The Wild Cucumber

Catch up.

2012-01-22T21:18:00.000-06:00

It's been a while, yes? Recently I've felt the preciousness of time. I've acquired a full time temporary job building super computers. (Not quite up my ally, huh? Rest assured I've been entertaining myself with the idea that I'm a robot. Along with occasional spontaneous dance...and a bit of sassy attitude) Well it's kind of neat. The people I work with are great though the amount of time it requires leaves me with a bit of exasperation. I just get fewer of my own tasks done.

I am excited that it is teaching me how to be productive. Productivity and motivation can be challenges for me. The scheduling of breaks I took particular note in. I tend to be a "lets finish this project" kind of person. I am learning the importance of and using time management and how to organize my time. (for Lord's sake, it's taken me 26 years to start to understand this concept!)

I have also recently learned so much about the human body and is healing systems. And also embarked on a diet. Not to loose weight but maybe to challenge myself and to see how my body reacts. It's called the Paleo Diet. It's quite simple. Eat natural, unprocessed foods. No dairy, no grains, no sugar. Basically lean meat, fruits, veggies and nuts. This particular diet is synonymous with CrossFit. It began on Jan 9. I also was ill with a cold during the first two weeks of it. It was interesting learning about my body and what it needs, balancing sleep and exercise. I have finally committed to competing in a CrossFit competition. I have yet to sign up (its on the agenda for tomorrow) The trainers at the gym have been at me for some time. I feel afraid to do it, which is why I want to do it. I haven't challenged myself lately to do something outside my comfort zone. It give me butterflies just thinking about it, and butterflies are sweet!

I have also just begun to receive Chiropractic/Welleness treatment. I have become very fascinated by the importance of the spine in regards to how our bodies heal themselves. And have been thoroughly inspired by Aaron. He is an extremely hard working person and it inspires me to see someone who cares and contributes to society as much as he does. It inspires me to manifest positive change in the world.

And my spine you ask? Jacked! Of course. I tried to convince Aaron that my 26 years of no chiropractic care would still not prevent my spine from looking perfect. Though from the shoulders down it looks pretty spiffy. Shoulders up = mess. The tippy top of my spine is actually pointing in the wrong direction, pinching off the nerves that control my immune system. (no wonder why I have contracted so many colds this winter! and had them for a long time!) So many wonderful things were revealed to me through my time spent at Apex Chiropractic. I would encourage all of you to look up your nearest Maximized Living health center. I was amazed at their approach to health!

Massage school has also been on my mind. I feel an intuitive draw to it. I enjoy touch and the healing power of it. I have always had a deep need to help, in the many different dialects of help. Help someone with a task, or to help someone heal. My heart feels strong and beats loudly, and I feel really centered and focused when I give massages. I like how that feels, it feels like love flowing through me and good vibes. I am completely fascinated with anatomy as well, so it looks like a win win!

with love

(the photos were taken on Christmas Eve of a local lights display. I love the glow of light off the snow, it's warm and inspiring)

Transitions and Adjustments

2011-12-26T22:38:00.000-06:00

I've always been able to see that life is a series of adjustments to achieve a certain balance. Major, minor and all those in between. Teetering and tottering. I'm coming to learn I am a relatively slow adjuster. I like to take my time. I don't like to be in a hurry. Though my mind has tendencies toward that. Racing thoughts of nearly anything related or not to what's happening in the moment. Distracting from what's actually happening. Feeling oblivious the the recent goings on.

Good. I learned. Slow down. Feel the moment. Breathe. Observe the sensations. Things are not "supposed to be" they are as they are.

an old poem

2011-12-21T00:38:00.002-06:00

I wrote this little treasure around the time I left for California a few years ago and stumbled upon it tonight. I can't say that I have perfect Iambic Pentameter but the feeling is there :)

The hue on my back does not match the rest.

My wings are cramped,

grown too large for this nest.

Something's calling me

among all the noise.

I must follow it now

and find my own voice.

I must use the word "no"

seek balance, and peace

or my very own garden

may never grow.

My voice is muddled among all the noise,

my message was lost

along with my poise.

Goodbyes are sad but full of potential.

I enjoy everyone as I leave for my flight,

to answer my call in a new hedgerow.

My colors are changing,

growing and morphing.

my surroundings are no longer suiting.

Learning and growing,

Planting and sewing.

I plan to be with

our Mother Nature.

With a wind thru the trees

and a smile on my face,

I head off on this adventure

to find my own place.

Love and Peace

xoxo L

Elfing

2011-12-01T22:55:00.001-06:00

Most of you might not know this but I am an Elf. This year I got hired to help make children smile and capture that memory on film! Of course Santa is there too! I would say I am well suited to this job, I am filled with natural cheer and smiling is my FAVORITE! I do it all the time, when I'm happy, to strangers on the street, even when I get hurt I'm usually doing the laughing/smiling rolling on the floor bleeding from the leg bit. It's certainly one of my gifts, and I am glad to bestow it upon the little ones. I love Santa too, he is wonderful with the children and reminds them that Christmas isn't all about the gifts, that he wants them to spread the Christmas Spirit through their smiles and joy!

Elfing has kept me busy in my Wild Cucumber Designs workshop too! Stockings are jingling right off the shelves (or thumbtacks to be exact), and special hammock requests are stuffing my mailbox. Not to mention graphic design work and screen print designs for my favorite local gym FitElite. Phwew I asked for some stimulation and motivation and I got it!

Elfing out in public has definitely been a good thing. Sometimes my natural cheer reserves run a little low when I stay alone too long in the Wild Cucumber Designs workshop. Being around other Elves definitely brightens my spirits! Even the fancy mall where the memory making workshop is located I find very interesting and entertaining. So many people moving about and all the different stores like one giant organism functioning strangely with fluorescent light, music and delicious pretzel smells. Makes me giggle just thinking about it, working there makes me feel like I have a back stage pass!

Heres to the universe and its gifts! No matter how they come or in what packages!

With a Huge SMILE and a joyous heart! Much love!

xoxo L (also known as B (for Butterfly))

Floaty-Dancy Land, Autonomy and ....

2011-11-17T18:27:00.001-06:00

I have been, for lack of a better term, in floaty-dancy land (kind of like your life is suspended in jello). Not really sure what I want to do, wondering what it is I am meant to do. Nothing really strikes me, makes my heart jump it's all lack luster... Obviously I'm identifying with something in my mind thats holding me back...

My problem is more so that I could see myself doing so many things that I can't decide! A blessing and a curse! I also need to push myself I need a bit of a challenge! I am starting a temporary job which I think might help out, I'll have more going on in my schedule and will make me appreciate the time I have to create and thus be more productive. Sorry I think I just needed to vent at you guys! Any suggestions are welcome!

One thing I do feel I need is autonomy. I like doing things by myself, I don't like relying on others for things. I like to do it myself and in my own way! I guess I'm manifesting my own place? I need a space of my own to flush out ideas. Or just be by myself. The fact is I'm a terrible decision maker! I just can't decide and don't feel compelled toward anything. BAH! haha

Oh who am I kidding... apologies for the incoherent rambling! But to be honest its quite descriptive of the happenings in my head of late. (sigh) It's honestly making me feel a bit exasperated even thinking about it let alone seeing it on the screen. (big sigh)

I think I will call this the dormancy period! Just like the trees and plants in the winter....I know something is just waiting to flower!

Much Love,
L

Northern Wisconsin Retreat

2011-10-25T17:36:00.001-05:00

I was proud of my emptied spool of thread!

I spent the past weekend with my cousin, Aunt and Grandma. I happened to be home this year for one of my favorite events, the Quilting Retreat to Camp Luther in Three Lakes Wisconsin! I love it for so many reasons. We get to run away for the weekend and sew up a storm 3 hours away from our homes! You bring with you what fabric you have and make use of it! I love how much I feel I get accomplished. It's almost as if we get trapped on Sewing Island with nothing to do but sew ALL weekend! And bombard the one local fabric store!

I decided that I wouldn't do as I wanted (which would be to bring my entire fabric stash!) and that I would make use of all of the scraps from previous projects as well as a few forgotten projects. I'm glad I narrowed it down! I may have spent the whole weekend deciding what to do instead of doing!

Grandma and Aunt Jane working away in the
background!

I learned so many things this weekend including some tips about how I can teach myself a more efficient way of working called I need fewer decisions! I will be the first to tell you I am the captain of the ship "Indecisive" adrift in the waters of indecision.... yep its that bad!

I also learned physical space can be a good tool. It felt wonderful to 'escape' for a weekend. I feel centered again. I had a rough cycle this past week, there were a lot of transitions happening and I was fighting with myself about a lot of things. The time and space away helped me to regain composure and see life as simple and wonderful, a gift to be cherished. I also had the blessing of Eagle on the way home, perched in a tree reminding me that nature is always speaking and that a silent mind aids in hearing her words.

We had devotional time where we sang songs and shared in readings from the Bible. I haven't spent any time studying the religion in which I was raised (catholocism). It was beautiful to hear the words and feel the oneness of the teachings of the religions I know. From Buddhism to Christianity they seem

to be teaching the same thing.

Add caption

Love yourself to love others, as we are all one.

paintings and nature magic

2011-09-30T11:37:00.004-05:00

This is an old friend I wanted to update you on. I started the "quadropus" when I was in North Carolina. So it has been a long process so far. I just wanted to give you a little pictorial tour of the changes its been through.

This orange phase was the under painting. I like do do under painting so that when I paint the final colors on top some of the colors underneath can show through.

This Phase was the background painting. You can see some of the orange pokes thru the green blue background. If you could see this in person the orange is very firy and red like a burning sunset.

I had a hard time trying to decide how to finish this one. I paint relatively fast and I tend to not have a whole lot of patience for tedious details. (which is kind of ironic...) I ended up having a lightening strike moment. I do have patience for embroidery and its tiny details. So of course I had to put them together!

I remember having a distinct vision of what the little suction cups would look like when they got embroidered. I have a clear vision for a few of the other details as well. The quadropus is a work in progress very slow progress! I love it!

This monarch I just recently finished. He (yes its a he!) sat patiently as I tended to sewing. I actually originally didn't like how the background had turned out so I set him aside. (do we see a pattern here... apparently my paintings need time outs before they get finished!) I felt so happy as I painted the wings. I could just feel the joy pouring from my heart.

This is my little Goldfinch friend. She came about right after the monarch. I had her drawn on the piece of hard board and just went straight to it after the monarch.

She was a visitor about a month ago, she came to visit me 3 times (did i tell you this?) right before I headed to the Midwest Shamanic Gathering. I looked up what she meant in my Animal Speak book, and in short she was awakening me to the Nature Spirits. I was so excited! When I say she visited me she landed on my window twice, barely gripping to the trim on the outside as she peered inside. The first occasion I was singing in the shower and stepped out of the bathroom still singing and she was perched there listening. The second morning i was sitting on my pillow meditating and I heard a small noise on the window, she had come back again! The third visit I was talking with my uncle in the living room and saw a flutter high in the window sure enough she was there!

A day or so before this all had happened I had discovered an old feather I had found while in California. It was crumpled and kinked up from being smashed in a pocket in my backpack. I showed it to my squeeze and we both determined that it was probably a turkey feather. I set it on my window sill (yep the same window where Goldfinch landed!). After my visits with Goldfinch I took the feather and others with me to the Shamanic Gathering, where they lay in a net in my tent all weekend. On Friday night I attended a sweat lodge, which was amazing! That night I had a glowing vision of feathers as if backlit by a bright white light. I scratched out a picture and proceeded to be serenaded by a thunderstorm all night. Then on Monday when I was packing up my things I pulled out my feathers and as I grabbed my 'turkey' feather my first thought was that it looked like a hawk feather, and my second realization was that it look like it was in almost perfect condition! Over the weekend the feather had been healed. The extra funny thing was that I hadn't touched it all weekend! I wish I had a before picture, it had at least 2 kinks in it and was bent into a "c' shape.

Happy Nature magic! Keep your eyes open it's happening all the time!

Much Love!

And I almost forgot! Check out my Etsy shop there are a few new listings!!

humbled

2011-09-19T23:43:00.000-05:00

So poignant that my post following one encouraging Bee-ing happy is filled with frustration. I currently am floating in a mood of frustration. I am home with my family whom I love and have even found someone I am a lottle sweet on, which tends to add to my frustration. I can't help but feel like a burden, and a huge money suck. Let me lay it out for you, as simply as I know how to. I came home, my dad fixed my car, my mom bought me clothes, I eat my aunt and uncle's food and live in their house. This boy I'm sweet on has a friggin' heart of gold, and also won't have me paying for things. I have no job, in the traditional sense (this may lead to another post...). And I probably have one too many hobbies.... (sound of giant vacuum sucking up a pile of sand...with a lego caught in the spinning brush) Mix into that the classic, what am I doing with my life!? That recipe sounds a little like worthless soup with a side of frustration and a lego SANDwich. (< hah get it? the sand and lego from before right?!! (note to self: research career in comedy.))

Worthless like a big ol' homeless, jobless leech. (with an incredible sense of humor) But I guess leeches even have a purpose, they can suck the life back into a body part that had been accidently removed right? (trying to convince myself here)

I feel HUMBLED looking at all these words. I really do appreciate the frustration, it makes me squirm a little and brings about change. It will push me to make decisions.

But I still feel guilt. Lets explore this.

Guilt, as I would describe it feels like weight on my heart. Like parts of it are made of lead making it heavy and sluggish. The lead was ammo of the mind, now poisoning the body. (making me feel yucky!) Life filled blood being pumped through a lead heart. (double yucky) In response, a poem.

Magic Mind is Heavy Heart?

Thoughts; non existent, but heavy like lead.

Shot aimed for the Heart, fingering the trigger.

The mind a skilled marksman.

Fire!

Guilt nails the target, frustration and worthlessness follow suit.

Ripping into the love and light of Heart.

Mind keeps up the resistance.

Pounding at Heart.

Heart keeps pumping, peacefully accepting its fate.

Breath focuses presently, softening the blow:

One moment at a time, one breath at a time.

A divine light is shown, lifts the weight.

There is no lead, no shot to the Heart.

Mind is a magician, an illusionist.

The lead is no heavier than a bubble.

Let it float away,

popping in the light.

releasing the heart.

The mind is very powerful, capable of coercing physical reactions to thoughts. Fascinating, and frustrating. But I choose to accept and observe my frustration. After all its just a sensation. It's just there temporarily. It will pass. I just have to breathe and be.

Thanks for listening, feels good to get that out. Sometimes I think I'm going to scare people when I share my feelings. So there it is. Take it as you will; be scared, spit on your computer, do a dance, make a face, ask questions, or remind me comedy is not a good career move. I will just enjoy the fact that my heart feels just a little bit lighter :) And even though my jokes are lame, they still make me smile and laugh! haha! (touché lame comedy haters!) I also revel in how easily entertained I am...hah. I bid you adieu!

Feel the love, spread smiles!

"Even when the sky is heavily overcast, the sun hasn't disappeared. It's still there on the other side of the clouds."

-Eckhart Tolle

xoxo

BEEn Busy!

