A is for awesome (month)

I feel like so much great stuff is happening already. It can only get better! And, I have a proposition for you :) at the bottom…

Gratitude Journal

Great Friendships. Drinks with my amazing hilarious friend Jenn at Zaytinya. I recommend this spot to anyone in the District. The menu strays all over the Meditarrean from Lebanon to Madrid. Delicous food.

This week I tried my hand at multiplicities. I am loving my camera. Check it out!

I’m really hitting back the homemade iced Tazo tea. Switching over from coffee was such a great decision.

I am finally finally all planned out for the Euro Trip, hotels and tickets booked. The itinerary is up in the air. I am meeting family/friends in Berlin after doing London and then on the Munich and Geneva.  We have to decide how much we can see and figure out where the best sausages are. Oh, and I found that there is something in Berlin called the Garden of Beer. What hilarity! New experiences. Excitement.

Work. The opportunity to do a job and get paid for it. No matter what I feel about a particular moment at work, I know that I am lucky to have employment. That is big. I don’t sweat the small stuff that comes with it.

Writing late at night. By late I mean 11 pm. I’m not a  late night person so the fact that my hand is moving and my brain is alert is miraculous. I am grateful for this energy.

A beatific soul sent word to me that this blog “inspires” them. I blushed - as much as coco-skinned people can blush :)

My Mom and little brother both had birthdays this week. My brother, who once called me Mommy – he was confused for a little while – is on the cusp of teenage-hood. I’m glad you were born! I love you both.

Sleeping better and less. Sometimes I’d sleep 10 hours but get up like I’d been chewed out by the garbage truck. If everything is alright within though I can sleep 6 hours and get up with a bounce.

Laughter. Laughter. Laughter. Beware of people who do not laugh.

Notebook

No book is really worth reading at the age of ten which is not equally (and far more often) worth reading at the age of fifty – C. S. Lewis

Garret Steider took the alphabet soup to the next level. He carved out the Alphabet in fruit and other edible items. Beautiful and useful. The pictures would make an awesome gift for your favorite pre-schooler and his parents.

Brian Solis explains why the webs and blogs are about context, not just content. In order words, knowledge is power, information is just another distraction.

Good news for tea lovers. “Theanine (L-theanine), which is found in tea leaves, may reduce anxiety and improve attention and the ability to focus in people who have high anxiety levels. Japanese researchers reported these findings in a recent issue of the Journal of Functional Foods.”

John Legend and the Roots Album on repeat. My current fave is Our Generation (The Hope of the World) . And I’m loving Beyoncé’s anthem to Girl Power, Run the World (Girls)

Silouhettes in paper. So neat.

Art Inspiring Art

David Hockney made these amazing composites with polaroids (above) and Flickr Photographer Sicoactiva was inspired to make a number of pictures in the same style. She has 27 such photographs in her pool. All amazing.

***And now A PROPOSITION for YOU!***

Let’s celebrate the messiness of life!!

Why should you clean when you have better things to do? Since last week I’ve been thinking about cleaning my desk. I’ve moved flower pots, relocated piles to the floor and chairs and back. But I didn’t clean. And I felt bad. But then I realized this is beautiful. This is Poiesis, the Greek version of what I like to call making stuff. Other folks call it creativity or productivity. I also like Heiddeger’s definition:

a moment of ecstasis when something moves away from its standing as one thing to become another.

 

I’d like to do a weekly round-up of messes. Send me your mess and together we will make a weekly collage of beautiful messes so that you can inspire everyone else to get messy the rest of the week. I will post the batch every Monday on this blog and on Facebook. For a peak at my current mess and full details about this project, read here.