My Guideposts -- Week49

Your day will go the way the corners of your mouth turn.

~Unknown

What a perfect reminder for my New Year's resolutions. And the perfect adorable kindergarten snowman to illustrate the point, even if part of his smile is hidden by his scarf.  He looks just like I do when I bike to school on chilly winter mornings!

(Except I have legs.)

Happy Next Year!

I love fresh starts:  unused tablets of paper, reorganized cupboards, clean dogs, new calendars. It feels to be good to be reminded afresh that the future is as untracked as new-fallen snow. Twenty-eleven can be anything we want it to be. We can be anything we want to be, if we want it hard enough.  Yep, it's that time of the year again when every one of us re-evaluates ourselves.

So I'm asking myself, "What do I want to change in my life?"  To my surprise, I'm finding that there isn't much.  Oh yeah, minor tweaks.  But the big things (knock wood) are fine.  I'm not sure if that means I'm extremely lucky, stuck in a rut or have my head buried in the sand.

I'm fairly sure that being a low-maintenance kinda gal really contributes to my overall satisfaction level.  As long as the basics are taken care of, I don't need much.  As long as I have my family, my dogs, my chickens and my garden to nurture and I feed my creativity with various craft/DIY/furniture/sewing projects, I'm wallowing in bliss.  Case in point--guess what presents made this Christmas fabulous?

Unfair question! (Because they weren't presents in the traditional sense.)

One, I got to rock a three-month-old baby to sleep (for an hour) when he awoke during the holiday program at school.  Two, that night I brought a bale of straw hay home from the feed store so that I could make sure the Bombshells were warm and cozy in their coop during our frosty single-digit nights. 

A baby.  Some straw.  Christmas.  Hmmm.

All the thoughtful, lovely, fun presents I received after that were icing on my Christmas pudding as the Universe nodded approvingly at me because I got her message about the important things.

And it struck me as never before, that Christmas (that very special birthday) isn't "over".  Every new mom knows that a birth is the start of things, not the end.  It's a celebration, a new beginning, a lifelong journey.

My New Year's resolutions?  Well, they involve smiles and laughter. A lighter outlook. Lots more patience.

Thoughtfully,

My Guideposts - Week48

I will honor Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year.

~Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol

Dickens had the right idea!  I'm loathe to give up smiling at people while I shop and happily humming songs everywhere I go and feeling that the whole world is united in love and peace--so I think I'll try my hardest to retain that wonderful positive Christmas Spirit throughout the upcoming year.  Every time I light a candle or see some outdoor lights, I'll remember to spread some Christmas magic.

Chubbily,

Holiday Mysteries

Mystery #1: Why doesn't Scotch tape stick to gift wrap as well as loose candy cane wrappers do to my hands?

Mystery #2: Why are flights late when the skies are clear and storm-free and the airport reports few delays? I can see a ripple effect adding a bit of time at the end of a day, but nearly four hours? Really?

Mystery #3: Why is it that no matter how early I start buying and making Christmas gifts, I still don't have enough time?

Mystery #4: Why hasn't there been a clear blue sky in the Biggest Little City (land of three hundred and fifty days of sunshine) so I can take decent photos of our red-and-green completely decked-out cottage to share?

Mystery #5: How is it possible that little ms. pogonip hasn't contributed one single craft to the blogosphere this December?

Mystery #6: What exactly has ms. pogonip been doing? Because it sure hasn't been blogging!

Answer #1: I solved the tape issue by no longer using "Magic" Transparent tape. Now I use old school tape--no more "magic" for this girl--and everything is staying closed (so far). And fortunately, Bob's Original Peppermint Candy Canes unwrap fairly easily so that even if they do still stick to me, I only have to persuade two pieces of cellophane per cane to jump in the circular file.

Answer #2: Flight crew enjoyed too much eggnog or they had to finish their shopping while they were in P-town or the plane just threw a hissy fit like the rest of us. I can sympathize with all those reasons.  If I were a conspiracy theorist I might have some other ideas!  But think how happy we'll finally be to see Pooh and the Professor and Tigger when they do touch down at midnight!

Answer #3: I guess Christmas is just such a wonderful event that I can't expect it to fit a time schedule. And it's probably good for me to relinquish control just a teensy bit.

Answer #4: I blame global warming. Otherwise we'd be enjoying sunshine between snowstorms instead of slogging through grey soggy skies.

Answer #5: I've been winding up some furniture refinishing, during our rainy but relatively warm days, as well as trying to bring some order to the chaos created by the contents of the storage unit that we liberated for my cousin this summer. Yeah, it's still going on all these months later. Lots of vintage delights. Lots of books--antique and newer. Lots of amazing genealogical treasures. And that control thing...yeah, I seem to need to go through every. single. thing. and ponder what should be done with it.

Answer #6: See Answers #4 and #5. And add piles of clutter around the cottage that I just couldn't stand to look at any more...and the need for Christmas decorating to happen...but that's all in the past and I can't wait to share some holiday cheer with y'all!  Now I just have to hope that you have the time to read a few new posts as I play catch up.

Cheerily,

My Guideposts -- Week47

All the great blessings of my life are present in my thoughts today.  

~Phoebe Cary

Merrily,

DiversityTastes Divine

When my older son was in kindergarten, we learned a song:

Hanukkah, Hanukkah, festival of lights.

Hanukkah, Hanukkah, seven days, eight nights.

Hanukkah, Hanukkah, let the dreidel spin.

Hanukkah, Hanukkah, let's all join in!

(I'm pretty sure it's an old Hap Palmer tune.  Love Hap Palmer, even if he neglected to mention the latkes!)

So tonight--the eighth night of Hanukkah--we lit eight candles (even if some were peppermint-striped and some shaped like Christmas trees).

 

If you counted nine, that's because we used a shamash or helper candle.

And we fried our latkes--you have to love a holiday that involves fried foods!

 

Sizzle, sizzle.

Yep, served on our The Night Before Christmas plates.

 

With homemade applesauce on top...Oh. My. Goodness.

We spun our dreidels while we ate.  Long ago I made up little rhymes to help my feeble brain the kidlets remember what to do:

• Shin (shin, shin, put one in).  
• Nun (none in, none out).  
• Hay (hay-af, half--one for the pot, one for me, one for the pot, one for me). 
• And Gimel (gimel, gimel, gimme all).

It took a lot of spins to get my mini-dreidels to come up Gimel.

 

I like the win/win of celebrating holidays from other traditions and cultures.  Celebrate, understand, respect, coexist peacefully.  We can learn a lot from kindergartners.

Dedicated to learning good things,

My Guideposts - Week46

Sometimes one creates a dynamic impression by saying something, and sometimes one creates as significant an impression by remaining silent.
 

~His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso

Devotedly (but quite as single-minded as Kharma),