2011-09-08T18:31:00.000-05:00

I had a most wonderful weekend at Beaver Creek Reserve during the Midwest Shamanic Gathering. I received healing in many forms over the weekend. And was constantly met with teachings from beautiful people and nature. I even participated in my first sweat lodge which was incredible! We got to sing and dance to Native American Drumming. I even got to play in a drum circle, which was so much fun. Not only were there Native Americans from WI there, but also Shaman from Africa, Laos, and South America. I feel strong, calm and happy. Very appreciative as well.

There was talk of the Hopi Prophesy of the Eagle and Condor. Which states something like this, When the Eagle of the North and the Condor of the South fly together, the children of Earth are reawakening.

Love Earth. Love You. Spread Love.

Simply, Love.

Reawaken.

I have been receiving lots of love via my Etsy shop! I am so excited that my cuffs went over so well and am excitedly making more! I hope to have some more "Bee Happy" since I have had requests for them after being in my shop for only a night!!

Till then you will have to check out the new Mini wallets. I know...they are no substitute... till next time!

The first custom order was mailed off today!

Custom order #2

Mini Wallets!

Love to you all! Till next time Bee Happy!

xoxo

Learning Happens..... Always

2011-08-30T21:56:00.000-05:00

I am learning so much about how I want my Etsy work to flow and what are the best ways to manage it. I tend to cling to certain methods in my head about how I should do something. An example: I think that I need to make a bunch of stuff, then photograph it and list it all in globular chunks. I realized today that my photo patience can be low sometimes and that I may benefit from shorter photo sessions. I also noticed it took me nearly four hours to edit photos for 4 items and list them. wow! I have also noticed my body responds better to being able to change positions frequently. I just wanted to share with you much was learned today with trials and errors and edits and re-dos! They are the best!

Check out some peeks of the goods and my ETSY Page!

A little bird has flown into my life to teach as well. I have had 3 visits from a lovely little Goldfinch. She brings exciting news of Awakening to Nature Spirits, which seems rather timely since I will be attending the Midwest Shamanic Gathering this weekend!

The first sighting was after I was singing in the shower I stepped out of my bathroom still singing and she was perched on the edge of my bedroom window, I kept singing and stepped closer and she opened her mouth in song as well. I sat on the bed and watched her for a moment then she flew off. I then realized the night before I had found a Turkey feather which was a bit crunched up and laid it on the window sill that she sat upon.

Number two: This morning I managed to prop myself up early for my morning meditation and the hour was well underway when I heard a noise I immediately knew was tiny talons grasping onto the window frame. I cracked my eyes and spied her again! She sang to me this time and stayed for a few moments as I attempted to capture her on my camera she flew off the exact moment I went to press the button.

The Third: I was being distracted by the television when I saw a fluttering up high in the living room window. Again I knew it was her! I slunk out the noisy screen door and leaned over to spy her clutched to the window frame, she spotted me quickly and sailed off with her up and down flight pattern.

Her very first visit inspired a painting, now for the doing! I have two other paintings in progress and other sewing projects. You can believe I haven't been sitting idly by ;) but there is a lot of behind the scenes work I hope to share with you soon!

Much love and light, and Learning!!

The Queen has a red dot!

and Bee Happy!

xoxo!

Messengers

2011-08-16T21:50:00.000-05:00

I feel I have always had what I call a soft spot for animals whether they are two, four, six or even eight or million legged. They capture my attention and fascinate me....beautiful beings. I have started to learn they are bearers of messages. Reminders for us to be aware. Reminders and guides. Their intelligence is not one from books it's inherent, intuitive and wise. I don't feel yet I can share with you their magic maybe soon. For now I will share my encounters.

Butterflies

I met this beautiful Monarch at a butterfly house at Beaver Creek Reserve. It wasn't the best day for butterflies I was told. Of course I decided to venture out anyway. I locked right onto this one struggling on a plastic sign cover. I stretched my hand out and it crawled right on. We spent quite some time together before it decided to fly over to a nearby milkweed plant. I remember the great sense of power I felt as it crawled on my hand. For such a weightless creature it had an incredible grasp!

Red Spotted Purple

This is another friend from the butterfly house. I collected another of its kind in my garage. My mom had pulled out her car to give it a scrub, and in its place were two treasures. One perfect little Pink Edged Sulfur and a Red Spotted Purple, who was a little worse for the wear. They unfortunately had met their end, though I touched the Purple and it began to flap its wing, slowly open and closed. I stayed and watched quietly as my parents shuffled about, my dad peering over obviously wondering what I was doing. I showed him the flapping butterfly. He commented something about a butterfly healer haha. I would be so honored! After I was sure the Purple had passed I picked them up and inspected. I couldn't believe the Purple had been able to flap...only had one good pair of wings on one side the other side was crumpled as well as I believe it was missing many organs....a special moment.

Aphrodite Fritillary

I was out for a bike ride with my Auntie the other day, and of course as always had my animal spotting eyes on. After about 10 miles I hadn't noticed much. Then on my way down the hill I saw what I thought may be a Swallowtail traipsing in its bouncing flight pattern across the road. I sailed closer just to have a friendly collision on my shirt. It really didn't seem to noticed and continued on his way. We should all be so calm and accepting of surprise situations!

Cope's Gray Treefrog

This little friend my mom found hanging out on our house. Just a little bigger than a quarter.

This is my parents resident Gray Fox. It lives in the back yard, we've seen it often leaving the den and returning about two hours later near dusk sometimes with prey. So beautiful. My dad also had a Fox and pups living under a shed at his auto shop! Maybe he has a fox totem animal? They sure seem to like him. I let my dog Jack outside one morning about 4:30 am and heard the strangest "Arf" noise...it was the fox with its territorial call!

Jack also woke me up early to see the mist burning off the lake. He's a great friend :)

Have you experienced any animal magic lately or do you have a totem animal? I would love to hear about it!

xoxo

Tennessee, a small glimpse in pictures

2011-08-08T11:02:00.000-05:00

It was a lovely spot, lush with growth and life.

I was so excited to see this little treasure! Its a Luna Moth! I have seen two this year, the other one was at Wood's Hole Hostel. It gave me some inspiration to paint again. I've encountered lots of animal visitors lately. I got a book that helps me understand the messages and magic they bring.

much love

xoxo

The Cascades: Virginia. Trip two.

2011-08-05T14:00:00.000-05:00

Still just as beautiful as the first time. This time I had my big camera...

The butterfly is taking flight!

Justine was excellent at finding caterpillars and taming butterflies!

The Rhododendrons had such beautiful light falling on them.

When I got to look back on these photos I felt such a sense of calm. The Cascades is such a serene place, happy soothing vibes.

Bidding you some happy soothing peaceful vibes

xoxo much love :)

District of Columbia

2011-07-24T12:25:00.001-05:00

Ah, the District of Columbia. A place I don't think I would ever choose to vacation to, but my aunt and uncle were going to be there so why not? And to top it off a friend I worked with at Emandal lives there as well! It was a jolly good time, and was also the first time in a long time I was hitting the pubic transit solo, I felt pretty awesome at it. Totally achieved just below pro level, definitely.

Awe, that's nice. Uncle Kelly and Adam
holding hands, how sweet!

They are fond of red circles with lines thru them in DC.
We were entering the grounds of the pentagon.
We weren't allowed to take photos but somehow I'm
positive they were being taken of us.

A recurring theme...

The 'tube' as the english might say.

Intriguing columns

..... chinatown?

The one chinese looking thing in chinatown...

There are no words for the awesomeness this portrays.

An anti Nuclear weapons display out front of the whitehouse...

The following three photos, I just couldn't help myself. Honestly I'm just really easily entertained, and there was an astounding amount of them....

On the walk back the hotel, I found a little unassuming beauty. Colors of course :)

Christian I hope you had fun!! It was definitely awesome riding
back from the Jefferson monument!

A lovely trip.

The Cascades: Virginia. Trip one. 6/22

2011-07-22T15:06:00.001-05:00

My (totally awesome) friend Paige came to visit, she lives nearby in Harrisonburg, VA. Upon her arrival Neville and Michael decided that it would be an excellent day for the crew to take a zero day (in hiker terms a day off so you hike 'zero' miles). Well on our 'zero' day we hiked 2 miles in and 2 miles out in this gorgeous gorge! I managed to leave my nice camera back at the hostel for this adventure....silly me, luckily I still had my phone camera.

We had stopped to get some food in town and the above was the resulting food coma....mmm napping at a waterfall, what could be better? Also noted, apparently we were the crazy people of the woods... everyone who were there when we arrived vacated shortly after we starting jumping in off the rocks! We honestly didn't smell THAT bad!?

Got ya!

Congrats Cascades, Best nap ever list achieved!

Mountain People: Evan, Neville, Michael, Paige and Shad

Professor Evan giving us a lesson on the mushroom "Chicken of the Woods". Hilarous....

Trip to town anyone?

slack packing and building demolition

2011-07-01T09:42:00.000-05:00

hi.

Well, I just arrived in DC, where I shall meet up with my Auntie Jolene and Uncle Kelly, their son Adam and their foreign exchange student Christian (Who is from Chile) And also where I am updating from! Anywho stay tuned for those adventures next....onto the adventure recap

SLACKPACKING!!! yup, for those of you who don't know, this Appalachian Trail (AT) term it means as a Thru Hiker you have your heavy backpack toted to town by car and you take a daypack and some agua on the trail. More like a day hike.

This was the awesome crew that convinced me it would be rad to hike to town with them. And it was. 10 miles in 5 or so hours left my knees feelin' decrepit and my side butt sore for a couple days! IT ROCKED Thanks crew! You can keep up with what's left of this crew here at Wren's Blog.

From left to right: Neard, Old Spice, Lauren, Wren, Josiah, So Far, and Birch

We trekked thru some awesome Rhododendron forests (I love that word because it sounds like a dinosaur! You can guarantee I was holding my arms t-rex style as I bounced on thru) and saw some awesome Mountain Laurel flowers...that I didn't photograph. I encourage you to google it...ha Ooh and a Scarlet Tanager, electric red feathers!

This was an overlook entitled "Power Lines" where we stopped to have a snack and pee on stuff! (I've really come to enjoy peeing outside...its just so convenient lol!) What a fun group. Magic Mix is the one with blue hair who picked up a kitten in Demascus, Va and is now hiking with him. The kitten's name is Sir. Night Walker is the other man on the right who enjoyed my "slow"pace until he commented about it!

The Deconstruction Project

Ranger Cabin Before Shot

Sunlight on an old mattress

I strolled into the cabin after carefully maneuvering the rusty nail obstacle course of a deck and found a treasure inside. Im not sure if I can describe to you why I love such old and dilapidated things. They just have such a profound stillness perhaps, they have just been there still, enduring the weather not wanting just there.

Shad, Neville and Michael taking it to the roof!

Evan or "Easy" ripping off the siding.

A butterfly visitor.

Aumakua with her stick of course...
she has an addiction...

Michael throwing popcorn!
It looks like its in his beard!

Rocky and Bookworm

The wrecking crew back row:
Aumakua, Scrubbs, Easy/Evan Bookworm, Shad/Scar, Five Stones
Front Row:
Neville, Michael, Rocky, and myself

All in all it took us 3 days to take down the old ranger cabin. I was on the de-nail crew. Which at some points I was not entirely thrilled with, but it was still really fun! Evan tore down the old privy too, and now all the wood we saved from that has been turned into siding for the pig pen! There should be three new little piggies to meet when I get back to the hostel!

VA, yup made it.

2011-06-14T08:36:00.000-05:00

So I made it to Virginia....a week ago hehe. It is amazing. Just what I needed. As I drove up the rode turned into a tunnel of trees a welcome hug from nature. So far I have planted peppers, pulled some weeds, set tables, folded laundry, meditated, hiked 10 miles, "moved mountains" also known as doing some trailwork building stairs out of boulders, drew some signs, petted dogs, smiled and laughed a lot, and met many amazing people, and learned much everyday.

There are so many wonderful people I have met here and learned so much from each of them. And plus I get to live in a tent! Oh and I forgot to mention the amazing home cooked meals! uh well this is a short one but I figured a few people might be wondering what crack I had dissappeared into. Ill be back later hopefully with photos and more stories.

With greatfulness for the interconnectedness of life,

Much Love!!
Lindsey
xoxo

Transitioning and Painting

2011-06-06T12:50:00.000-05:00

It seems life is almost always transitioning, at least in my experience. Well, yet another transition is happening. I am moving to Virginia for a spell to help a wonderful woman whom I met at my Vipassana Meditation course named Neville. She and her husband Michael own Wood's Hole Hostel which is located 1/2 mile off the Appalachian Trail. So they host lots of those thru hikers! For those of you who don't know, a thru hiker hikes from Georgia to Maine on the Appalachian Trail (AT) which usually takes around 6 months! Pretty amazing! One friend I met while working at Emandal, Dave, completed a thru hike a few years ago doing it entirely (as far as I know) in Chacos (hiking SANDALS!?). Also very relevant Dave may be nearly done with his first Vipassana Meditation course! I hope he is learning much and working very diligently. Not only do Neville and Michael host hikers but they also feed them, grow a garden, keep bees, teach yoga, and perform massage! I know right!! I am excited to help them with whatever they need and hopefully I get to play in the garden a bit. I hope they are prepared for me! I come bearing plants and an arsenal of seeds! This looks to be a wonderful next step.

With this transition my path leads away from Dorian's. It has been a bit tearful but very important for both of us. I can't speak for him but for me it equates to an excellent opportunity to practice presence and non attachment. Within relationships I tend to become dependent, which suppresses my intuition. I just end up wanting to please the other person and lose track of my path. With that said I can feel the excitement of opportunity and the thrill of not knowing what the universe holds for me in its hands. Taking each step as it comes. Just like flowers, as one fades another rises and blooms, but not after dropping a few seeds ;)

Shifting gears a little, you haven't seen much of my work lately huh!? Well, my favorite neighborhood family was over working out the other day and we decided to see if 5 year old Gage wanted to do some painting. (Dorian and I ended up taking about a million canvasses from his parents over the holidays, and it was a good time to put them to use...so we didn't have to pack them in our cars!) While Gage was experimenting with color mixing on his canvas (his paintings were awesome by the way...) I was thinking about two furry roommates....one fat and white and the other thin and orange. I entitled this diptych "Fat White and The Orange One" The cats real names are Sugar and Ginger but ever since Dorian and I moved in Sugar has been Fat White Cat. And for a while I couldn't remember Ginger's name so I called her The Orange One, currently she is walking across some bare shelves then onto the bed and crashing her head into my arm, licking and biting me. I'm not sure what it is but cats tend to bite me...usually not in a mean way...except for one.... Though she bites me I can't help but feel very relaxed and calm when she walks past and grazes me with her tail and kneads me with her paws though the drooling and sandpaper tongue is less effective at this....

"The Orange One"

"Fat White"

You can see an orangish splotch on "Fat White" I decided not to paint over it because we were all joking that it was a scale representation of the two cats! haha! These masterpieces are going to stay up in the cat's room :) cats should have art too I guess!

