.blue skies of January.

I came across a question this week that made me pause - what brings your unrestricted joy right now? - 

I think it's a blue sky

 

after the dark short days that feel like fleeting moments between the never ending nights

the surprise of a blue sky

the delicate yet vibrant pink/orange sunrise

the weak yet radiating sun rays enveloping me on a slow cold walk

it can feel like a deep exhale

a moment of resounding joy

the truth that impermanence is the only constant

the reminder of hope 

the hope of spring 

with all the complexities the unbearable unknowns lurking this year

maybe the greatest joy is the simplest of pleasures

maybe it can be as simple as a blue sky day

maybe it has to be, the rest is too much to hold

what brings your unrestricted joy right now? 

.almost blue.

 The low heavy sky is almost blue today

a winter of gray darkness

making the days feel like brief moments

in-between the long endless nights

mild until two weeks ago

but winter has made up for lost time

pilling all the cold into a few freezing days

highway shutdowns and days of snow

today started with snow but 

2:30 now, almost feels blue

there'a brief pause, a levity 

to the low winter sky

February the month of almost, not quite

is days away

I hold my breath

.the soft in-between.

Friday was the last working day of the year. I left work early, four instead of 5:30. It's been sometime since I've left work in the light of day, so when I walked out to the overcast but light sky I was thrilled. The day seemed to have a surprise extension. When it was time to turn off onto my street, I just kept driving to a nearby trailhead. I haven't hike after work since probably October. With just enough light for a quick hike, I set out on the soft trail. 

It feels strange to be here, at the end of the year. January and February feel like forever ago but it also feels like it was just June. As with all across the world, the weather isn't aligning with traditional timekeeping. We've only had maybe two snows this winter with one sticking around for a day or so. The foothills barely have a dusting on them. The earth smelt musty and fresh like spring. The pungent burn of sage rising up to my nose. It felt strange to be on the edge of the new year and hiking in the surrounding of a false spring, a different moment of transition. These illusive boundaries of here and there, now and then. The lines seems to continue to blur as time goes on. It made me think about these moment of the soft in-between, the waiting, the pause.

 

I was listening to Tara Brach's podcast episode about the sacred pause and one part I loved was: 

"Pausing is really a way of reconnecting with what I sometimes call Being-states — the very essence-states that express who we are. At one point, the well-known pianist, Arthur Rubenstein, was asked: “How do you handle the notes as well as you do?” And I loved his response. It was really immediate and passionate. He said, “I handle the notes no better than many others. But the pauses, ahh, that’s where the art resides.”

 I wonder how I can be more present + attuned to the sacred pauses.

.winter sunset.

 

I struggle to appreciate the winter months, but each winter seems to bring more appreciation for another season of learning. This winter I was struck by the magnificent sunrises and sunsets. A vibrant display of color for the short, dark, and cold days of winter.

I've held onto this batik for some time, maybe I bought it in North Carolina. I can't remember, but one evening in December watching the dark and cold day slowly illuminate into cotton candy sky of bright pinks and soft blues, just for a moment. It seemed like a tiny gift for these hard moments. I came home and knew how to use the batik fabric. Slowly working on a patchwork. I started with a square and then another until I decided I needed nine patches. I worked on it for a few weeks, not knowing what direction it would take, just letting it slowly unravel. Then when it felt done, I stitched it onto a drop cloth, no batting and no binding. This is something new for me but it felt right to leave it open, expanding.

It's a interesting piece that from a distance you can see the ombre effect with more batik squares at the bottom of the piece and less at the top, alluding to the fading color of the sky. Yet, if you come closer what you noticed is the stitching, the mix of bright pink and ecru pearl cotton with varying stitch styles. It gives the viewer different perspectives, something to think about, just like winter. The season for the soul, as a friend once told me during a cold, hard winter in Boston. A time of reflection. These piece feels like a transition in a new direction and I'm excited to see what comes next.

