Friday happy list

Some weeks it's easier and other weeks it's more challenging to come up with a "happy list" - but then that's the reason for this exercise!

1. discovering - or rather I should say being reminded - that the world is full of lovely and amazing people everywhere - you just have to start talking to them, duh!
2. starting "Assignment #2" in my painting class
3. sipping Starbucks French Roast with almond macaroons & lemon cookies from Casa Italiana (they have the best Italian cookies ever)
4. my new red polka-dot sweater!!!
5. the scent of our autumn yard: damp, musky crushed walnut husks
the sound of our autumn yard: walnuts continually falling with loud thunks
the site of our autumn yard: walnut leaves riding breezes to fill the sky and ground with fluttering, shimmering, glowing yellow

Walnuts! Walnuts! Walnuts! (they're everywhere, might as well love 'em!)

Full disclosure: jumping for joy because I got back good news from the doctor: I'm gonna live! ha ha :D

my kind of week

(a.k.a. this week's happy list...)

1. Monday: moving around my monitors and workplace set-up - it's that thing like moving your same old living room furniture around: feels like a whole new place

2. Tuesday: after a rough month for Cookie, seeing her return to her feisty, cuddly self

3. Wednesday: starting new painting classes!

4. Thursday: celebrating my dad's birthday at John Lithgow show then Black & Blue with family

5. Friday: touring Wendell Castle's studio! - So inspiring to see a team of highly skilled men & women creating wonderful pieces representing Wendell's vision. As always happens: through learning about their process, I gained better appreciation for the final pieces. I can't find good photos online (especially of the specific pieces we saw, his newest works) that quite convey how inviting the pieces felt in person - you just wanted to lay all over them. And at age 80, they say his studio is busier than it's ever been!

Bonuses, all week: catching up with Spring/Summer 2013 Fashion Weeks around the globe... last week: NYC; this week: London + Milan! blah blah blah run around barefoot while the weather still allows!

5 things that made me happy last week

1. drawing more with pencil & paper again

2. not combing my hair for 3 days = true dat :D

3. Excedrin, Ibuprofen & Aspirin oh my (yeah, it was one of those weeks)

4. seeing my dad upright & smiling like himself so soon after surgery on Friday!

5. our friends returned home safely from Lebanon! (hooray!!! and phew!)

this week's happy list

1. Honeycrisp apples are back at Joseph's Farm Market! My favorite apple!!!

2. A trip to the hair salon (lurrrve feeling my head massaged during shampoo ;)

3. Gutters installed on the barn dormers - woohoo! Maybe the flowers will have a better chance now - (Tim & his cousin Bryan)


4. Getting to see a "blue moon"! Full moons twice this August - seems fitting to happen during the month that Neil Armstrong left our world. The sky was so clear and the moon so bright that looking through binoculars with my naked eyes I could see craters! ..though when it first came up on Friday night, it was orange:


5. Wearing an old pair of sweatpants & sweatshirt from 20+ years ago - super soft with age... Sometimes those kinds of things catch you unexpectedly in how happy they make you feel.

5 random things that made me happy last week

1. our jungley-bungly veg garden! Despite this year of crazy weather, we've had our most successful veg garden ever (not sure what to make of that...)! Green peppers taste like I remember eating in childhood (from my parents' garden) - store bought peppers taste bland & watery now. This inspires me to try even harder next year -

2. We finally got our own wood splitter - so we can process firewood more efficiently (and get all that wood clutter away from my beloved little catalpa tree)


3. Chitty chitty bang bangs...I cut myself. Every few years I get the urge to change my hair, but this is about as extreme as I go: to have bangs, or not to have bangs
(this was another cell phone picture I tried taking of that amazing inlay work)


4. recognizing places I've been in my favorite "fashion tomes"! Vogue's September issue has a spread set at Edith Wharton's home in Lenox, Mass. (visited a few years back); the latest J.Crew catalog (kids edition) was shot in Brooklyn Botanic Garden! (a lovely hidden spot in NYC - I spent a peaceful day there by myself this summer - motivates me to go through the rest of the photos from the NYC trip with my mom & sister...)