This is a shot of one of my fabric cuffs that has a happy new home with one of my favorite farmer's market friend Katy, she also owns the wonderful bag I made for her which I decided to entitle "The Katy bag"

Be Happy & Much Love :)

the buzzing of bees and flowering of consciousness

2011-05-28T16:12:00.000-05:00

As I sit here I have the images of our garden flowers etched in my mind. Something about those cute Chamomile flowers reflects this bounding happiness within me. Flowers are somehow very connected to me........ perhaps we vibrate at similar frequencies (if you read this last line about frequencies and are perplexed, think of it this way, all matter is made of atoms right? and those little atoms have electrons zipping around outside of them (yes) so isn't all matter essentially moving or vibrating!?....i know right!?). Like feeling the buzz of bees right down in your heart. I can feel this buzzing sensation easily in my hands, try this: close your eyes, and see if you can feel your hands....not picture or imagine but actually FEEL them ....can you feel it, the aliveness and vibrations?

There is usually a flurry of winged creatures busily dancing about the blooms. Maybe I was a bee in a past life? It could explain my attraction to bright colors and flowers! ha Well I took a few pictures maybe you too can get a sense for my flower love :)

If you haven't you should click on the picture to enlarge them and see more detail.

The Borage flower is beloved by bees, but check out that iridescent green guy..or gal!

German Chamomile

Candy Stripe Cosmos

Backside of the most beautiful purple Gladiolus!

Here's her face! Ms. Gladiolus! You may
recognize her from my tattoo!

Nodding Borage buds. Just waiting
to flash their blue petals.

Pink Zinnias! I love those
raggedy ones!

White Polar Bear Zinnia

Our Sugar Snap spoils! yum!

Baby Red Bell pepper

Bell Pepper flower, so beautiful!

How many cayenne's do you see?

The Tomato forest :)

Clouds have been very grounding for me....maybe the opposite of grounding. I'm not sure, but they remind me of the expanse of the universe and that I needn't get caught up in trivial matters....we (humans) are so tiny, yet can cause much change....

I look at them in awe and then become still, my mind empties.

I can feel the expanse of the sky.

My mind is rendered void and spacious.

Flowing with the currents of the universe.

Liberation.

New surprise friends!

2011-05-17T20:31:00.000-05:00

Dorian and I were out perusing the garden the other morning as we tend to do. And we made some exciting discoveries. Dorian had spotted a tiny mantis in our broccoli on day, but on this day we found TWO baby Mantis...mantisess, manti...I'm unsure of the plural...Mantids? This one is so little the silver circle is a nail head.

This is my version of where's Waldo.... Mira Mantis? I think I've been watching too much Dora the Explorer with the tots I get to babysit haha.

I'm not sure who found who!?

Beautiful.

Of course we love the Ladybug, because they love munching aphids! This one is hanging out on my bolting cilantro, I didn't mind at all that the cilantro decided to go to seed. Bees love the flowers, and flowers make me giddy! I have buds on my stained glass flowers and a couple zinnia...talk about bugs in my britches, I don't want to pressure my flowers but I sometimes feel like camping out for a few hours to watch them.

Damselfly hanging out on some lettuce. While I was working at Emandal I had a Damselfly land on my hat and stay there for almost a whole day! I took it into my room with me that night, and upon further inspection I found its wing to be crinkled :( The next morning it was gone. I'm certainly glad it came to stay with me a while.

Yeah, I know. Super badass....right!? This plant makes me so happy! It's my Darlintonia Pitcher plant. Also known as the Cobra Plant and is native to Califorina whom also has 'cool root' requirements. Its a carnivore, yea it eats bugs! Hopefully not our friends mentioned above! This plant is so well adapted! Check out the windows on the bulbous head, once the ...lets say fly crawls in by that cool looking forked tongue and realizes it wants out, it flies up into those windows and can't find the hole it crawled in! Pretty narly... I am especially pleased because 2 of my other carnivores perished after some hard freezes and cat perils this winter, my beautiful white trumpet pitchers and my california sundew...

the brassica homies, under their awesome shade structure.

there she is looking nice and green!

Recently I have noticed my consumerist tendencies. I have also felt a bit of disconnect with my intuition and a general lack of focus. A bit hum drum if you will. Dorian and I made a trip to a local farm today, Raft Swamp Farm. Where Louie the proprietor lead us on a jacked up golf cart tour. It was so inspiring, he was truly a survivalist, using awesome cover cropping techniques, drip irrigation, and running things almost totally off grid! Who wouldn't want grapes, peaches, persimmons, blueberries, strawberries and mulberries! YUM! We also got to taste some purple passion asparagus! YUM, uh the mulberries were so delicious! What a wonderful place. Oh and the birds, he built tons of birdhouses for the birds and says they take care of all his flying insects, especially the purple martins they eat 3,000 bugs a day! Plus he has one of the only 3 registered natural apiaries in North Carolina! Yay for bees! and not using chemicals on them :) He also has I think eight 3.5 acre plots that farmers can come and use! He's a farmer incubator! He is full of wonderful ideas!

Louie was full of wonderful stories and even picked us some sassafras so we could make some tea...which reminds me its ready! Y'all remember what sassafras makes right?? I thought it smelled like licorice, and it does a bit but its root beer!

Thanks Louie for a wonderful day! And for all you do!!

Much love xoxo

-L

What do you think?

2011-04-27T12:08:00.000-05:00

Welcome to my brain! You are about to take a trip through an artists creative process and endless stream of questioning, Buckle up!

I have had some new ideas for products....eh something about the word product just seems so manufactured and cold... anyway, lets call it new art. Yes, I have had some ideas for new purchasable art. I wanted to run them by you and see what you thought, sometimes I like making things because I like how they work, which is great because then others might have the same feelings, but I would love to know what you think of these?

I feel myself leaning more toward love and life, and less wallet and money...? Does that make sense? What I mean is I want to move toward more soulful items, or things that you see that make you smile and remind you of what life is really about, the present moment, love, compassion and happiness. Though I do really appreciate the handiness of the wallets and have no fear wallet lovers they won't disappear!

Lets just get to it, I made a few little things and would love some feedback!

First is this which I love! Inspirational words/sayings inspired by my Vipassana adventures, as well as Eckhart Tolle and his brilliant books. This one is a reminder to observe. Observe nature, life, and especially your mind and its processes. I think the cuffs are fun and I have totally fallen in love with embroidery thanks to Natalie's birthday bag! I was also thinking maybe a fabric necklace? Bookmarks? or little flags kind of like prayer flags? Any critique is welcome! I think I need to make the word a bit smaller so one can read it on the top of the wrist (tho I have rather small wrists).

Welcome little Mini Wallet version Denna! You may have noticed in this post (the tiny pink thing in the top photo) a little mini wallet which was the Stacey version! Dorian's mom noticed that one and thought she might like one for an upcoming trip. Of course being an artist I have a compulsion to always make improvements. So the first one is the one showing the velcro right on the credit card part, I didn't like how it closed and the quilting/batting didn't feel as strong as I wanted it to. I made another one with a tab closure that I liked much better and interfaced the lining and exterior. I liked it better because it felt a little stronger and the tab made it feel more secure.

It can fit a ton of cards and you can even stick some folded cash behind the card pockets! I really like this design...here come the critiques....

One awesome thing about this is I have a stash of fabric cut to the width of the big wallets I make, and I am able to use those pieces to make these little guys which = less wasted fabric! (wasted fabric makes me cringe!) The drawback is I really want to topstitch around the outside edge like I do with the big wallets, I think it would give it such a nice finishing touch and that little bit of strength I think it still needs, but then I wouldn't be able to use my pre-cut fabrics (sad face!) well I could but there would be a lot of waste...which i could develop into something new...!

Help!? haha

Oh, and Denna if you are reading this...do you like that blue? Do you need more blue?? Don't be shy now! Do you want something brighter!!? I want you to love your new wallet (I am not offended in the least if you hate this color hah! so please let me know!)

What do you think? I need some direction on my ship floating thru the sea of ideas! And I think I just wanted to talk to you all!

Thanks for listening to my ramblings!

Lots of love!!

xoxo

Natalie's custom birthday bag!

2011-04-21T14:52:00.000-05:00

This turned out soo cute! Even after my three attempts at embroidering her name! My beautiful friend Paige requested that I make her daughter a bag for her birthday. She also mentioned that Natalie loved things with her name on it so I had to brush up on my embroidery skills. I made her this little messenger bag! Now I want one! I really love the size its a little shallower than mine which makes it easier to find things, and perfect for a little girl, well not so little I believe she is 10 now!

Yes! I'm so glad I watched the padded satin stitch videos! This is much more of what I had in mind! The previous two attempts were directly on the blue fabric and it was really hard to see her name, as well as not very cute! This little blanket stitched patch did the trick! All done by hand, which was a really relaxing process.
I saw Natalie after she had received her gift and asked her if she had filled it up with things yet, she responded with "yep, bubble gum!" I love it! Happy Birthday Natalie!!

New Roommates, New Garden Structures, someone is getting FAT, and I have to Pea!

2011-04-15T10:13:00.000-05:00

Yep, I've been thinking about all of you and how much you have been on the edge of your seats just waiting for me to post again. WAIT NO LONGER!

I have been so busy this past week or so. Three markets last week, a custom bag order, tons of garden work....... My sentence length to busyness ratio seems a bit off..... Well I know if you are like me you just mostly want to see pictures anyway so take a look! I may have had my sentence/busyness ratio off but I believe my words to pictures ratio is much better.

A little peek of the Farmer's Market table. Ogle away.

On a Farmer's Market related note, I was requested to make this little number. It turned out awesome! And for size reference, I believe a mini schnauzer would fit inside....Thank you Katy & Justin!

I told you someone was getting FAT! haha YAY fat little blueberries!!

We built this awesome little hoop shade structure! We are so excited. We look like garden pros now! Hopefully the lettuce, brassicas, and spinach will like it! There were a few scary parts when we were setting it up and we definately would make some adjustments upon building another one but its not too shabby for a first attempt!

Dorian attaching the shade cloth.

BAM! Super cool! We might even be able to turn it into a greenhouse so this stuff can be grown during the winter. All we need is a thick clear plastic tarp to cover it, and maybe a little heater.

We totally pea-d! Dorian was telling me all about sugar snaps and how fast they grow. He said I should take a picture everyday to see how much they are growing. Well this was the best I could do.

The first clinger!!! Go pea go!!!

The peas are now 6-7" tall and haven't quite gotten the hang of our hillbilly fence yet.

Above and below are our new roommates! I had a Farmers Market event at the Cape Fear Botanical Gardens' Plant sale! Of course we needed and aloe.....we are going to be in the sun all summer, and have already had one little sunburn incident...

And the ORCHID! So beautiful! I wanted one that was a little different then most you see. This one reminds me of some of the ones I saw at the Berkeley Botanical gardens! It smells wonderful too! Yay Plants!

Clap your hands for orchids!!

And the winners are.....

2011-04-06T08:40:00.004-05:00

Thank you all so much for your wonderful comments and for reading my artist interview! I LOVED reading your comments about what you wanted to do! And Kristen...Seriously who wouldn't want to hang out at Mairin's Center?? Mairin you NEED to do it! It sounds AMAZING!

❤ Thank you, thank you! ❤

I used my furry giveaway-winner-selection tool miss Bella Sue! She likes paper and tasting things so she doesn't mind at all. She chose both the winners very delicately this time and listened very well when I told her to 'drop'. (if you remember last time I had to do an extraction, and the winner was covered in slobber! haha) OK without further delay......

Good girl Bella!

The winner of this lovely wallet is:

AUNT DENISE!!

The winner of this also lovely wallet is:

MAIRIN!!!

❤ Thank you again everybody I really appreciate it! ❤

Mairin and Aunty Denise I will need your addresses so I can mail out your wallets to you!

You can leave a comment on this post with your address, or Email me here

LindenTreesNearTheWater@gmail.com

Artist Interview Give Away!!

2011-04-02T21:24:00.001-05:00

In honor of my first ever artist interview (located here!) I would just love to give away these two bright springy wallets! WEEEEE! They have just been waiting for a special occasion like this! Thank you so much to Lauren for the wonderful interview questions! I had so much fun, and it also gifted me with much insight, inspiration and reflection. ❤

The first winner will take home this little gem

The second winner will get to meet this lovely wallet. (quite gravity defying isn't it?)

ENTER TO WIN BY:

Following my blog! (its the button over on the right, that says follow) Make sure to leave a comment that you do! If you are one of my current followers leave me a comment as well. (bloggers love comments!)

ENTER 2 TIMES BY:

Leaving a separate comment about what you would do for a living if you could do anything at all. Really anything! I would love some details too!

The giveaway will conclude on Tuesday April 5th, I will post the winners on Wednesday morning. Using some very random and creative choosing mechanism, of course!

Thank you so much for visiting, and reading and commenting!

❤ Best of luck, and much love! ❤

Check back this afternoon for some bloggy fun!

2011-04-02T06:55:00.001-05:00

Hey Everyone!

I just wanted to let you know that I have a farmers market this morning 9-1 but will be back soon with a giveaway and some new wallet additions to the store so hang tight!!

If you are reading this and you havent visited my amazing friend Lauren's blog, you should! She so graciously offered me an artist interview, so you can learn even more silly facts about me!

See you again soon!

Lots of LOVES!!

a super quick update before the unofficial FARMERS MARKET!!

2011-03-23T12:39:00.000-05:00

Our little toddler transplants are going to market today! I hope people like broccoli and cauliflower around here....and the weather will stay cool enough.......

Chamomile! Such a wonderful tea/medicinal herb! You are coming to market too!

BASIL!!! Has to be one of the most beloved herbs! Though you are not quite ready for market...you need to get used to the outdoors first.

And one of the blueberry bushes has flowers already!!

Oh and I found out today that I'm IN for the farmers market...the official one. Yay, thanks to my wonderful brother and his lovely wife for the donation!! It got me in!! The official farmers market hasn't started here in Fayetteville yet but there's an unofficial one happening currently that I'm about to join in an hour and a half! So exciting!

Keep on se(o)wing the love!!

xoxo

A Garden Day

2011-03-04T16:36:00.000-06:00

Good girl Bella, stay on the paths!

We got some Sweet Mint plants the other day and stuck them into the corners of our herb bed, I also seeded some Broad Leaf Sage around the Mint. I LOVE the smell of fresh mint. It reminds me of summertime, and Emandal, they had a huge mound of mint that you could smell as you walked past the last cattle guard to the farmhouse....mmmm. So soothing and such sweet memories, of a most wonderful place! Dorian caught me yesterday bent over with my face in the mint wagging my head back and forth, sniffing deeply, such a happy aroma.

Greenhouse space is getting tight! We had to go get some wood to add shelves, and we were requested to add another long bed to the garden! We potted up lots of broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, and a mix of lettuces. As well as today I did a bit of cilantro, and about 12 jalapeno peppers mmm, I'm so excited for salsa!! I planted some more strawberries today and some gladiolus! I think Dorian indulged me a bit at the seed store the other day :) He knows how much I love flowers and that it seems we may run out of garden space so I have to keep my flowery aspirations under wraps so we can have enough room for all our yummy veggies and fruits!

Speaking of fruits I almost forgot! We planted 4 blueberry trees! They are huge! Especially compared to the first little blueberry plants we got that were about a foot tall, these are almost 4 feet tall!

