for jade on her birthday

...it's a few days late, but hopefully you'll be celebrating all week.

i love that you've inspired me to be creative today, even though i don't even know you. i've caught a glimpse of you on mr. burns' blog, where you often have something wise, funny or kind to say. i admire that you use your gifts to inspire and enlighten other people.

i just recently had time to look through your blog, and it's really beautiful. i especially love the picture of the candles in front of the window. it looks like an alter. and your writing is quite honest. it reveals your true nature as an artist. i hope you continue to share yourself with the world. and i hope you expect great things this year.

jade, you were born on september 3, which, according to our big fat birthday book, is "the day of the mold breakers."

you were born on the same day as: marguerite higgins, carl d. anderson, urho kekkonen, frank macfarlane burnet, pietro locatelli, mort walker, and memphis slim.

the birthday book lists your strengths as: multi-talented, socially adept, and patient.

it says your weaknesses are: procrastinating, overly stoic or yielding.

the advice for people born on this day: "actively seek to do what you really want to do. develop your self confidence and assertiveness. don't be afraid to fail. try not to cultivate too much mystery around what you do; take time to explain your methods and motives to others."

your meditation is: hear what others say to you, but remain in tune with your own inner voice.

happy birthday, jade.












the big fat birthday book = "The Secret Language of Birthdays" by Goldschneider & Elffers (1994)

pony ride

for rob

my dear friend has been very sick. this is our "get well soon" video for him.

measure each day...

by how much love you give.

everyone you touch

God is amazing.

i hope he is blessing you and everyone you touch.

i hope he's singing you lullabys and taking you to your favorite gazing spot and and flooding your eyes with beauty and filling your belly with deliciousness and lifting away your aches and pains and making you laugh out loud today.




(from a note to my dear friend priya)

be yourself

dog days

happy to see you

happy birthday brother byron

free smells

“Smell is a potent wizard that transports you across thousands of miles and all the years you have lived.” - Helen Keller

do you have any grievances?

our 2 year old amazed us with her answer... this video includes that amazing answer plus some sweet clips from videos created over the past year set to a u2 song.

baby deer

in this video i talk about how i almost hit a baby deer, i get really weepy, and i learn something deep from a wilco song.

cause and effect

"Life is perpetual instruction in cause and effect." -Ralph Waldo Emerson

time for a break

i've been teaching a class for two hours a day over the past month. today was our last day. we ate pizza and ice cream and watched "little miss sunshine." it was nice. i'll miss my students.

i gave a few of them hugs. i just had to. i may never see some of them again.

...now i'm ready to rest a while.

daytripping

...i wish. i'd love to spend the day at the park.

but i have plumbers and carpet cleaners and students and laundry and books and work and such waiting for me.

at least i can visit this page when i need a little fix.

now, onward... upward.... etc.

why am i so tempted to linger? must everyday life be resisted?

renew your mind... it'll be a piece of cake.

night-light

sometimes the moon reminds me of the man-moth. that sad, sweet creature. i'll never forget him.

confidence

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that frightens us most. We ask ourselves, 'Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and famous?' Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that people won't feel insecure around you. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in all of us. And when we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.” - Maryanne Williamson

stay

my husband left some songs by "the meadows" up on windows media player. apparently he used to know one of the guys in the band. i was immediately drawn to a song called "stay". it's my new favorite. it's so beautiful. i used it in a short video of my baby and me playing in the shuggie shack. this sweet picture is a still from the video. i didn't post the video. i thought about it. but i decided it's just for us.

thanks to the meadows for a truly beautiful song.

here are the lyrics...

stay with me tonight
don't ride out in the darkness
under a street light halo
it will be all right
i know you'll find your own way
in your own time
don't trouble yourself now
leave it all behind
don't carry the weight
upon your shoulders
fall into a dream
stay here with me
i can't stop the world
but i will wait
for you

stay with me tonight
ride out in the morning
into a new day
it will be all right
stay here by my side
stay as you are
don't trouble yourself now
leave it all behind
don't carry the weight
upon your shoulders
fall into a dream
stay here with me
i can't stop the world
but i will wait
for you

no i can't stop the world
but i will wait
for you
i can't stop the world
but i will wait
for you


check out the meadows myspace page,
where you can download the song:
http://www.myspace.com/themeadows
(see the jukebox player below the auto-player on the top right of the page -
it has a whole bunch of their songs on it)

i didn't find love...

i called

out to it

and it came running.

independence day

we didn't wear red, white & blue, we didn't eat hot dogs, we didn't hang a flag, and we didn't see fireworks.


instead we hung out in the shuggie shack, ate leftover birthday cake, thanked God for our beautiful country, and played most of the day.

happy independence day.

i love trees

i found this beautiful poem today, my 38th birthday.

Maples
by Mary Oliver

The trees have become
suddenly very happy
it is the rain
it is the quick white summer rain

the trees are in motion under it
they are swinging back & forth they are tossing
the heavy blossoms of their heads
they are twisting thier shoulders
even their feet chained to the ground feel good
thin & gleaming
nobody can prove it but any fool can feel it
they are full of eletricity now & the shine isn't just pennies
it pours out from the deepest den
oh pretty trees
patient deep-planted

may you have many such days
flinging your bodies in silver circles shaking your heads
over the swamps & the pastures
rimming the fields and the long roads hurrying by.

awesome

it makes me very happy to watch my baby play in the back yard...

thank you thank you

Proverbs 15:15 (The Amplified Bible) All the days of the desponding and afflicted are made evil (by anxious thoughts and forebodings), but he who has a glad heart has a continual feast (regardless of circumstances)



i had been feeling a sense of "foreboding" this week. for me, pms sometimes intensifies that feeling. it's like a sense of anxiety and grief over pretty much nameless, faceless things. some part of me is expecting something bad, dark, tragic, or evil to be waiting around the corner, instead of hoping for and expecting great things. i wanted to believe for great things. miracles. possibilites. "light around the corner." i needed help in cutting this foreboding loose. so i asked for it.