.rabbitbrush in the snow.

 

Seasons always bring new eyes. I went on a walk after a snowstorm this weekend. Despite the countless times I've walked a path or taken in a view, a new season always makes it feel renewed. The snow-covered foothills seem to transform the dull yellow/golden grasses of October to a luminous hue in contrast to the crisp white palette. As I made my way, climbing up the foothills, there, barely peeking out of the fresh heavy snow, slowly emerging was my favorite, rabbitbrush. A shrub-steppe native that brilliantly radiates in the scorching dry day of summers and still manages to persisting in 20-degree snowy inches. 

What are you noticing in this new season?

.unthawing landscapes.

Exploring and experimenting with stop motion videos. I'm learning as I go, but really enjoying the ability to capture a place and feeling though images.

.frozen landscapes.

I am in a new landscape, exploring the Okanogan Highlands. It's just been a week. A place I know but only from short visits. I'm excited to explore more, to listen. 

We are still in winter here, but the light is slowly returning and the land slowly unthawing/melting from all the rain. I went out to explore yesterday and found a new trail, a canyon trail. It was so beautiful and vast. My favorite part was the frozen pathway that was slowly cracking from the influx of warm and cold temperatures. The pathway looked like shattered glass to me. There's something so beautiful about this illusion of shattered glass, and the emerging grasses wintered over patiently awaiting spring to come. 

.maine in march.

When you get a nice day in winter in Maine you take advantage of it. The winter has been late to arrive here in the Northeast but it’s here, with two Nor’easter storms in the past week and another one might be coming next week everyone is desperate for spring. Two days after the first Nor’easter the sun came out, blue skies with a high of 43 degrees! We took advantage of it. We went to a favorite trail that curves thru the forest and opens up to the ocean and continues along the coastline looking to where Maine waters meet New Hampshire. As the trail opened up to the ocean we saw a small girl building a sand castle and her mom was stretched out wide sunbathing in her boots and winter jacket. I smiled understanding the feeling of enjoying the sun with air that didn’t hurt. We walked out to explore the tide pools and on the beach a couple were sitting on the rocky beach soaking up the sun and as we were heading back up to the trail another woman just laid down right on the trail with her dog. I love these moments that are unique to a place. It seems that once it gets above 40 degrees in March Mainers seems to just collapse with joy! They were acting like it was a summer day and 30 degrees warmer than it was but I get it. We are ready - we are so ready for spring and sunshine and warmth and longer days!! 

Another storm came a few days ago bringing almost 24 inches of snow, 35 mph winds and white out conditions for most of the day. The next day the sun was out so I went on a hike trying to be grateful for the beauty of the snow. Trying to remember the way the snow holds a silence, the fresh smell of winter air and how it illuminates everything even on an overcast day. I try to be present because it will be gone - nothing stays and winter, as trying as it is, allows me to turn inwards and reflect. This winter has been challenging but just as the days are getting longer and warmer days *should* be coming I’m grateful for the new awareness and truths that have found me this winter. 

New adventures are here and coming soon! I’m ready. I’m so ready. 

.happy solstice.

Happy Solstice! A moment to celebrate the returning light and the beginning of the winter season. A moment to remember to slow down and embrace the season to turn inwards. I'm a summer person - I love the heat and the energy but this year I feel like I'm opening more and more to the gifts and beauty of winter. I have a favorite woodland near my house that I walk a few times a week and have found some beautiful young pine trees on these walks. Today I collected some to make pine needle vinegar. It's super simple, similar to balsamic vinegar and super high in vitamin C.

||Pine Needle Vinegar ||

Just collect white pine needles - enough to fill jar size of your choice. Then wash the needles and remove brown parts. Pour organic vinegar (I use ACV) over the needle to fill up the jar and cover with a plastic lid or I covered with wax paper and metal lid. Let set for 6 weeks and then enjoy! You can find more pine needle ideas here.