Our backyard is going to be DELICIOUS!

a mini messenger and some other creations

2011-02-24T17:11:00.001-06:00

I have had the idea for this simple Mini Messenger bag in my head for a while. It came to me during a meditation and I had to scribble it down quickly after I was done meditating. But I finally got it together and it went very smoothly. I love making things in a modular way. Making each section then putting those sections together. Simple, no fancy flips and turns really. I love the nautical theme print too! There are tiny little anchors on the red section.

I decided that I should take it for a test drive to see how it felt and if I liked all the decisions I made. The only critiques I had were to make the strap a bit longer or make it adjustable, and divide the inner pocket. I kept getting my wallet stuck on the inner pocket because it likes to hang out in the middle of the bag instead of staying close to the side. Its a gaper... like a whale swallowing krill, only it's a pocket trying to consume my wallet, which doesn't fit well in the pocket and makes you stay awkwardly long at the checkout counter....

I plan to have a few of these on my Etsy page soon! And maybe some mini wallets too! Comment if you like em and it might inspire me to whip a few together! I would love to hear your ideas as well! I'm incubating some more apron ideas too....I HAVE to use the nice ruffling foot aunty Jane got for me :)

In that picture at the top you will also see a little Mini Card Wallet. The lovely Stacey had a dream that I should make her a little wallet that would hold her credit cards, because her super cool metal one can't quite fit them all. So I made her one with some stiff material in the middle and it didn't quite turn out how I wanted but Stacey seemed to like it. So me being me I had to make one more to get it right. So there it is!!

This is the cutest thing EVAR! And SUPER EASY! I got a job baby sitting for a wonderful family and mom Kelly asked me if I would make a book sling for Lindsey's room and I got really excited and I had the PERFECT fabric in my own stash so she didn't even have to go shopping! I LOVE IT, I'm totally making one for Dorian and I. We have lots of books and if you end up in the corner spot on the bed you have to play steam roller or tractor to crawl to the end of the bed or roll over the other person. I think I will add a pocket for highlighters....we are compulsive book doodlers.

(if you want to know how to make one let me know!)

This is my rendition of the full moon a few nights ago. We were working out and I HAADD to go grab my camera. The clouds were dancing around the moon it was so beautiful, but my cameral is incapable of capturing as I saw it. I had to combine two pictures to get both the clouds and the moon to be properly exposed. ...and I may have fiddled with the clouds a bit :) I like it. The clouds seem to be cradling the moon in its hands, feeling the light through their wispy palms.

Just a few things I've been up to besides baby sitting and gardening!

Lots of love! ❤

L

It was a warm day....and there were transplants at the Seed Store....

2011-02-22T11:45:00.000-06:00

Can you blame us? It was a gorgeous sunny day in the 70s and the seed store said they had strawberries and rosemary.... So we went and came back with not only strawberries and rosemary but a ton of romaine and a few red lettuces! So we went to town on one of our smaller beds. With a slight bit of organization, and a bit more intuition we started plopping the plants in. Dig a little hole, add a handful of composted cow poopoos and tuck em in!

We used some companion planting techniques I learned in the book, "Carrots Love Tomatoes". Essentially there are some plants that when planted together benefit each other. Like in our bed, members of the cabbage family, get along with spinach and lettuce, and benefit from onions because the onion's aroma keeps the aphids at bay. Our bed also contains a two strawberries, who like to hang out with spinach! Diversity is the spice of life... and apparently very beneficial!

And then there is this bugger! Natalie, one our friends beautiful children brought it over to us. She said if she planted it and took a picture with it when it was big that she could get a $1000 scholarship! And she wanted to plant it in our garden! I was so excited that she thought of us when her teacher talked about the plants! Her O.S. Cross cabbage makes 30-50lb heads!!! Hopefully we can keep it alive and happy! If you can see there is a baby in the picture on the tag next to the giant head of cabbage....this thing is going to be huge if all goes well!
I asked Chris and Paige (Natalies' parents) what they were going to do with 50lbs of cabbage, we decided we would use it like an atlas stone, which might looks something like this only instead of that really heavy cement stone it would be a cabbage.... I feel a Lonnie Video coming on.....

OK gotta go out back and fashion some sweet pea trellises and chuck some poppy seeds around to see if they will come up! And check on the lettuce to see if it has been blown out of its bed yet...it was super windy yesterday! There may be some interpretive garden dancing too.

OH we watched a super 70s awesome film called The Secret Life Of Plants. If any of you have netflix, and enjoy time lapse video, Stevie Wonder, polygraphs, and science I highly recommend its an instant play! Also very interesting....it speaks about plant consciousness... c'mon it cant be any worse than the crap they show on the news.....i know you are intrigued why polygraphs are in there hehehe

Lots of love and warm weather wishes!!

xoxo

Big Garden Changes in Less Than a Week!

2011-02-13T10:40:00.001-06:00

Our 'mid leafing' shot

We sat outside eating breakfast in the sunshine one mornoon( we tend to sleep in so we eat breakfast around 11 sometimes haha!) looking at our straw covered beds. Dorian wasn't too convinced anything would really grow in the straw. We, after all, have only experienced plants grown in dirt, so the straw is a bit of a foreign concept. I started poking around and found a surprise! Straw was growing in the straw! So our passions were re-ignited! We shifted back into "bulk materials collection mode".

We had used much of our straw and needed some more bulk material to lay down... so we headed off in search of leaves! According to the books I read on sheet mulching the leaves are supposed to be chopped up, but it also says that sheet mulching is very forgiving, so we just went for whole leaves!

The 'leafing' is finished!

We poked around a neighboring subdivision on super bowl sunday and decided to rake an empty lot! We chatted with the neighbors that walked past (who were harassing me that I wasn't watching the game...hahah), picked up some trash, recycling, and about five bags of leaves that we packed into my truck. Dorian also picked up an obsession with collecting bricks to border the beds in. The beds look much cleaner and more organized, but we still need a bunch more bricks! We found a gold mine of bricks in some old empty lots with houses that had been demolished. The Truckalier was looking more like it was fully equipped with hydraulics and they were set to looowww! (cue "Low Rider" song, doot doot doot doot doot doot doot, doot doot doot doot dooooooot!)

On Tuesday we went on some more adventures looking for bricks, after we got some letter stencils so Dorian could make a personal training sign for the front yard. We were tooling around good ole fayetteville, as we stopped at a light eagle eye (yours truly) spotted some bags of leaves! HA! Perfect, we didn't even have to rake them! We stopped by the house and they had a table there too! I had mentioned a day or two ago that we needed an outdoor table to have some space to do seeding and transplanting. It was so amazing, our brick hunt had turned into finding the perfect table and more bags of leaves than we knew what do do with! Yet another example of how life unfolds perfectly :)

We had eyed up some awesome composted mulch at our local yard waste facility, but as you know a bulldozer load of composted mulch probably won't fit very well in my Chevy Truckalier....(remember this??) We felt a little frustrated and unequipped, and antsy, wanting to get our beds ready.

Recently I had a family contact me about baby sitting (don't worry this actually relates I'm not going on a tangent....). They live really close so its very convenient and the family is so sweet! I happened to mention to the father that we were trying to get large amounts of mulch into our back yard and he immediately offered his truck and help!! I've only met these people for a total of about 3 hours! He let me know that Friday the 18th he didn't have to work and would have time to help us out! (Ok this whole unfolding life things is getting a bit blatant.....These people first SEEK me out, provide me with a wonderful job, and then offer to help us haul a bunch of compost!!??)

Dorian it looks like you are planting nothing...

AH! ok, Yellow Wonder Wild Strawberry seeds! So tiny!

We were hoping to have the mulch a bit sooner but decided that we could look for bricks, and start some seeds in the mean time. We started a bunch of seeds on Friday afternoon, and let the broccoli, cauliflower and spinach out of the greenhouse to bask in the unadulterated rays of the sun for a bit, we were thinking about leaving them outside for the night (they are getting big!). At about 10 or 11 pm Dorian asked me if we had zipped up the greenhouse.......I couldn't remember.......I was feeling confident about our little seedlings and their outdoor adventure, but I checked the weather anyway. EEEK! It was supposed to get to 29 degrees! I ran outside picked up the frosty seedlings, got them back into our chilly greenhouse (which was left unzipped, gar!) and figured that we probably had just killed them...

Red and Yellowish Onions and Ground Cherries!

Peppers!!! Hot and sweet!

We awoke early on Saturday morning to check on our frost victims. Dorian reported they were still frozen and so was the soil in the trays we had just planted....ruh roh.... Since we were awake at such an early hour we decided to get our morning 1 hour meditation in and eat breakfast at breakfast time!

Almost as soon as our sit was done my phone rang. (this was surprising itself because of my reliance on texting) It was the people I started to baby sit for. I answered and it was the father, he said he would have time today to haul some mulch for us!! (Ok again...the unfolding of life and its synchronistic qualities..... is this becoming more obvious to you too??) So we tossed on some workin' clothes and drank our breakfast (Dorian sometimes prefers drinking his meals in the form of milk, bananas, apple, peanut butter, cinnamon, and oats in a blender...haha!) and headed over to get a bulldozer load of mulch!

Dorian watering the leaves....so they don't blow away!
"Bella, what do you have? DROP IT! Stop eating dirt!"

We had a nice full load of mulch for just $10! The unloading was the fun part. We have no wheel barrow.... We had cleverly dumped each load onto a tarp and carried it across the lawn and dropped it onto the beds. Woof! We had gotten about half the garden covered and said good bye to the boys, they were in need of lunch and getting ready for the circus later that day!

We were excited and wanted to finish what we started. We had heard that our other friend was in town this weekend and we may be able to use his truck, and as luck would have it, he was headed over to work out! And sure enough he brought his truck, and we had a bunch of other people over at our garage gym that were going to keep those guys busy for a while. Just enough time for us to get a load of compost! (seriously.... do I even have to say it again? I will, synchronistic unfolding!)

Yay! All finished! There's one of our helpers too! Thanks!

Ta daaaaa! We got another truckload of composted trees, and finished up the beds! It was a lot of work, hauling tarp-loads of composted trees around the yard but it looks GREAT! I hope our plants appreciate it!

Thank you SOOO MUCH to our friends for their help and use of their trucks! We appreciate it beyond comprehension, we couldn't have done it without you! Be prepared, hopefully we have some garden skills and will be sharing our bounty with you!

I will leave you with this:

Nice mustache Farmer D.....

Lots of love, happy thoughts, and dirty fingernails!

xoxo L

Vipassana Cliff Notes

2011-02-07T18:54:00.000-06:00

I decided that my last post was ridinkypants, as in wayyyy too long! Sorry about that! I will now put together some of my favorite points for you. If you are at all interested in seeing a bit of what I did please netflix or check out The Dhamma Brothers Dorian and I watched it the other night and it was wonderful.

Now for the favorite insights and quotes:

Observe Objectively.
Observe Respiration and Sensation.
Remain Equanimous. (balanced and calm)
EVERYTHING is subject to the law of Dhamma (nature)
EVERYTHING is IMPERMANENT "anicca, annica, annica" [pronounced ah nee chay] (ever notice how things claiming to be perminent are not i.e. permanent markers and permanent hair color!!?? yeah... I know)
The four Noble Truths:

the fact of suffering
the origin of suffering (craving)
the cessation of suffering
the path leading to the cessation of suffering

YOU are 100% responsible for your reactions and emotional well being.
The 3 roots of all mental defilements

craving
aversion
ignorance

The following are some of the things that really stuck with me:

Our minds like to live in the past and the future. Times that don't exist. It's obvious that the future doesn't exist and the past has already happened. Vipassana is meant to break our minds of those conditioned habits, to teach us to live in the now. The now is the only time anything ever happens in.
Planting a seed of anger in yourself will sprout a plant of anger. This plant will then produce the fruit of anger. The fruit contain many many more seeds than the single seed that was planted. Then those seeds are planted and thus begins the process of multiplication of anger.
Negative actions by yourself means you had to plant a seed of anger within yourself to grow and multiply in order to give that negative reaction to someone else. And you have thus created a deep saṅkhāra [reaction/mental conditioning] within YOU.
Just as if someone brings you a gift and you do not accept, the gift stays with that person. So too with negativity. You can choose to NOT accept that person's gift of negativity and it will stay with them.
"The secret to success is continuity of practice"

This last statement carries so much truth. It is easy to be calm and equanimous from the meditation cushion, much more difficult amongst others.

I have had a difficult transition. I felt I understood the practice and did well while at the Vipassana center, where we sat for 10 hours a day. Now back here in a town that I tend to have a distaste for, it has become challenging to sit for two hours a day. Luckily I have Dorian to sit with, and I have started to realize how important those two hours are. If I am able to be happy that happiness is very easily shared with others. Which is in all honestly all I ever really wanted to be....cue tangent:

What do you want to be when you grow up?

I was in middle school and we were doing all of those fun 'career' testings, projecting what we would be good at in the future. [looking back at this it seems really ridiculous...I was maybe 12 years old and half and half of my lifetime I probably don't remember...] I remember having a really hard time with them. I never knew what I wanted to be when I grew up. It seemed to change on a whim.... After a while I realized that these career testing things were useless for me. It really didn't matter what I did, just as long as I was HAPPY. Since then I have always told people that I wanted to be happy when I grew up. Now having gone thru Vipassana everything just makes a lot more sense.

Well anyway, now I can't really remember where I was at before this tangent took place so I will leave you with this.

May you share my love, my peace, my harmony and my liberation.

Smiles happiness and metta ❤

Wonderful Vipassana! Observe your breath and focus this is a long one!

2011-02-01T13:54:00.002-06:00

Of COURSE during my 10 day Vipassana course I was contemplating what I would write you all...Then I thought, "i have no use for this now, i must learn the technique now!" or else I would have nothing to tell but that I was thinking about what to tell you the whole time..... and that wouldn't be a very informative post.

This statement is actually very accurate of the teachings of Vipassana. You have to be present experiencing reality as it is, without your mind constructing and reacting to things, because you will miss what is actually happening in reality.

The course is taught by S. N. Goenka on video/audio. There are also assistant teachers present for the course to answer questions and check in with you.

I'll add a list of glossary terms too, such wonderful Pali words. (Pali is the language at the time of the Buddha, it's mostly a dead language at this point but resembles Sanskrit) Do not take any of this as a teaching, if you are very interested in this I insist that you check out the Vipassana site and sign up for a 10 day course it's the best and only way to truly understand the technique. This is just what happened in my personal experience and should have no comparison to anyone else's experience. We all have our own path of dhamma, no two walk the same path.

I apologize in advance for errors and an incoherence.... ask lots of questions! ❤

The Timetable

4 am

I wake up to get into the Dhamma hall for the 4:30 am meditation. I practiced Anapana and observed respiration while sitting cross legged. We were allowed to shift positions when we became uncomfortable. There was usually chanting by S. N. Goenka to start off or end or both start and end this meditation. The chanting was to introduce good vibrations to the room and were encouraging descriptions recited in Pali.

6:30 am - 8 am

Breakfast of oatmeal and stewed prunes, cereals, yogurt and fruit. Then we could head back to our rooms for rest or shower still continuously observing respiration.

