Pumpkin Sunrise

  How was your weekend? Mine was quite nice especially since autumn is squeezing out summer days by leaps and bounds. The mornings are chilly and the sunset inches closer and closer towards dinner time. I love all of it and am savoring it. I spend most of summer trying my best to enjoy summer but really deep down inside I long for fall. I did a bit of puzzling, reading and knitting. Also a lot of research on the internet about healthy diets. I cut added sugar on Saturday because of a really crazy high-salt high-sugar Friday. I felt so crummy this weekend. I remember being in my 20s and eating anything I wanted without ill effects. Oh how I miss those glorious days. I have to do yoga frequently so I can sit and knit. I have to exercise frequently so I don't have chronic back pain or joint pain. Now I believe I need to cut the added sugar (most days I am low salt so that isn't an issue). I'll keep you posted on the journey. I don't like to obsessively track health goals b

Oh September thank goodness you are finally here.  September hasn't been one of my favorite months because it tends to be hot and summery.  However, September leads to October and I am all for that month!  There were a couple of cool mornings this past week with low humidity that hinted of fantastic weather to come.  Yesterday the humidity was back and I hid inside the house doing my crafts. My September goals are quite minimalistic.  I want to read, knit, work on my artistic skills and journal.  For quite some time I was reading a lot in June and July but August was not a reading month.  I don't have a reason but I can reset and focus.  I want my sketching and watercoloring to improve and the only way that can happen is to do it more than once a week.  Do you get into ruts?  You know, the kind that you do everything else but what you really want to do.  I'm not sure why I sabotage my own goals.   My journalling and keeping track of what is important is helping immensely.  

Happy November!  This month is my favorite because it's my birthday month.  I've been reflective this past week on two quotes I ran across while toodling about on the internet.  Both have had me coming back to them again and again. a dr. who reference First quote: "The happiest people don't have the best of everything, they just make the best of everything" -Oprah Winfrey. Do I do that?  Do I make the best of everything?  I'd like to think that I do.  But I'll be honest, in spite of my 'positivity' on this blog, I do have a dark side where I get jealous or envious of others.  My main jealous notion is of people who have family living in the same town.  Gah, I want that. I get pea green with envy, and it can at times consume me if I let it. Here is the thing, when I'm jealous, I'm miserable and my worst self ever.  Being jealous is a choice and not a fact.  So I work at my thoughts and feelings.  I work to focus on the p

This is not my dog!  However, he is at the babysitting job and I do love him so and he loves me.  Whenever I arrive, he whines for me to let him out of his cage (which I do!).  I give him time to 'get his wiggles out' as he runs about looking for mischief. He is a Papillon and is a lap dog.  I definitely could be a lap dog in a previous life I think, sit and get petted, sounds great. The terrible twos seem to be giving way to wonderful threes (in April).  There are some temper tantrums but I give her lots of sympathy----'I know you are angry but let's think of something else instead'.  It works most of the time.  My little toddler girl that I babysit now has emerging imagination play and I'm all for that.  Our toy cows fly through the air and make friends with the toy pigs who fly as well.  We sing 'cockledoodledo' as long as we can and giggle over the tandem voices.  She dances and sings.  She also is funny.  I drank all of my hot tea and said it

always a black pen For many years I've established and kept a writing practice that I thought I'd share with you.  I wake up quite early, by choice around 5:15 a.m.  That is my time where I sit quietly in my kitchen with a fresh cup of coffee in my favorite mug and I write before the day begins.  I am a morning person and have been one since I was a child.  My best thinking is before 2 p.m., after that I'm toast. I keep a hard cover Moleskine journal without lines as my daily account of what has transpired the day before (since it's early!).  I write about what happened, the weather, what I was thinking or worrying about and maybe what I wished I was doing instead of wasting time. At the end of each daily entry, I write a gratitude list and focus on positive thoughts.  I see good around me in minute detail.  Writing a gratitude list is a saving grace for me and has served me well in my overall attitude on life. The red paperback moleskine is a writing prom