Fertility Celebration

This has been the year for flower fecundity at our home. Our orchid, which only had two lovely blossoms last year, graced us with seven. Our violet, full of lush, iridescent leaves that usually sends up five or six flowers a couple times each year sent a whopping thirty two! And our miniature orange tree that sent a delicious four oranges our way last year, is ripening about seventeen as I write this! We suppose that they are celebrating with us as we anticipate the arrival of our baby boy in December. All of nature is joyously partying right along with us!

To see more lovely prints like the one here, go to The Shiny Squirrel. This one is entitled Spring Cloud by Betsy Walton.

Put a Little Heart Behind Everything

Oh, if only my mouth were on my heart and not on my head! I am clearly at my best when my heart is in charge. My head makes things overly complex every time. I love this image from Irana Douer titled Angel. You can see this and others at Thumbtack Press. Tons of great artists and prints from which to choose.

Organicity: Stop Tryin' so Hard

I was reminded today to be less planful, not more. Just let things unfold. Truthfully, the best things in life seem to simply happen. You find this perspective in some of the great teachings, but somehow in our push-pull world this message gets lost.

I love Rebecca Wood pottery for this reason. It just does not try too hard.

Something Elegant in the Midst of Change

Very recently a sweet friend of mine moved from one city in Georgia to another. She and her husband have two children under the age of five. What an undertaking, to say the least. I wondered how I could best support her during a serious transition so full of dust, boxes and emotion. So, I sent her a Boden clutch from the UK in a print that reminded me of her. I imagined her immediately tucking a few things in it and taking it out the door to dinner to say good bye to friends and feeling just a tiny bit special.

What can you do to lift your burden or that of another just a wee tiny bit?

When Hard Stuff is the Right Stuff

I am reminded by yet another jaunt into America's heartland that doing the right thing, even when it is difficult can immediately clear up a congested circumstance for the better. In this case, it had to do with work. But I am aware that this thought applies to the deeply personal too.

Deciding to take responsibility for a less than lovely aspect of self in order to build healthy relationships and allow for the good to grow is not easy. It does have rewards though. In all cases it restores hope and opens a path to something new and possibly very rewarding.

Of course I'd be remiss if I did not emphasize the importance of providing yourself with a lot of love and kindness in the process. In the heartland case, for example, I engineered the difficult day to include plenty of rest and creature comfort which included a beautiful hotel location downtown right by a bricked-in historic area beside a glorious fountain that attracted lots of children who petted the horses waiting to give carriage rides.