8 am - 9 am

Group mediation in the hall

9 am - 11 am

Instructions are given as to whom (old vs new students) will stay and meditate with the teachers and whom may go to mediate at their residential quarters. I usually stayed.

11 am - 12 pm

Lunch. Vegetarian meals with salad and fruit.

12 pm - 1 pm

Rest time or if you signed up for an interview with the teacher you waited for your turn. I took rest or walked around outside.

1 pm - 2:30 pm

Meditate in the hall or your room.

2:30 pm - 3:30 pm

Group meditation in the hall.

3:30 pm - 5 pm

Meditate in the hall or your room according to teacher instruction.

5 pm - 6 pm

Tea break. We got fruit and tea for dinner.

6 pm - 7 pm

Group Meditation in the hall.

7 pm - 8:15 pm

Teacher's discourse where we watched S. N. Goenka on video explain the technique and give stories.

8:15 pm - 9 pm

Group Meditation in the hall.

9 pm - 9:30 pm

You could stay and ask questions of the assistant teachers if you had them or retire to your room. I usually headed back to my room.

Pre Course

I arrived at the Southeast Vipassana Center in Jesup, GA round about 2:30 pm. Yea sounds about right for GA....( I get a kick out of the back country sound of the word Jesup :) especially when pronounced with a southern accent) The center was down a dirt road which in my opinion is always good. I wasn't sure if we were able to talk to people (I apparently took the instructions very literally and seriously!) but upon arriving in the registration building we were allowed to talk. I was assigned a bunk and moved my things in and surrendered my contraband: keys, phones, listening things, books etc. I was actually pleased to hand them over and excited, there was no doubt in my mind that I would be wanting to leave.

The location was beautiful, there was a pond and nature walking paths. The men and women were separated once the course began which was later this evening.

We had dinner and an orientation about how everything is run, like showers during rest times, a little about the Noble Silence vow we were going to take and staying in course boundaries. With that we headed to the Dhamma hall to be assigned our meditation cushions. I was so excited and ready for silence.

We got in the Dhamma hall and watched a video of S. N. Goenka who explained the five precepts we were going to take and why they were important.

To Abstain from:

1 killing any being

2 stealing

3 all sexual activity

4 telling lies

5 all intoxicants

We also took the vow of Noble Silence which was very very important. Noble Silence is silence of the body, speech and mind. Any form of communication between students is prohibited such as: gestures, sign language, written notes, etc. Basically we stared at everyone's feet, tried not to make eye contact. I couldn't help myself though, I watched people....You could get such a wonderful sense for people in silence just from how they carried themselves. Throughout the course I could feel which people were struggling.

The Course

The first three days we studied the Anapana technique which involves you objectively observing your respiration thru your nose. We were then instructed to focus down to the area below the nostrils and above the upper lip and focus on the sensation there of the air moving past or any other type of sensation, and as always observe OBJECTIVELY, meaning without a reaction.

I felt a kind of tingling or pulsating feeling that would appear in different areas. Sometimes I could feel the gentle breath passing over the area right below my nostrils. I think this may have been one of the days I struggled to keep focused, I felt tired and was head bobbing and mind wandering. Luckily at one point our assistant teacher announced, "STAY ALERT, STAY ALERT" shattering the dull hum in the hall frightening me awake for a bit. I may have headed back to my room at one point to give my knees a break, so I sat on the edge of my bed and continued the practice which helped (on this day). We were allowed about 5 minute breaks between hours to get up and stretch.

I was a bit frustrated because of perceived 'poor' mediation and that I wasn't able to stay alert and focused, but during the discourse I realized that that tired feeling wasn't a feeling at all. It was my mind whispering, "oh, I'm so tired it would be nice to go lay down. I did not sleep well last night I should take a nap. This is sooo boring!" I was without realizing convincing myself I was tired and distracting my attention from practicing. I felt better knowing this truth and my mind felt sharper better able to catch the lazy wandering habits of my mind.

This Anapana stage works as a whetstone, to sharpen your mind to its ingrained habits of distracting you from experiencing the real present moment. My mind likes to wander and explore creative endeavors and rehash the past and project into the future.

S. N. Goenka explains the habit patterns of our minds live only in the past and the future. Learning these meditation techniques helps you bring your mind to the present reality and into peace and liberation.

Day four was Vipassana day, half the day we practiced anapana then in the afternoon we learned the Vipassana technique. This technique to put it very shortly and while leaving out a ton of important info: you begin to observe sensations throughout the body starting at the top of your head and moving part by part down your body to the tips of your toes. We are also told that there will be three one hour sittings from now on that will be sittings of strong determination or adhiṭṭhāna. Meaning we will not be able to open our eyes, hands, or legs for one hour. This isn't a means of torture but to practice remaining equanimous and balanced in the face of what your mind perceives as "pain" and associates a negative feeling toward as well as adding to our virtues or pāramīs. Because essentially that pain is only a sensation, our minds just construct a negative reaction to it. This too goes for positive feelings, we should not become attached to them and crave them.

Two of the five hindrances I remember very well are kāmacchanda--craving and vyāpāda--aversion. To me they are like positive and negative, wanting for good and aversion to bad.

While we learned the technique I chose to not move. I ended up sitting rather still only moving to straighten my back or tip my head for an hour and a half. I was having extreme intense pain in my knees and lower legs, they were pounding and frozen and on fire and numb all at the same time. There were definitely times my mind told me to move my legs but I was able to stay put. Because I remembered anicca—impermanence, that EVERYTHING is impermanent and constantly changing. So too this feeling would arise and pass away, the feeling itself was not solid but moving pulsating arising, getting stronger and then a break. It was so beautiful to observe this sensation as it was instead of breaking down into screams of pain which magnify and intensify the pain.

This day was good, all days were good, all days were constantly changing and challenging.

Day six: this was one day Goenka said people are prone to 'run away.' I could understand why. I struggled. I woke up already my mind was not wanting to go and meditate. I took some deep breaths and headed to the hall where, I struggled for hours, it seemed my mind was wandering more than previous and I couldn't keep track of it. I felt frustrated, I was out of balance, tipping in the way of negativity. I was very relieved by the breaks during the day, I tried moving to my room for a change to see if that would help. it didn't. I tried to remember my instructions but I resented the voice of Goenka a bit...I was feeling grumpy. My mind convinced me I was grumpy and that some external circumstance had made me grumpy. No, no environmental circumstance is the cause of dukka--suffering. I knew the trouble was my doing, it was due to my thoughts, my reactions to my thoughts. The discourse that night helped clarify and re-energize me for the next day.

Day seven: this day I felt a little more inspired, the days seemed to pick up pace, ha the numbers were nearing ten! I had to make sure I wasn’t trying to focus on the future and keep my head in my practice.

Day eight: Goenka had told us the night before that we had only two more days to work seriously. This was one of them. Knowing this helped me stay focused and do serious hard work. One of the more difficult thoughts to come in my head was time….when will this be done…I hope Goenka starts chanting soon. I think this feeling was compounded by the fact that I had a lingering pounding feeling in my head and by the evening sit it was migraine-al, including subtle waves of nausea. I focused on the feeling when I was surveying my head but when I was on other parts of my body I focused hard on that part and the migraine feeling subdued a bit, I also focused on my breath which was a bit irregular and kept hoping to hear Goenka. There was a certain phrase Goenka would say that basically signified the meditation was coming to an end. Though it took me till about the sixth day to figure out the cue phrase and what it meant. Bhavatu sabba maṅgalaṃ—May all beings be happy! Then we could respond if we liked with, sādhu, sādhu, sādhu—well said, well done; we agree we share this wish. And I did :).

Day nine: Very wonderful!! Our last serious work day we continued with Vipassana and learned either this day or the day before to sweep from the top of our head and simultaneously and symmetrically arms legs etc down to our toes then back up in the same manner. I got this really well on my extremities but lacked sensation on my trunk. So then after a couple sweeps you keep going part by part to try to open up the blind spots.

Day ten: Mettā day!

This day we learned how to share mettā which is selfless love. We focused on the subtle sensations throughout our bodies and filled our bodies and minds with thoughts of love and goodwill to others. We were then released from our Noble silence. I was very hesitant to talk at the beginning. Most people got up to see the mettā day display, I stayed in the Dhamma hall until the lunch bell rang, I was having a productive sit and didn’t want to stop. After the bell rang my roommate said hello and it was over! Time to chatter! Noble chatter of course! This day was full of laughter, sharing of experiences, yummy food and healing from our deep operations we had performed on our minds. At the next meditation my forehead flutterd and popped with thumping pressure and I experienced flashing lights when I closed my eyes. The talking and chatter had overstimulated. It settled after a bit and I fell right into Vipassana. We then practiced a bit of mettā at the end, I could only hold it for a couple minutes so then I went back to anapana. The same thing happened later, I came in with lots of energy and it showed up as a popcorn feeling in my frontal lobe and eyeballs. It was a good healing day. Later that night though we were to refrain from touching each other I got a haircut….a much needed haircut from wonderful Tye! We stayed up a bit late and filled our hearts with love and shared stories of life it was beautiful. And we did the majority of our cleaning. We all had trouble falling asleep…but managed a few hours before the 4 am wake up bell.

Day Eleven: Our last day, so exciting! I was pleased to know I would be heading back to hug Dorian and pet little Bella Sue. I kept my focus though and knew it would come in time. I was also very excited that I had a buddy for my ride home, Fauna. Fauna’s friend whom had brought her down to the center from Charlotte had left on the first day!(that had to have an effect on her mind all ten days!) So I told her I would bring her home, we worked it out so that her friend would meet us and take her from basically my place to back to Charlotte. We had a wonderful long talk and exchanged much information. The 6 hour ride went by very quickly with such wonderful company! The driving was a little too much to handle….Fauna had the job of reading the signs…I could not comprehend... too much stimuli after being in a dimly lit Dhamma hall for ten days!

Dorian had left me a lovely message on my phone welcoming me back to the ‘real world’ though he said maybe he should have called it the ‘fake world’ hah. Well, I finally made it home and got my hugs and wished Dorian a happy birthday! I felt exhausted! I shuffled around wearily and got to sitting. After our last discourse earlier in the day and talking with Fauna I realized I had been visualizing while I was meditating, which isn’t neccisarrily bad meditation but not in line with vipassana. So I had to stop the visualizations, I had thought visualizations applied only to religious symbols or shapes, but no it was all visualizations. I had been visualizing my body and a band of light passing over it….still not good. Needless to say, I was tired and really just wanted to sleep so the sit didn’t go well, I was cross. It was difficult to not visualize, a very strong habit of mine from being an artist. I build up and take things apart in my head, dream up artwork and solve sewing situations. My mind habits appeared strong but I made it!

I have decided to rid myself of the visualizations I should head back to anapana and re-sharpen my tool. I am pleased, I feel calm and peaceful. It's a wonderful feeling, I hope you may feel it too. I hope you have lots of questions!! Leave comments and I will do my best to answer them. May you share my happiness, peace and love!

Bhavatu sabba maṅgalaṃ!

Glossary and some of my other favorite terms (I'll give you my best guess at pronunciation)

Dhamma [damma]: the law of nature; the teaching of an enlightened person; the way to liberation

Buddha [booda]: anyone who is fully enlightened

Adhiṭṭhāna [ahhditaana]: strong determination

Mettā [metta]: selfless love

Anicca [aneechay]: impermanence

Saṅgha [sahngha]: anyone who has practiced Dhamma and has become a pure-minded, saintly person

Bhavatu sabba maṅgalaṃ [buhwadu sawa mangalam]: May all beings be happy!

Three Trainings:

Sīla [sheela]: morality

Samādhi [samadi]: concentration, mastery of the mind

Paññā [panya]: wisdom, insight that purifies the mind

more synchronistic happynings

2011-01-16T19:26:00.000-06:00

Wow. I am really at a loss for words which is a wonderful feeling. Some important things happened this weekend. I watched a life changing documentary, found clarity in my life and mind, and the universe figured out my heart and mind are ready....to do nothing but observe my breath.

Maybe a month ago I signed up for a Vipassana meditation course, which had a very long waiting list for females. (Dorian and I both signed up) I signed up knowing that D had participated in one before and told me it was one of the most challenging things he'd ever done. As I sent the application my silly mind thought, "eh...you basically have a snowball's chance in hell at getting into this one." So I wasn't too concerned with it. The Center had sent me emails saying that Feb would be a better time to get on a waiting list, but Feb didn't work out so well with our gardening plans. Around Christmas I got an email asking if I wished to stay on the waiting list, so I pondered, and agreed to stay on.

Now, as in TODAY I received an email saying that I have been accepted! My heart RACED, I felt nervous, my ego kicked in and made me think that this maybe I won't be able to complete the course. I just felt my heart nervously beating in response to my my mind's noise. My hands were trembling from the shock and surprise. If I accept, I have to leave in 3 days!

I talked with D a bit more and watched a video made by the teacher of the course S N Goenka, which settled me and brought about a sense of calm and happiness. So that was it, I confirmed my application right afterward and still feel calm and confident that this is what I need to be doing in my life right now. Wow, I have to leave on Wednesday for the course! Luckily the universe hasn't given me a job!! Life just seems to unfold and you can either fight it or accept and enjoy :)

I will be on complete communication silence from 1/19/11 to 1/30/11.

Don't know what Vipassana is? Click here to learn more.

With a full heart

xoxo

Sheet mulch, sheet mulch, dirty wormy fun mulch!

2011-01-10T12:54:00.000-06:00

Hooray! We have begun our sheet mulch!! (two great resources about sheet mulching: Gaia’s Garden: A Guide to Homescale Permaculture and Lasagna Gardening)

After acquiring the amazing mulch complex (sort of like the sixth sense but instead of seeing dead people you see lots of free sources of sheet mulch) and stacking straw bales, cardboard boxes and newspaper sky high, along with some soil amendments. It was finally time to lay it all out. Oddly enough we started late in the afternoon of the Winter Solstice/Full Moon/Total Lunar Eclipse!! Definitely a good omen!

Here’s what we did:

Step One

Drawing Board

The very first step we did was draw up a garden plan. I made a sketch of the backyard and the areas where things were, what spots were shady at certain times of day and where water might collect in pools etc. We also marked out where we administered a couple pH tests and where soil samples were taken from.

In the Yard

We began by using a rake and scratching out all of the pathways that we were going to be walking on, so essentially what didn’t need to be mulched. We wanted to make sure we weren’t wasting materials on an area that didn’t really need them. (hey, when you don’t have a job its your job to be frugal!) From our pH test we found that our soil was very acid so we sprinkled on palletized lime to neutralize the acid. We also raked on a thin layer of Black Kow composted cow manure. The sheet mulch recipe called for a thin layer of hi-Nitrogen material.

Well you can't discern much from this picture but trust me
I raked in some compost!

Step Two

In the Yard

Cardboard time! We began to lay out the cardboard overlapping edges by about 6 inches to prevent the grass/weeds from popping thru. We also covered other gaps (our boxes had holes for handles) with the newspaper and wetted it all down. (TIP: work like you are painting a floor, so you try not to step on the work you just did, and don’t paint yourself into a corner!)

D is wetting down the cardboard so it stops blowing
away!

