made it home alive after too many drinks with his friends last night. even when upset by such things, i am grateful that we share a life together.

i am grateful for two cats who make us laugh.

i am grateful for friends and family, near and far. wishing you peace and abundance.

microwave chocolate must try

since our new residence comes with microwave, i could actually jump up and try out this recipe as soon as a read about it here. tashi had just asked me if there was any dessert, and cake in a cup was a quick solution.

i got a kick out of it, really. and it was actually good. the chocolate chips made a sort of frosting. but i don't think i stirred quite enough at the bottom of the cup, because there was some dry powder when i tipped it upside down.

it only took two minutes in our microwave, which is 1500 watts. make sure you watch it while it cooks, because it's a trip watching the cake rise out of the cup!

thanksgiving thrift, or the post in which gender is revealed

before i sink my elbows deep into days of stuffing and mashed potatoes and basting the bird, i thought i'd treat myself to a little thrift session. i walked into the spca store, and saw that childrens clothing was half off. i hadn't yet purchased a thing for the gestating one, let alone make anything. so i started searching through piles. you see, many of tashi's old clothes -- which i have been holding onto all these years -- won't do. at least the floral, pink, frilly, skirted items won't. as society dictates, anyway.

but stripes will do.



and more stripes.



and motor vehicles! oh my!



and of course, ducks.



with tashi, the gender remained a mystery until she was delivered. but this time, we pretty much wanted to know as soon as we could. i think that after so many losses of little known souls (though i always had a sense), there is a desire to know as much as possible about this one.

i have been so nervous this pregnancy, not feeling entirely convinced it could possibly be. but as i approach my 19th week, and i begin to feel this little guy wiggle and dance, and start to focus on how we need to prepare for this new life entering our home, i find myself facing a bright, soft, sweet sunrise, and a warming breeze. i am beginning to embrace this new dawn, as clinging doubts and fears loosen and drift off.

i picked up a present for myself too. i've had my eye on this swan for a year. an entire year it has sat in that thrift store, unclaimed. today i found it at half price, and decided it had been waiting for me this whole time.



isn't she sweet? i think so!

saturday night movie

yesterday was a day of furniture placement adjustment, raking, and more unpacking of boxes. after tashi's favorite dinner of kasha varnishkes, we popped in the two towers, so to continue yet another round of the the lord of the rings trilogy. i've seen these films so many times, i actually fell asleep.

i guess one could call it cozy, with tashi and loki both on my lap, sitting by the fire, watching orcs and men.



here are two of my favorites.



today i have to make a thanksgiving shopping list, go with tashi to her school to participate in a class project, and once and for all, get my sewing room set up for some sort of production, minimal as it might be this holiday season.

cafe time

because there is going to be an asbestos abatement performed in my workplace, all of our offices are being moved to the second floor of the building today. so my belly and i have relocated to a the nice sunny new cafe called para. i really like the location of this cafe at the end of a small street called elliewood. the building is perched on the edge of a hill, between the railroad tracks and a small road. when a train passes the whole cafe vibrates.



but really, it's impossible to accomplish much here because of databases and files i can't access from my laptop. so why not play with photobooth?



decaf cappuccino anyone?

i'm dreaming of a white tuesday

this morning i arose from bed and was absolutely amazed to see snow on the ground. perhaps this is an advantage of living at a higher altitude. i'm guessing it didn't snow in charlottesville, as even a dusting can send the whole town into a frenzy of alarmed uncertainty. schools have been closed on days when snow was simply "expected." i try not to be snide about it, but having grown up in a pennsylvania snow belt, and lived in both buffalo and ann arbor for periods of time, i just can't help but roll my eyes. i am always happy to see snow, and tashi is ecstatic, jumping out of bed without a quarter of the usual prompting, and squealing in between bites of bagel.











oops, we hadn't even raked the leaves yet!

rise and shine

this morning after our oatmeal we took a brisk three mile walk. it's the first walk we've taken out here aside from a few jaunts down our road or in our woods. horses and goats and alpacas and cows, oh my! and of course, mountains, changing character depending on sunlight and clouds. it was wonderful start to a day of relaxation.