5. attending a wine & cheese tasting with my mom, hosted by Lively Run Goat Farm - neat to discover so many yummy goat cheeses, locally made! ...one of those activities I didn't realize would be that fun til I tried it - Thanks, mom ;)

5 things that made me happy this week

1. Using the rain barrel with the hose to water the garden for the first time - gravity fed, it works perfectly:



2. Conversation at a luncheon in Naples:

Woman 1: "You have no idea until you're 70 how young your 70s really are. Truly... It's incredible!!!"
Woman 2: "How would you know?"
Woman 1: "I'm 72!"

3. Evening walks through the village with a friend

4. Chocolate vegan ice cream (made with coconut milk) + roasted almonds + fresh raspberry sauce

5. Opening ceremonies for the 2012 Olympics in London!!!


***Update: On August 2, 2012 they won 2 Olympic gold medals!!!***

5 things that made me happy during the past week

1. Ate the first ripe tomato from our garden, and baked zucchini bread with the first ripe zukes!

2. Closing out the week with cooler temps and gentle rain - what a relief! - which meant...

3. Mowing the lawn for the first time in a month! I've actually missed that chore

4. Saying "Good-bye" to a stye on my eye!
(that was a gross one - I've never had anything so disgusting - ugh, hope to avoid that ever again!)

5. The best one for last: my dad went through two medical procedures this week (one right after the other, poor guy) and came out with a healthy report card on both afterwards!!!! Hooray! Hooray! Hooray!

5 things that made me happy during the past week

1. every summer morning


2. The rain barrel our neighbor made for us got put to use!!! - Tim installed it just in time to collect water from the desperately needed rainfalls (we still need more, but what we got felt sooooo good) (it's been so dry, look at all the walnut leaves already fallen on the ground)


3. winning a raffle to take home a fern centerpiece from my cousin's fiance's bridal shower - I've always wanted to plant ferns, now I'll have a nice reminder of the day


4. something new: I've started doing these "5 Tibetan Rites" each morning - spinning is my favorite!


5. discovering that others also keep a "Happy List"... (Ha!) Keep focusing on life's happy moments! :)
(I'm trying to be diligent about maintaining this list as a weekly exercise as well)

5 things that made me happy this week

1. I frequently put 4-leaf clovers in little vases, but this is the first time I've watched one grow roots!!!
(and unbelievably: it came from this "batch" - picked in mid-May!!! That is seriously how long I've had that particular clover in the little bottle!)



2. making an awesome new choc chip cookie recipe (using our outdoor hillbilly kitchen to keep the heat outside) - on the 4th of July!


3. painting our garden/lawnmower shed with colors mixed from Oops paints (a temporary fix, but it looks better than it did) (there is actually a bunch of stuff growing in the veg garden but somehow it doesn't show well in this picture) (and yes, the grass is that dry!)


4. enjoying this detail on a building next to our local grocery store's parking lot - apparently it's been there for a long time, I only just recently discovered it


5. watching this bunch always cracks me up

5 things that made me happy this week:

1. microfiber fleece sheets - soooo soft & cozy!!! perfect for this damp, drizzly January


2. replaced a blown 40 watt lightbulb with a 60 watt bulb and it completely transformed the room -
extra bright light seems necessary lately, it's been too grey outside.


3. cut my own hair! (just a basic choppy trim)


4. found a new source for delicious, locally (& "mindfully") roasted coffee beans:
The Dalai Java in Canandaigua, NY
(discovered via a Christmas gift :)


5. great Netflix watches lately (we don't have regular TV or cable) - I highly recommend these two series:

"Long Way Round" - Actors Ewan McGregor & Charley Boorman take a motorbike trip around the world - it's like the ultimate grown boy's adventure! (can't wait to watch their 2nd trip: "Long Way Down")



"Human Planet" about the ingenious ways humans have adapted to different habitats around the world:



*BONUS HAPPY NEWS: The oak tree across the street hasn't been removed yet! - probably because the weather hasn't been cooperative for such endeavors... The take-down is inevitable, but for now we continue to enjoy the tree.

5 things that made me happy during the last week:

(resuming a recommended exercise...)

1. the cashier at Bob & Irv's (our local grocery) asked to feel my fuzzy shirt because it looked so warm & soft -
she's right: getting to wear it is one of my favorite things about this time of year...


2.


3. rediscovering my corn husk doll collection - mostly made by my grandmother, with a few that I made under her tutelage (mine have no faces because I always feared my features wouldn't look as sweet as hers)



4. a new recipe for pumpkin-chocolate chip bread - it's a keeper!



5. We completed our first 3-D V-carved signage! (photos here)