Step Three

In the Yard

Another thin layer of Black Kow or any hi-Nitrogen material. We also added a peat moss to the section with the white bag in front of it just for a little more material. Also included in step three was chasing Bella Sue around on and off the cardboard as she collected poo poo on her paws and seemed to be magically inspired by the sprinkling water to tear around at mach 12 on the boxes, avoiding use of the paths and becoming more excited when we told her to get off and thus perpetuating the poo poo paws circle. (it was really hilarious to watch!)

Cow Poo Poos on the cardboard!

Step Four

In the Yard

Straw fun time! We got to tear apart our straw bales into one or two inch “books” (because obviously when the worms come up they need something to read!) watered as we went (to the wrung out sponge consistency, or at least as best we could tell in the dark with chilly fingers!) then came back with another layer. All of our straw bales weren’t baled really well so some areas were more fluffy.

Our compost is magical, that's why it's blue. tee hee
(its right there near the free broken red shovel we found)

Good girl Bella Sue! ...this time.... :)

We are going to go to our local yard waste facility and borrow some very sweet friends' truck and pick up some loads of topsoil and mulch to finish it off although I think we just want top soil because we just covered all ours up! It is much cheaper than buying bags and bags of stuff though and we need a bit more material to get to the 18-24" mark, so topsoil and wood chip mulch it is! $10 a truckload sounds pretty appealing.

xoxo!

The Winner is.....

2011-01-08T19:14:00.000-06:00

You might notice that I am missing about 4 names from the list, Mr. Dorian admitted to me that he had "planted" the first four names! How sweet...Booger!

So it looks like a lucky four of you! Two L's and two R's....who will be the winner.

I had some help picking the winner from Bella Sue. I cut up the paper and folded them up and my original idea was to have Bella sniff the selections and whichever one stuck to her beard would be the winner. Bella had a different idea, she decided to EAT the winner!

We had to do a two person extraction to get this one back!

Congratulations Renee!!

I hope you enjoy the garland!!

Thank you SOOO much to all of you who entered! I really appreciate you stopping by!

Lots of love to you all!

GIVEAWAY!!!

2011-01-06T12:10:00.004-06:00

Free stuff, free stuff, That's right!

~~ENTER TO WIN BY:~~
~~Leaving a comment below!~~

It's that simple and you could be the winner of this fun little felt garland!

These cute little tropical colored felt circles are hand sewn with a blanket stitch and then strung together with loops on both ends.

It measures about ten and a half feet long, great for mantles or windows or whatever you can think of!

GIVEAWAY ENDS:
on Saturday January 8th at 8:00 EST!

I'll post the winner around 8:30!

Good Luck.

much love!

What happens in the greenhouse......

2011-01-03T19:22:00.000-06:00

Dorian diligently working....as I run around with my camera and giggle

Yeah, I couldn't come up with a funny mockery of the "What happens in Vegas" tag-line because what happens in our greenhouse is for everyone to see!!

You wanna know what's inside??? SPROUTS!! AND DORIAN!!! Those tiny plants had a rough start, remember the greenhouse mini disaster!? They took a tumble in a windstorm but they did what seeds do and they grew, we just won’t know what they are until they are bigger. (seeds are so freaking cool....don't even get me started on plants)

We left the little sprouts in the germinating flat a bit too long, but we went on transplanting into the six pack cells so they can stretch those roots out. Most of the sprouts are broccoli or cauliflower and we have about a half dozen spinach that made it.

You may be asking yourself what in the name of the great green earth are you planting seeds in the middle of winter? Eh, I guess you can just chalk it up to an experiment, we wanted to see what would happen and even if it would stay warm enough in our greenhouse. So far it has!

We lost a few when we left them unattended over Christmas (they got crispied) but the others are going strong!

These pictures were taken a couple weeks back on transplanting day.

Oooh...open it open it!!

Hehe, Bella Sue is checking in on Uncle Dorian
to make sure he will come and play soon.

Sproutlings!! Reach for the sky!! or at least your plastic dome!

I am getting so excited to have a big garden in the back yard! Excited doesn't even begin to describe it. It's like when you see a dog that is just SOOOO cute it makes your head want to explode, yeah that excited.

Online seed stores have been the target of my internetting. Dorian had to rein me in on the flowers (but I still went to another site and went flower gaga and just selected whichever ones tickled my fancy!) Ok, I had to reign myself in a bit too but all together we ordered nearly $200 of seeds! Yayhoo! Check out the final list (plus some that we had from earlier)

Go plant some seeds!!

Leave a comment if you are thinking about starting a garden and let me know what you want to grow!

With love and dirt under my nails!

xoxo

the space in the clouds

2010-12-30T22:11:00.001-06:00

I have always loved how the rays of the sun can be seen dancing among the spaces in the clouds.

It's sometimes hard to remember that space is such an important thing.

The rays would be invisible if there were no space in the clouds.

Space

This physical space is just a signpost pointing to the realization that space needs to be made not only in my physical world but more imperatively in my mind.

Minds like to hang on to many images, thoughts, clutter of the past and future.

It's time to make space.

This space, this openness leads to stillness.

In this stillness I can FEEL the life around me.

I can FEEL with my heart.

There aren't any problems.

Only moments constantly renewing, never past, never future.

Life as it is happening.

In the space I've made Love, Compassion, and Joy move through it and it can be shared.

With you.

with love xo

Business Card Update....Update....

2010-12-18T16:04:00.000-06:00

So, I feel a little silly, as thought my previous post was in haste and I wasn't patient enough.... I would like to say THANKS to Google for giving me access to my thewildcucumber@gmail.com address back!! yay!!

For all of your custom hand sewn, knitted, painted, photograph needs you can reach me at:

thewildcucumber@gmail.com

iamthewildcucumber@gmail.com

Hope to hear from you soon!!

This wasn't at all confusing was it?? (hee hee)

Business Card Update

2010-12-14T10:23:00.001-06:00

So, remember those lovely business cards I designed about a month ago.....well.... I finally got them! And they look great except for one thing.....GOOGLE deactivated the email address printed on the back! I have no idea why either....500 business cards.... so with D's help it is now iamthewildcucumber@gmail.com! Google was trying to foil my plan but I shall persevere! maybe ill make a little tiny stamp that says iam and stamp them all! Not ideal but I am not about to be ripped off by vista print again....lol so if you want to contact me about my crafty handmades remember.... iamthewildcucumber@gmail.com <3 <3

just adds a touch-o-human ;)

Creativity comes from NO-MIND and thru the hands

2010-12-13T13:09:00.001-06:00

We have taken a cute little doggy named Bella Sue out on some walks in the afternoon. As we walk on the sunny side of the street the grass shadows on the edge of the sidewalk always catch my eye... Especially in the late day orange-gold sunshine that leaves shadows so blue...So through my eyes and into my hand comes this simple image. Too bad cameras are a little incapable at capturing images as I see them...

My hands have transformed the octopus's environment. So quiet, serene and deep. I've enjoyed gazing upon it. I find the colors very beautiful. It's so beautiful that I'm feeling a touch apprehensive about painting the octopus itself, but I think its time for it to transform as well!

Wonder what this could be...?? Leave a comment with your guess!

mmmm You may have noticed by now I see the world in colors! These ones look juicy and delicious I kinda want to lick them!!

Much love!! xoxoX

the soft light emanating from my window

2010-12-13T12:42:00.001-06:00

We hung a sheet up in our window. It lets such a lovely light into the room, I find myself staring at it. The soft glow puts everything in a beautiful dream like light. I've found myself staring quite a bit lately, at lights, out the window at my painting, my mind usually a buzz with thoughts. I just can't let the thoughts be, they've been a little overwhelming lately I've watched them flipping around like a T.V. racing thru channels, click click click click. I don't like how that makes me feel. It seems a familiar feeling though too, ripping at my projected sense of self. My mind is very self destructive. Everything outwardly is just as it should be, but the mind, takes and judges every little thing. Judges things I did (or didn't) things Dorian did (or didn't), things anything or anyone did or didn't do and tells me I don't measure up. I should go, I'm just in the way. I reacted in the wrong way. Not good enough.

But all of those things in my head are just that: in my head, situations invented by my mind to prevent me from living in the now, seeing the beauty in each moment, enjoying each button I press on the keyboard. They distract my attention or intention away from what is currently happening. My intuition has been clouded and masked by these streaming thoughts, but I can feel it in my heart just below the surface. Ready to re-emerge softly and kindly parting the thoughts, acknowledging them as what they are...imaginary. As my intuition grows in light an intensity, I am ready to break that conceptual sense of self and just live. I want to strengthen my intuition I want to be life.

Meet 'Bulby'. He's from my Senior show in College.
I love knobs :) This one's a two-hander!

Have you ever noticed the 'life' objects have? The way they command space, almost as if they are living. I find this easier to see in art but I can see it in most objects. They have a sense of life, not that they are living though if we get real technical for a moment, they are all made of atoms which are moving molecules! I remember during a critique in a ceramics class I took, having a hard time trying to explain why the object I was looking at was so beautiful. I could just feel it in my chest that it was beautiful. It had a commanding presence, a life to it. It seemed to be breathing in life and holding it in its belly. Full of breath! Breathing in all that life has to offer.

I'm making an agreement right now for every person who appears in my thoughts or I physically see, I want to make a conscious effort to send them peaceful loving thoughts. Everyone deserves love, everyone IS love. (maybe that's why it's so hard to describe, we ARE love)

Well, this one go a touch crazy some may think but thats just the crazy life is :)...

Sending joyful loving thoughts, and bidding peace of mind ;)
xo

"Thousands of candles can be lit from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared."
-Buddha

a bit-o-art

2010-12-07T14:59:00.000-06:00

We went out on a little adventure recently to visit a farm in which we could purchase some delicious cage free eggs. Winford Pond Farm was the place, and heritage chickens, geese and goats where the game! They were wonderful, fluffy little ochins, and beautiful roosters, and ADORABLE Nigerian Dwarf Goats....of which I did not photograph :( We did however stop on the side of the road and I snapped a few shots of this lovely old building. I seem to be attracted to photographing dilapidated things. They turned out beautifully.

Here we have the little Octopus, it's only in the under-painting stage. It will look completely different as a final product.

Just a couple of creative endeavors of late. Made a few aprons too, which may lead to my next post and a new addiction....

A 'mini' disaster!

2010-12-02T22:01:00.001-06:00

Back a night or two I was gazing out the window and noticed the sky looked a touch peeved, and appeared to be spitting in a misty way like when a two year old sticks their tongue out at you and blows sending a shower of saliva your direction. Was I going to be able to enjoy a thunderstorm??!! That was one thing I occasionally missed about the mid west while living in California, a good old wind whipping, downpour, lightening cracking good time! (tornadoes, however, were not missed) The thought excited me. But, alas, the sky seemed like something (or someone?) was coercing it to precipitate. Like a mother hovering, "well c'mon now. Don't just stand there, squeeze out a few drops now. There ya go your doing it, oop well now ya gat to give it a bit more now dear. It just doesn't seem like you're trying very hard. Give it another go now."(spoken in a nice midwestern accent don't ya know!) So I lay back down succumb to the fact that no storm was to happen tonight, only saliva (pthhhht!).

20 minutes later...

The clouds unzipped, and unleashed all they had! A deluge of rain and whipping winds! Weee! (insert wind and rain noises here)..... for about 25 seconds(wah wahhh). Eh I guess I was wrong, apologies for the underestimation, sky. (not about the thunder and lightening though! ha!)

Now for the disaster...

A couple weeks ago a lovely little portable greenhouse was set up in our backyard, by the two suburban farmers (Dorian and I...ay thank you!) in the hopes that we could start sprouting seeds come January to set out in the garden. We have also been getting a bit antsy so... we decided to experiment with a few cool weather crop seeds and see what would happen. (maybe they would combine in a strange chemical reaction and form a bucket of ooze that we could play with!) So we set up a flat with a few rows of seeds; spinach, cauliflower and broccoli, we then watered and waited. Until today. I went out this morning because our backyard faces the west (by west I mean south) and the house acts like a giant reflector, not like the foil kind that you use for sunbathing but a less shiny vinyl one, and toasts up our cement patio quite nicely. And I of course was freezing I can't help it, I'm prone to being a peoplecicle! I didn't find much respite there so I wandered over to our dinky little greenhouse (tee hee greenhouses are warm too!) and came upon the scene of the crime!

My 25 seconds of storm satisfaction delivered us splattered barely-sprouted seedlings, (storms are obviously are not pro-life! humpf!) disheveled shelves, and the pottery that once held my succulents lay shattered; succulents de-potted and strewn about the floor! CRAP! Well, in its defense our greenhouse is made of plastic and aluminum and may double as a kite if taken to the beach on a windy day... We had used some metal stakes and a 40 pound bag of lime to try to hold it down, unfortunately they were a bit ill placed... Oops!

I shoveled the seedlings and soil back into its home and we hopefully (cross your fingers... seriously look at the thing, it totally has kite tendencies!) found a new more storm-worthy home for our little greenhouse.

The Carnage

I had cleaned it up at this point, I can't lie, the pottery was staged. (Thanks D :)) But my poor succulent 'tree' is sadly leaning against the fan.

Kindness of Strangers

2010-11-27T16:31:00.000-06:00

I am in AWE today. All due to a stranger.

As most of you know Dorian and I have moved from glorious California to North Carolina to live with his brother Sean and Sean's Girlfriend Stacey. We moved here not only to live with these two wonderful people but to start our own garden and perhaps infect a few people with the idea that growing your own food is an incredibly useful tool. (Not to mention delicious, rewarding, and way better for you!)

Now we have this glorious blank canvas of a garden that we get to have our way with. We decided to sheet mulch as much as we could. (find out more about sheet mulch here, or check out one of my new most favorite books Gaia's Garden: A Guide to Home-Scale Permaculture) Which means we need an absurd amount of cardboard/newspaper, straw, mulch and manure. As well as a boat load of lime as our pH test let us know our soil is 'very acid'.

With our budget of $0 we were excited for the challenge of "materials reconnaissance" (OH MY! My spell checker just let me know by NOT putting the red line under that word that I have spelled it correctly (side note - I am a terrible speller and am incredibly pleased with myself)). We started out asking newspaper companies for old copies and ended up with a 1.5 foot stack. The local library informed us that they have an internal recycling system, which means sad face for us. But never fear treasure (abandoned boxes) was to be had! We didn't even have to dig it up it was just laying around the neighborhood so we picked it up when we were out walking (we also found a shovel that was a little broken but would still dig holes! Even after these victories we still need much, much more.

Haulin' a load in my truck!

Next step, straw. ( Which is really what this post is about.) We could have purchased them for around $5 a bale, but that isn't much fun now is it? Right, so on many of our tours through our little maze of a community we had noticed that a few people had straw bales up for decorations! It being nearly Thanksgiving I had a inkling that perhaps these bales needed to be gotten rid of. Lucky them! I knew just the people who wanted them! After ringing a few doorbells and leaving some notes we ended up with about seven bales. One of those people that was so kind to give us three bales (seen here in our "truck") even offered to ask her friend about getting more! So we gave her a call today, she had said perhaps her friend had seven bales that we could have. She not only brought seven plus two bales she had gone to her friends' house picked them up and delivered them to us FOR FREE! All from a woman we didn't even know. It was such a sweet thing she did, she even said she might have more for us! (sighing in awe and total gratitude, I think this is a little wink and smile from our friend Karma! you reap what you sow! (pun intended!))