Winter's Cloak 

By Joyce Rupp

This year I do not want
the dark to leave me.
I need its wrap
of silent stillness,
its cloak
of long lasting embrace.
Too much light
has pulled me away
from the chamber
of gestation.
come late,
let the sunsets
arrive early,
let the evenings
extend themselves
while I lean into
the abyss of my being.
of my soul,
for too much light
blinds me,
steals the source
of revelation.
Let me seek solace
in the empty places
of winter's passage,
those vast dark nights
that never fail to shelter me.
Let the dawns
Let me lie in the cave

.midcoast maine + showing up.

I've found myself deep in process + questions the past 3 months of being back East. I've found myself trying to answer questions instead of embracing open curiosity. I think the familiarity here - or elements of familiarity make me quick to jump to expectations or assumptions and feel frustrated when things don't align. I'm at another place of transition moving out of my temporary dwelling and heading West for a few weeks before I come back East, again - to a new place. I want to make more time to write down my observations + questions + curiosities here as I finish 2017 and dive into 2018 with new intentions.

Thanks for being here.
-----------------------------

I've been exploring Maine a lot in the past few months. It's a fascinating place that feels rugged, unforgiving and unknown to me. This past weekend I spent some time in the Midcoast region while we received our first snow fall. I'm so curiosity about these little seasonal art communities - how they change so much with the season and how the community needs one another because of these drastic changes. I really loved the town of Camden.

.december thoughts.

There's something challenging and magical about December - the frenzy of the holidays that collides with the slowing down into winter. During the past few weeks I've been balancing between sprints in the studio making/selling my wares at holiday markets and the quiet exhaustion at home when I stop and look around to remember that it's December, it's winter time. The season is softly asking me to refocus inwards. I'm trying to find more balance and less extremes, to start gathering my focus and intentions for this season - for this new year - for this opportunity to renew myself, to learn myself more.

This is what I started to gather today on a walk in the woods:

to greeting - someone/a moment/journey with no expectations - just an open heart - to accept what it offers me with gratitude, not judgment - to stay present with its offering, as if I know nothing at all. 

I don't know if that's possible but it's something I want to work towards this coming year. To stop reacting to old stories - to stop carrying the past into the n o w - to stop asking someone to take care of my wounds and to stop taking care of theirs. 

slow
calm
presence
without judgment
and when I move towards judgment remember to 
be here 
now.

What are you gathering in these shorter days? 

.black new moon.

The cold foggy scene from Boston on the black new moon.

Some of the latest creations from the studio.

aeo designs etsy shop update is happening sunday.

hope everyone is staying warm.

.words to live by.

Winter is hard. Or rather this winter has been hard for me, challenging. Forcing me to sit with myself, breathe deep, share little tiny spaces with a lot of strangers, wait and wait and wait a little bit more for something to happen or to get somewhere, to expect the unexpected, to work extra hard with nothing in return, to ask the difficult questions and be ok with not having answers...and just when the day seems so long and I am ready to yell or run to hide in my room - I am given the most beautiful sunset. Calming me - reminding me that there is beauty/purpose in everything, I just have to allow myself to see it. 

I read this quote in a blog this morning and loved it. So much truth in it.

"Who you are is what has happened to you. Separate yourself from the learnt experiences of others. They are not you. Remember them, but remember also that the actions therein are those of another person who has experienced another life. They are not your actions. They are not your experiences. They are not your opinions, not your problems, not your anything. They are not yours. Separate yourself from what you have heard and been told and live in your now. Your now is where you are at this very moment. Your now is what is around you. Your now is how you feel when you close your eyes and breathe in slowly, and out slowly. Take control of your now. Be your now. Be you."

mexico rosel

.snow day.

It's been a very dry New England winter, cold but dry. So when I woke up yesterday morning I was surprised and a little excited to see the huge snowflakes rapidly falling. Maybe it was just the change - the new energy that it brought. I've always loved fresh snow for it's ability to make things feel so quiet and calm. I walked to my jewelry studio and the city seemed so zen - like the snow had forced (allowed) all these busy people a chance to slow down - to take a breath. Or maybe it allowed me to take a breath from the city. 