i still hadn't gotten my period, but by yesterday i was sick of feeling so awful. i paced about trying not to call people (calling people when i feel this way usually gets me in trouble), and then i picked up joyce meyer's "battlefield of the mind" devotional. i love joyce. i watch her show all the time, but i never actually look at this book too much. i prefer the little purple one (it's helped me immensely), but my husband left this one on the counter that day. i picked it up and opened right to a page that started with that proverb. actually i didn't read the proverb straight away, i skipped right to the prayer and worked my way back. eventually i got it. the point i mean. although i got the period, too, less than an hour later.


thanks Joyce. and thanks God. my heart is glad again.








here's joyce's prayer i skipped to:


Dear Lord Jesus,
Through so many days of my life I have been robbed of my joy and contentment by evil forebodings. As those feelings come to me, please remind me that You are in control. Help me to rest in You and rejoice in Your power in my life. Amen.

here's my prayer today:

Heavenly Father, thank you for joyce. she is an amazing teacher. thank you for continuing to bless her and her family. thank you for taking good care of everyone in my family, and for helping them cope with my "special needs" this week. thank you for helping me get through all my challenges. thank you for reminding me that i can relax, and that you're with me. thank you for giving me the safety, security, and peace of mind i need to be comfortable and enjoy my life. thank you for blessing us with so much prosperity and abundance. thank you for replacing the foreboding and dread with excitement and joy over great things to come. thank you for all the miracles you perform every day. thank you for filling my heart and my mind with such beautiful dreams, and for giving us the means and opportunities we need to fulfill them. thank you for never giving up on me. thank you for my sweet little baby. and of course, thank you for this awesome camera. it's been such a blessing.

thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you...

i love you.

in Jesus' name i pray, Amen.




















song in the video: "kind and generous" by natalie merchant
for more videos please go to YouTube.com and search for user name ask123321

"are you ok, mommy?"

"yes, sweetie. it's just been a long week."

the huge debt

Romans 13:8 (The Message)

8-10 Don't run up debts, except for the huge debt of love you owe each other. When you love others, you complete what the law has been after all along. The law code—don't sleep with another person's spouse, don't take someone's life, don't take what isn't yours, don't always be wanting what you don't have, and any other "don't" you can think of—finally adds up to this: Love other people as well as you do yourself. You can't go wrong when you love others. When you add up everything in the law code, the sum total is love.

from : the bible gateway

happy daddy's day

a day of rest

maybe the sun will shine today

the clouds will roll away

maybe i won't be so afraid

i will understand

everything has it's plan

either way

(from a song i love called "either way" by wilco)

the cardinal

he closes his eyes
and climbs
into that sweet
soft
silent
part
of his mind

where the lighting
is just right

and the static
of every day life
is forgiven
and quickly
forced out
by thoughts of bliss,
visions of wonder,
feelings of calm.

no matter what
goes on
around him,
the cardinal
sleeps peacefully
every night.

selina's birthday

we had some of my sister selina's friend's over to celebrate her birthday last night. we made a birthday video for her the day before:

despite all my usual pre-party jitters, the celebration was pretty fun. my two favorite parts of the night were when my brother and i snuck off to my office to hang out, and when we left the ice cream cake out too long...

sound waves

poetry
riding in
on waves
of sound
is quickly
forgotten

(think fast,
write faster)....

thirsty
for rich
mineral
water

waves that roll
from gardens that grow
in deep waters below

we sit
and sing
and stretch
and breathe
and wait

patiently

for every thirst
to be quenched ...

ahh...

nice.

shuggie shack

shuggie loves her new swingset. especially the treehouse part.

we all need a little place of our own to hide away in now and then.



thank you nana & grand for this beautiful gift.

"the shuggie shack" (video 6/12/07)

the shadow

"The artist is not a person endowed with free will who seeks his own ends, but one who allows art to realize its supreme purpose through him." - Carl Jung

daydreamer

“You know you're in love when you can't fall asleep because ...

... reality is finally better than your dreams." -Dr. Seuss

white daisy passing

sometimes i sit in my office and look at our beautiful pictures and videos. one reason i love them so much is because, in a way, they help me keep a moment alive and well, in the here and now.

feelings about the passing of time reside in a deep, vulnerable place within us. the sadness of loss... the grief over change... the longing for times past...

the song "white daisy passing" expresses these kinds of feelings perfectly. thanks, ken, for introducing me to it. and thank you, rocky volotalo, for a song that surpasses time.

here's a nice youtube performance of the song: http://youtube.com/watch?v=ozHv4YbiWlQ

here are the lyrics:

white daisy passing
please slow it down
there's a secret magic past world
that you only notice when you're looking back at it
all I wanna do is turn around
I'm going down to sleep
on the bottom of the ocean
because I couldn't let go
when the water hit the setting sun
passing white daisies taking turns
close the door walk into the street
catching raindrops on your tongue
and for a minute it all stops
but it won't last man
it's just a passing moment gone
please slow it down
there's a secret place that I know
where I could dig a grave out and climb
underground for good
all I want to do is turn around
I'm going down to sleep
on the bottom of the ocean
because I couldn't let go
when the water hit the setting sun
passing white daisies taking turns
all those evenings on the back deck
of our first apartment
they meant everything
but the wind just carried em off
and you can't go back now
just a passing moment gone

life is sweet

"It is the sweet, simple things of life which are the real ones after all." ~Laura Ingalls Wilder

smile

all is well.


now, go outside and play.