Yeah he is that strong!

It's when things like this happen that remind me why Dorian and I are meant to be here. To share in the human experience. The world is so full of kindness, consciousness and love; we all just have to remember it is in everyone.

Adjustments

2010-11-21T12:03:00.000-06:00

Well, we have arrived in North Carolina from California. My friends at REI thought I was a bit crazy for moving here, and when we got here I completely agreed. Fayetteville is a military town, kinda dirty, full of dispair and mustangs (this has begun to become a joke, each trip out we see how many we can count, i think around 20 is the number to beat), and most certainly absolutely nothing like northern California. ...sigh..

When we finally got the courage to venture out of the house (Dorian and I are road warriors, we slept only a handful of hours on our trek and we were in no rush to get back in our cars!) we were frightened to say the least. Organic food was very hard to find while in Nor Cal you could trip and fall on organic food! All of the stores look pretty run down, and our neighborhood is a suburban labyrinth! Luckily Stacey (Dorian's brother Sean's girlfriend) has the low down and let us know that there is a grocery store resembling Publix nearby. Harris Teeter! (really!? who came up with this name??) Who did have organic food and was a nice grocery store. (Food Lion=Scary Charlie C's even more so we hear....haven't been brave enough to enter yet...)

The whole town seemed to be in a state of depression on first glance. So we gave it another go, we went out looking for a local seed store to check them out. We found it and the people were lovely and helpful we also ended up taking a detour through downtown proper and it was cute! We felt relief, we no longer had so much animosity for Fayetteville! Though the first week brought about many thoughts of why in the HELL did I leave CA for THIS? I knew in my heart this is what we need to do. After a few more adventures (in the next few blogs) we realized we may be able to cultivate a wonderful growing community after all, our neighbors are so close and so many!

The house we are staying in is very beautiful annnd....We have a HUGE backyard for our GARDEN and Sean and Stacey are so excited for all the fresh vegetables they are going to have!!!

My new business cards!

2010-11-20T18:46:00.000-06:00

The title is really self explanatory... But yay! I spent around way too much time on these they better arrive as glorious as they look on my computer screen!

Cars are never too far from my lens!

2010-11-14T21:54:00.000-06:00

This one's for Papa. He HAS to be the reason why every time I catch a glimpse of a shiny classic car my eyes lock on and I get a touch of tunnel vision. The glittering chrome and lollypop bright paint jobs definitely demand a snap from my camera!

Fairhope, Alabama!!

2010-09-13T15:24:00.004-05:00

How could you not LOVE a place named Fairhope!!! And it is located on the lovely Mobile bay, you say?? Well I got to stay and play near Mobile bay!! (OK OK I took that one a little too far...) All I have to say is ADORABLE! Dorian said I would love it, and we are basically the same person so it's true I LOVE IT! They have the cutest downtown filled with wrought iron and neat storefronts even, a miniature french quarter. My absolute favorite part was the Fairhope Windmill Market! They are shooting to be the first LEED certified green building in ALABAMA!! (learn more about LEED here) Coming from CA made me realize that the green revolution is huge in CA but is lacking in many other areas! Which has become an exciting thought for Dorian and I. Stay tuned!

Here is just a little sample of the adorable town of Fairhope!

Check out Fairhope Here!

Hay is for Horses! (and other animals too!)

2010-09-09T15:44:00.000-05:00

Our new friends! These are some new friends that are visiting Dorian and the crew at Emandal- A Farm on a River. Bo, Sam and Sisco. Bo is very friendly Sisco and Sam are a touch camera shy. So Bo hammed it up for us!

Synchronistic PURPLE!!

2010-09-09T15:04:00.000-05:00

I was asked by a dear friend of Dorian's what colors I find myself drawn to. Purple was my answer, along with a few others like lime green and turquoise. But purple has been working it's way into my life recently. I never used to like purple especially pastel purples (which aren't my favorite shades), but recently I've found myself drawn to dark purples, plums, royal violets, any purple that is a cousin of black. Deep and rich.

Now for the exciting part. So one night as I was headed to borrow the local downtown internet in Santa Rosa I had this deep urge to stop at a gas station, my heart began to pick up its pace and the color purple whispered in my head. I really didn't want to stop so I continued downtown. Then after my internet extravaganza as a neared the gas station I could still feel a pull to stop there. So I pulled in.
Dorian and I had taken up buying $3 crossword scratch off tickets not really in the hopes that we would actually win (of course we wanted to win!) but more for the 1 minute of entertainment they provided and which we over dramatized! I entered the store and so as not to look like a compulsive scratch off ticket buyer I instead lurked around the store for 2 minutes before peeking thru the glass counter and seeing a purple striped Bingo scratch-off! That was the one! (I also managed to buy a teal crossword one tee hee)

I then found myself traveling off to see Dorian with my scratch offs in hand. When I finally saw him he had on his purple shirt, and I was wearing my purple tank top! (totally unplanned people we live 2 hours away from each other, and contrary to popular belief we do not plan to match....he barely has a phone to call me!)

So in our usual excessively dramatic way we scratched off the cards. The teal crossword was a bust, and the purple bingo card was looking that way too, until nearly the last scratch! BINGOOOOOOO!!!!! we won $50!! PURPLE PURPLE PURPLE!! Unfortunately I am unable to tell you the story with my eyeballs expanded to maximum proportions, with large and excited gestures... so you will have to imagine... might look something like this though...

Do any of you guys find yourself drawn to colors? Have you ever had an intuitive experience??

YAY ART!!

2010-08-03T00:55:00.004-05:00

Hey I made some art! Now it's time for show and tell!! or at least show! BOOM! There it is self portraits yep... all you need is a mirror! Oh yes even though I look perhaps near petrification in my charcoal drawing and that the length of my face is nearer a horse than a human I consider it a success!! I LOVED drawing the face, nose and mouth it's the spaces in between I have to work on.... there isn't much detail for me to work with so they are largely blank. I look rather disgusted in the charcoal form hah! Either way I am proud of myself, especially having had a chance to look back at my drawings from good 'ole Stout, I feel I have made improvements.

Now zee painting! I didn't feel I liked this one completely. There are definitely parts I enjoy like the lips and fingers. Uh, very yummy and full of color (which really is the only way to be!). So after some looking and squinting and turning and looking and walking away and staring and looking again I got it. I really liked the paintings more as separate paintings. Though they match up together my favorite is the bottom one. But both paintings obviously talk with each other but it is in the way it's displayed. The art is currently in my room in a suspended tetris formation where the top portion of the painting is in suspension above and to the left of its counterpart. So now you use your hand and cover the top half of the painting... What do you think??

ps. two consecutive month postings!? yeah that's right!

I have an infatuation.... perhaps two.

2010-07-17T14:55:00.007-05:00

1. Flowers. I can't stop looking at them, it really is a bit disgusting. My friends were even noticing my not so covert ogles at flowers as the strode by at the farmers market. They thought it very lude... what can I say they are amazing, beautiful and colorful.
So I did the only thing I could think of. I went down to Petaluma to the heirloom seed bank to get some Non-GMO flowers because lets face it July is a tad late to be planting delicious food plants and the garden area is currently occupied by 4 baby goats who would thoroughly enjoy a garden... for approximately 4 seconds! So Zinnias it was! (check out this AMAZING seed company Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds!) And .....maybe a few other flowers...or 3 types of Zinnias: Giants of CA, Envy, and Bright Jewel Cactus Flowered. Giant Asters, some Poppies, Bachelor's Buttons, Bells of Ireland, and whatever other wonderfully colored (in my case dark purples and blues and a splash of lime green!) flowers I thought I could eek into the growing season! I then went and grabbed a bag of organic potting soil and a 7 inch deep wine box and sowed my seeds!
2. a man! He's a strapping young lad from the south! Just what every girl wants right?! A southern gentleman! Well, he is all of that and one of the most conscious and caring human beings I know. Meet Dorian! This was from a recent one night camping adventure to MacKerricher State Park! Which was terrific by the way

That's all for not but I shall be back soon with updated art and photos because I know you are like me and only really look at the pictures!

a small photographic infatuation

2010-05-28T12:56:00.004-05:00

I happen to have a small infatuation with photographing old and dilapidated vehicles. Maybe one of these days I can work out one of these photos and actually have it printed. I'm starting to believe my creative hobbies should become creative jobbies?! But really how many times have I had that thought... Maybe not jobbies but just the fact that I need to do them more, because they are in fact so enjoyable. I have been at a few thrift stores lately and I have found myself holding a developing tank and just the other day there was an enlarger. Something may be speaking to me. Stay tuned and see what develops!
I have been aware of some serious feelings of creativity lately, I keep seeing beautiful charcoal drawings and paintings in my fanciful little head. Here's a little photo of a sketch for a self portrait painting as well. (there is paint on it too now!) So to take heed to those feelings I took a little trip to some art supply stores I ended up with the old giant pad of drawing paper and gigantic clip-board some charcoal sticks and a kneaded eraser. Sounds like my first drawing class at good ole' Stout. I still remember my first drawing class met at 8 am and we would literally sit for 3 hours and draw. There was always someone in class doing head bobs! Myself included, that's what you get for having a drawing class at 8am in a dimly lit studio! I am excited to go home and look at some of my old work! YAY FOR ART!!!

The bike commuter BUZZ!

2010-05-05T17:53:00.003-05:00

I think I just got my dream job! And I didn't even know it was looking for me! I am a VERY PROUD and EXCITED new employee of REI Santa Rosa! I don't think it ever crossed my mind that I would be so happy working retail!!? Its only been about 3 days of training and I am in amazement of the company as a whole and the people I get to work with! Crazy huh?

Well now that I got that out of my system, I was informed that May is bike to work month and specifically May 13 is bike to work day!! So naturally I piped up and exclaimed that I wanted to be on a team at work!! One of my admins then got very excited, but I had to burst her bubble with the fact that I didn't have a bike! whoops! Talk about thinking before speaking.... She tried her best but her extra bike wasn't ready to ride. So downstairs on the sales floor at REI I found my new love, the Novara Buzz V we pulled it off the rack and no adjustments were needed, it fit like Cinderella's glass slipper! And did I mention it was a steal! My crew outfit me with a light, helmet, lock, and pump kit to make sure I wouldn't run into any situations on my new commute!! Heck I even rode to the grocery store yesterday! And the clerk at Trader Joe's didn't think I could fit all my merch into my back pack! He wasn't aware of my super talent of volume estimation and my skills in packing!

If you can people get on your bikes and ride!! I think I need a little bell, a mirror and an under seat pouch for my tire patch kit/tire levers/multi tool. And a sweet commuter backpack! This job is just too fun!

just a little somthing

2010-03-16T16:01:00.004-05:00

I have this AMAZING friend who is so gracious to me. She's even offered me part of her tiny apartment which is literally the size of a postage stamp (two people living in a postage stamp oh yes)! She's a life saver! Earlier this summer I was helping her out with her business: Kashaya's Brick Oven Pizza where I became an Extreme Pizza Maker! I with my infinite crafty skills decided she needed an original Wild Cucumber creation! Who else but a fully tattooed pizza chef would love a My Little Pony apron!! Well it's not totally sugar and spice check out the pony's brand, a sun and cross bones! The best part is everything but the blue ric-rac was reused material they used to be sheets!!

uhg...jobs...

2010-03-05T18:25:00.003-06:00

I have been looking for jobs out here in the great state of California (which I am totally in love with, just look at the smile on my face!). I'm not even sure where to begin... what a frustrating task, finding the jobs isn't so stressful it's the waiting....and waiting......and waiting.... to see if anyone responds. Reminds me of something else I know...fishing! Job hunting is a lot like fishing. You can see all of the little fishy jobs out there, and you dangle down your resume lure hoping one will latch on! I've had a few nibbles and hopefully my smile will read well across the phone on monday!

I have had people ask me what kind of job I want, the list then spews out of my mouth. Well, I say, I love being outside, and have recently taken to the idea of landscape design, my love of the outdoors and background in art make that a perfect fit. But I could also see myself doing countless other things like sewing, making art, working on another farm, working at a nursery, retail if I must, or even being a sign shaker! My many options are like winning the lottery, great until you realize the how much gets taken away in taxes, but yet still a good thing! It's a good thing to have options but a difficult task to make a decision!

Well, I'm just going to make adjustments, and cast my line back in with my brand new shiny resume lure (thanks Sarah!!) and see who's hungry!

The Redwoods

2010-03-04T18:24:00.003-06:00

The Redwoods are so calm, as soon as you enter their world a hush settles around you. Their enormity quiets all the white noise we are used to, even the nearby bloated rushing creek is swallowed in. They seem to slow time, your footsteps are muffled by the duff of needles they leave on the ground. Even if you shout it seems to meander upward then get entwined in the branches. Everything suspended in the damp breath of the forest.

I want so badly to take a photo that truly depicts the forest, but I have realized it isn't possible. Even with the idea that I can do anything I set my mind to and my stubbornness to do so has given in. It just cant compare with actually being there. I love thinking about what the trees may have been thinking about...after all they have been there for longer than I can comprehend. It would be fun to ask them questions!

I have met the Redwoods a few times after being out here for nearly a year now, I've been down the Avenue of the Giants twice, the the Drive Thru Tree twice, and up to Humbolt Redwoods State Park and down to Muir Woods. I really can't get enough! I think my best friend Nicole may understand why now too! Can you see her in the top photo??

Every time I see them my heart swells, my chest feels full and happy, and a giant smile grows across my face. While in Muir woods we were on an Owl walk where we were allowed in the park after closing to see if we could spot and hear owls. In fact we did hear some Barred Owls and a Saw Whet Owl, then on the way down the mountain out of the park, the nearly full moon was glowing through the fog in the redwoods. It was beautiful, being able to be in the park so late and watching the moon beams through the trees...sigh...I think I'm in love...or I at least have an idea for my next tattoo! sorry mom! :)

...annnd we're back!

2010-03-04T17:43:00.008-06:00

Hey hey all! Ready to give you another dose. Since I last wrote I have been up to much mayhem, madness and a ridiculous amount of painting! I moved into a different house on the great Emandal Farm called the Vineyard house. which I was in charge of painting, not the exterior however, I really don't think it would have had a chance to dry anyway. It's been raining quite a lot...with some beautiful sunshine in between. Here are some photos of the changes! Oh and that is our lovely ancient cat Lady Scruffington (5th picture down she's black and white), or as we call her "Scruffles" she is approximately a million years old and has a gimpy leg, so we love her and feed her treats. In turn she yowls, attacks our doormat and makes us laugh. Us being me and my awesome roommate Karin!!
The after shots are the red and gold living room, the green and cream bathroom and the green cream and red porch, the hallway is gold now too! Hopefully they are an improvement!

The brown cow belongs to a friend of the farm, she and her friends followed me home one day thought I made it clear I had no food for them. Then they proceeded to drop land mines all around our cars... turds! (literally)

I'm not so good with, times, dates, and numbers in general. And apparently comma usage.