.expectations.

Expectations.

Always seem to sneak up into my mind without me even noticing. This weekend I was still on the mend from the flu and embracing this cold weather I delved into myself and spent 14 hours between Saturday and Sunday in the jewelry studio working on a new collection that is slowly revealing itself to me. It's really magical to watch the process unfold and feel myself tense up and let go as the  pieces morph into what they will become. BUT expectations. Saturday right in the middle of that strong free flowing river of creative energies something occurred that made my body tense up, heart sink and my eye well up. The shift in energy was so dramatic. 

What happened?

I knew exactly what happened. I didn't get what I wanted. I gave something with hidden expectations. When it was returned NOT in the way I wanted I gave it all my disappointment/energy. This is a thing that I do. I keep looking outside. I keep grabbing onto something. I keep doing things for something. I woke up this morning and was graciously reminded that nothing is going to come back in the exact way that I want/need/expect. By giving out all my good energies with expectations I only end up draining myself.

Stop running away from myself. Stop searching outside of myself.

When I acknowledge that love/validation can only be found inside of myself ONLY then I can appreciate anything that IS given to me as gift - love. To truly realize that I am receiving the best that can be given (which will most likely be different than I want/expect) in that moment  - the best, that is beautiful. 

Oh winter I don't know if you have even taught me so many lessons.
Much Love.

.weather for the soul.

a central washington winter a few years ago.

I woke up this morning to a broken furnace and no heat at my house. The outside temperature was 1 degree. One degree. I am not a winter person. I’ll take a summer day any day – everyday.

I was complaining about the weather to a friend who is a New England native and they said, this weather is for the development of the soul. It stopped my words and made me think. The development of the soul? I've been thinking about those words today and realized the truth in them. The way in which winter/bitter cold forces me to dive into myself/move slower/just be in a way that I find so challenging.

In this way winter offers a gift to me that the fun lightness/energy/fun of summer never could. I rode my bike to work yesterday, it was 16 degrees. I've never ridden my bike in weather colder than 20 degrees. It was a shocking stinging pain despite all the layers. I found a new level of endurance and mind over matter in the cadence of the ride, a determination and focus that I had to access.

And then I read this quote in another blog this morning:

“When we are stricken and cannot bear our lives any longer, then a tree has something to say to us: Be still! Be still! Look at me! Life is not easy, life is not difficult. Those are childish thoughts. . . . Home is neither here nor there. Home is within you, or home is nowhere at all.”

- Hermann Hesse

All thoughts flowing together, all we have is this moment. Express gratitude for the elements that help us dive inside to that place to better understand “home”, to develop our souls or open our eyes to new layers of awareness. Whatever words you associate with the process of understanding all the things we don’t understand.

Much love to you all.

Stay warm and embrace the season. 

.winter transitions.

.thrilled.

photo source: lifewithacinnamongirl.blogspot.com

Julie over at Life with a Cinnamon Girl is birthing a quarterly cook-zine, Seasoned.

"...I have spent the past month in the kitchen working up all kinds of delicious meals and if the kale, leek and white bean pizza that we just tested out has anything to say...it's that you should really pick up a copy come early January! The cookazine will be available in digital and hardcopy. Not only are there going to be twenty-something recipes from our kitchen there will also be articles about winter life from some of my favorite people on the internet and off."
(Seasoned Quarterly).


It is a seasonal zine that will be filled with yummy eats and delicious conscious thoughts about mind, body, and food. She asked her readers to submit wintery pictures and I'm thrilled to say she picked two of mine!! Be sure to check out the zine on January 7th.

.drives.

taking drives up on badger mountain road the clouds hung low and the snow piled up. 
how easily i can change my environment (perspectives). 

happy weekend to you and yours.