2009-09-11T15:45:00.006-05:00

It has been a spell, but give me a break! None of my recent days off have been spent on the farm. I've been making trips to Santa Rosa to help a friend with her nomadic pizza oven where just last night I had to be the front person dealing with money AND people. I know giving change should be a simple task but never ask an art student to do it! There were several blank stares given to customers especially when they give you a 100 dollar bill for one slice of pizza! (I went into art to avoid math...) There were many hysterical things that took place starting off with the owner of the farm giving me a cooler with money in it and a scale and telling me a toothless woman has something for me to weigh. Blackberries, wild frozen blackberries it seemed sketchy though right? (she was in fact toothless as well) I've also been hanging out on the coast, just something about the ocean ...And who uses computers anymore anyway, right!? You can ask my parents how much I've used the phone lately too... I love living in my little farm bubble!

(meet Delilah and her crazy eyes...and her back licking habits, she really does lick her own back)

A Painting!

2009-07-09T21:18:00.004-05:00

(read the following post with a slow Texas drawl) Hey hey I did an art project!! Ok one of many but I'm real proud of this one! This is the epitome of farm life, a barn, a tractor, a farmer and a red plaid shirt. Yup! When I saw Casey driving that tractor I knew I had to paint it. And this is what it ended up being. Strangely enough I think its the first time I have painted a face and I LOVE IT! Casey and his gal Diane loved it too, Casey said, "It'll do my mom's heart good to hear about this" in his little slighly texas drawl. Yep Casey is a mixture of willy nelson and santa clause...haha and he's full of one liners! Diane thought it be best to be named "Grump of the Farm" Here' to Casey, aka Mr. Fixit!

Animal Activities

2009-07-09T20:22:00.002-05:00

So During Environmental Education at Emandal (ahah alliteration!) from April to June I was the animal chore master! Yes thats right I was in charge of 120 or so chickens, 2 pigs, 2 ostriches, 6 goats, and the cows well they kind of took care of themselves. We have new additons however, like a set of 4 cute little kittens that were invited into our house and eventually peed on my roommates' bed! Then there is the goats you see. That big one in the middle is the only female of the crew, and she has a nice little goatee! haha And she also has the best bleat ever MMMAAAHHH!
You may be wondering about the cat. Meet Dumpster Kitty. She was found in a dumpster and given to Tam the keeper of the farm. Dumpster Kitty recieved several different names during the Environmental Ed season. Such as Shenanigans, because she was always up to somthing usually consisting of running through a circle of children and completely distracting them from the lesson. Letter B, this was a trifecta name. We wanted the children to LET HER BE, it sound like the song by the Beatles called Let It Be and also the letter B. Lucy was another one, short for lucifer. And to this day I still refer to her as Turkey Head. She got this name because Monica the Gardener was working outside the hoop house on day and D.K. (dumpster kitty) jumped up on the table and into a bunch of potted plants, and to this Monica replied, "aw you Turkey Head!"

Well we have a resident mouse at the Bunkhouse (although our house is currently called the Funkhouse because we like to get down!) whom we don't really want to catch in a trap, so I decided that we could use some natural mouse eradication techniques, so Dumpster Kitty came to the rescue, or so I thought. Ok this kitty is really hilarious when its isn't E.E. season. She's simply just nuts. So when it came time for be she was wandering about on my bed and attacking my feet when they wiggled under the covers. I was petting her for a bit and she got all frisky and was biting (yes Jolene and Kelly pretty much all cats bite me...true). So then I began to do something else and she ran straight up to me latched onto my arm chomped it and ran away. (HILARIOUS RIGHT!?) Then at approximately 5:18 am she was screwing around with my shoes and attacking my feet.. and she had no mousey little snack either... little bugger. But at least she was cute and entertaining. The picture details her mischeviousness. She is inside a drawer at our house hanging out with the cereal. Gotta love her.

San Hedrin Saved by the Gatorade

2009-06-11T16:25:00.002-05:00

This is the story of the triumph of a rag tag group of super humans who decided a mountain must be conquered. It was a lovely Friday afternoon when we began the trek. Our goal: to conquer San Hedrin, the highest nearby point in the area. Nearly a vertical mile in elevation with the summit being around 6,700 feet. By far the largest mountain I will have tried to climb. The summit was 9 miles away from the Farm. Though we managed to take a slight detour amounting to about 2 miles total which makes the round trip to be approx. 20 miles for the entire trip. It also roused the suspicion of the neighbors who owned the land we inadvertently camped on (and started a large fire!). It so happened the night we camped we also were visited by some unidentified 4 wheel vehicldes and men speaking. Laying in the tent with a pulse rate rapidly increasing, and hearing these vehicles outside sent our minds in the motion pictures, where strange vehicles show up and whats left in the aftermath is relatively gorey...(ill spare you). We kept on the next morning, we all survived the 2 visits from 4 wheelers but still not knowing what or who those vehicles were. We finally found the logging road leading to the top. This road....hmm. Well lets just say it was aprox. 9 miles of extreme uphill switchbacks. We did manage to stash our packs so we weren't wearing those on the summit run. The views were amazing, we could see the farm from some vantage points and the top was glorious! We did it!! Then there was the down...prepair your kneecaps.... We also ran out of water at the top, we were told there was a spring that we could find (ha ha) nope! So we were eating snow and thats when the gift of the mountain was bore upon us. A bottle of unopened GATORADE XTREME FRUIT PUNCH! WE are SAVED!! We were so thrilled, what a gift! We then proceeded to make Gatorade slushies with the nearby snow, ya hoo!!! An amazing trip, though the excitment was far from over. After letting ourselves loose, flying down the hills hopeing there is enough strength left in our legs to stop ourselves on the corners. We come to where our packs are stashed. But there are a few more things there then when we left. Including a Jeep, a 4 wheeler, 2 dogs, a pair of shot guns, and 3 male humans. The asked us if we knew where we were going (we did at this point!). Basically what they told us was that they had trail cams out and we were on them and they thought we may be and I quote "mexican dope growers". (i thought this was histerical...). Well of course we were not but they didnt give us a ride either, Monica was very upset about this for quite some time...heh. But my friends it was a glorious adventure and my first backpacking experience, one for the memory books, afterall it isnt everyday that you get mistaken for fugitives...haha!

California =

2009-04-24T15:21:00.004-05:00

I have trouble trying to find the words to describe my trip and experiences thus far in California. Maybe love, because love is something that is difficult to define but still universal. I love it here, I love what I am doing and I love the people I work with! I couldn't be happier! Amazing happens to be a work we have begun to overuse along with: unbelievable, beautiful, crazy, oh my god, and blank stares and deep soaking inhales while making a mmmm noise while exhaling. I am so blessed, lucky and appreciative. Nothing but big smiles and laughter from California!! (and some guitar playing too!!)

The photos are not in any order, but the first is the naturalist doing "quick act like a tree". Some cranes from Nebraska. My friend Hiro in Colorado, some trees in Utah. The skyline in Utah or maybe Nevada. The tall tall trees of California, the plum blossoms of Emandal Farm. A rescued Brewers blackbird. And a shot of the farm from Inspiration Point.

A Canoeing Obstical Training Ground...

2009-03-26T11:45:00.003-05:00

Sunday was a beautiful day for BOATING!! So that's what we did. We loaded up the canoe and the bicycle and headed over to Rocky Run Creek. I got to do the bike shuttle this time.

Since of course it isn't the brightest idea to take your brand new camera on a water adventure (and yes there was an incident once that involved my mom's camera a canoe and some water) so I drew you pictures. The first image is of an obviously to scale and extremely accurate depiction of Rocky Run Creek (in blue) and the shuttle route (in black). The green 'x' marks the spot where we began and the red 'x' is where we landed. It took me approx. 20 min to bike from the red x to the green to begin our adventure extreme. (I've included a "real" map even though you cant see all the tipped over trees and I beleive my map may actually be slightly more accurate. I was there and paddled it myself)

The next image depicts a scene just 20 yards down stream...yep we could see it but we did it anyway. My first 'canoe over partially submerged log through a bunch of Alder branches' experience. It was sweet, I sat in front and was in charge of being the 'eyes' of the boat to make sure we were in deep enough water and to avoid obstacles. After being attacked by the Alder we made it over, phew! Almost as fun as white water! As we dawdled along the extremely curvy steam (see first image "map") I spied a large roundish brown object entering the stream, immediate thoughts-beaver YES!! I love spotting wildlife!

As we rounded a curve we were surprised by the one and only bridge/tree combo (third image)! We couldn't plow our way over this one so we cleverly hopped out and chucked the boat over the blockage. Ta daa!! So on our way out to the Wisconsin River there were several hundred other tree in the way diversions, we had to get out of the boat 2 more times and carry it across some marshy land before we made our way out of the delta. ( I apologize for the partial swatches pallet in the last depiction, it was in no way along on the trip in the sky, its presence is inaccurate) After our wonderful river challange we ended up at Hooker's for a bite to eat and to listen to some billigerant drunks. The food was great, (cod sandwitch and walleye) the people were obnoxiosly loud and foul mouthed, and the beer tasted swell, a perfect end to a sunny Sunday.

I drank tree sap

2009-03-24T21:16:00.004-05:00

Yup, it's true, I did it. Drank tree sap. I liked it too! A beautiful thought crossed our minds; the tree sap we were enjoying was a beautiful life force. The tall Sugar Maples had collected this water from the earth and sky and had begun to transfer it to its tallest branches to begin its yearly wakening. I drank the tree's life juice, it tasted strong and cold, with a barely sweet after taste. Humans being humans then boil it into a gooey sugary delightful treat! This one is for my Grandpa Steve, who always was telling us stories about his maple syrup adventures. And yes, I hauled 5 gallon buckets of Sugar Maple tree juice up an abnormally rocky and mossy hillside and I only spilled a little. On my pants and down my sleeve. (no worries, wasn't sticky!) Oh and the sunset! It was a "slam on the breaks and snap" kind of moment high on the bluffs near Happy Hill Dr. Baraboo, WI.

Devil's Lake State Park!

2009-03-24T20:26:00.002-05:00

After some dawdling at Farm and Fleet in Baraboo to purchase the wrong flea and tick topical treatment for my dog, which we only found out about AFTER we returned home...we passed the turnoff for Devil's Lake State Park and feeling a bit forlorn, I shouted, "We're here, we're GOING!" As if my friend were opposed!? March 21 was a wonderful day, not only was the weather perfect for a spring hike, but Jack got to come too! I was amazed. The West Coast and all of its mountains and coastline sometimes seem so attractive, but when I entered Devil's Lake I was surprised for some reason. You kind of expect this type of raw beauty from places like Oregon, California or Colorado, but Wisconsin? No way, we just have cows and farm fields separated by kettle moraines and drumlins, and an occasional river. Not glorious boulders deposited on the edge of an ancient riverbed a million billion years ago! (get the real story on how the lake was formed, here) So ha! You states with your snow capped mountains and salty ocean breezes, we had the Wisconsin Glacier, which was humongous, really really old and had gargantuan bolders frozen in it!

Aldo Leopold's Cabin!

2009-03-24T20:02:00.003-05:00

Down a Wisconsin Rustic Road (# 49 to be exact) is Aldo Leopold's Cabin. Don't know him? Check him out here and here. Basically he was a Naturalist and wanted people to realize that the land and the wilderness and whatever exists in it is all part of our community. He wrote the A Sand County Almanac, in which he discussed the Land Ethic. Smart guy, and a sweet spot! His backyard consists of sandy patches, golden grasses and beautiful River Birch trees, and a Osprey circling above. How could you not love nature in Wisconsin?

Birding Adventure!

2009-03-17T17:57:00.002-05:00

The weather was so unbelievable today! With no sub job and the day to myself I decided to hit the trails and bag me some bird! (first I did laundry though...) My favorites were the Sandhill Cranes! Expertly camouflaged in the second picture, you can tell they are young because they still retain their rusty colored feathers. They were so noisy, along with their marsh neighbors the Canadian Geese who by the way weren't keen on me photographing them. As I was cruising along I spotted some Wild Turkey gobbling there way along the field, the one in side profile has a nice little beard! The Red Winged Blackbird cooed its little tune as we drove past. Lets not forget the silly Banded Woolly Bear Caterpillar! All in all not a bad birding day!

Weather Wonders

2009-03-13T21:13:00.005-05:00

I was in awe the day after the rain/hail/snow storm, out cross country skiing just after daybreak. Simply put unbelievable, so astonishingly beautiful. Then as I headed in toward the house nature bore yet another gift, fog. Gorgeous icicle branches snow and fog.

As a photographer I've always loved the unusual things nature has to offer, the mystery it can deliver with fog and the stillness and strange light of an oncoming storm. Nature and weather can be very curious!

The poor trees suffered for the beauty, yesterday I visited a beautiful tree farm. A long row of White Pines stood tall, but their branches littered the ground near their trunks. You can see the strain of the weight of the snow and ice on the trees, though one distinctly reminds me of "How the Grinch Stole Christmas". It definately belongs in Whoville.

Beachy bags!

2009-03-04T17:30:00.005-06:00

So I must have spring fever! This bags are totally for the beach, the slippery liner is perfect for being able to easily remove sand. And the colors, so beautiful and beachtastic. Or I guess you could maaaybe use them for groceries or a whatever you need to carry bag. Keep it in your car or close at hand, you never know when you need groceries or to take your clothes to be laundered!

$12 your choice! The ones pictured are the only that exist. Email me if your interested! lindentreesnearthewater@gmail.com

Machine Wash, line or lay flat to dry, I don't recommend ironing!

And then there were 2!

2009-03-04T17:26:00.003-06:00

A bit belated but hey, it was cold so I was wearing them! I did it my first pair of mittens with thumbs! Though each one is unique the pattern was a touch vague... my thumb placement is off in one and the top on the other is a little wonky. They are my silly mittens and I love their quirks!

WORK!!!

2009-03-02T17:10:00.002-06:00

As some of you may know I have been most pleasantly unemployed (pleasant because I had time to do sewing and loiter at the library) for the last 3 weeks and today I worked a legitimate job and loved it! I was nervous about being called into my first day at a new school as a substitute aide. Basically because I had no idea about all the hairy little details, like how long would it take me to get there, what would I be doing, are the kids going to hate me because I'm not the teacher who is supposed to be there. That said I LOVED IT. The kids were so much fun, I was so glad not to be at home. It really reaffirmed in me that I love working with children and put that combination with teaching them about the outdoors and I think I found my spot!

Going online??

2009-03-02T16:55:00.002-06:00

Get it? Going, on line?? Clever, huh? (holy butterscotch Batman its the Riddler!(ridiculous overuse of the question mark. and a poor joke to go along with it.)) I have been urged by a few people now (MOM! and my lovely friend Sally. (visit her blog here)) to get my sewing projects online to hopefully make a mint? Well, here are a few that are going to be traveling to Eau Claire for a "green" event. These simple bags are reusable grocery totes, or "whatever fits in here when I need it " totes. To make a short story shorter, I love bags and I love the Earth and this is what happened. To date I beleive to have made 34 of these bags some with lovely little liners.. wow 34! That even surprises me! That said I have been selling the unlined bags for $10 each and the lined will go for $12. (there are only 2 in the pictured group, the pretty pink ones in the middle!) Keep watch for some more of my creations!