New Year

I try to bind each year to a word and let that word guide my goals and actions as I move through the months. This year, my focus is on Beauty. 

I'm always at least half focused on Beauty, so this year is more of refocusing, a deepening relationship with the word, and all it represents.

In part, I am talking about physical beauty, I want to take more time to nourish my body and adorn it. I'll be paying more attention to the health of my skin. I've made a rich, moisturizing cream with coffee-butter, shea butter, olive oil, rose-hip seed oil, and essential oils indulge my face each night. I'm wearing honey-clay masks regularly; and I hope to pick up body brushing again. 

I'm also taking more time with my hair and makeup most days and working on building a capsule wardrobe. My current wardrobe is small enough, but it lack cohesion and consistent beauty. Too often I go out looking sloppier than I want to. I'd like to reduce my wardrobe just a bit more, add some 'muck-about-the-yard' boots to save my shoes, and give my wardrobe a sense of wholeness.

But beauty is petty when it doesn't go beyond the body. In this new year, I hope to extend it through the things in my life and into the spirit of it. As I craft beauty in my self and my home, through building a culture of simplicity and hospitality, I hope it will make soul-beauty more and more a natural part of life. 

I'm reducing my belongings, and my family is reducing with me. We're clearing out the cluttering, half-wanted things and letting our little house breathe a bit more. Fewer toys, fewer clothes, fewer distractions. The kids are even getting excited about packing away the toys and clothes they don't love and sending them off to other kids. My daughter could wear three outfits over and over each week and be happy in them, she adores the soft, cozy clogs her grandparents sent her for Christmas and her glittery boots, but is only half-heartedly attached to 2 other pairs of winter shoes in the basket. The warm, red union suit her other grandparents gave her for Christmas is deeply loved, but two other pajamas can be packed off easily.

My husband is filling the house with artwork this winter. Some of it will sell on his Etsy site, Paperwine Industries, but some of it will replace less loved pieces on our own walls.

And as we clear out and simplify, we're building in time for prayer, reading, quiet, and especially play. We're adding in a daily noon Angelus, a personal rosary and divine mercy for me, and a family quiet time at 3pm..which I intend to be a tech-free time. I want to make sure I have order in my day, structure for my children, and time to play with them as well. I think I tend to neglect play.

I have a bullet journal and a dreambook to keep me focused on my goals for the year, hopefully they will help me make 2017 a year of living beauty.

Blessings this new year! What are your goals and how are you pursuing them? Tell me all about it!

A New Year

I'm easing back into blogging, with the help of my husband. This past year of quiet balancing of life and time and thoughts and dreams has been lovely. I didn't intend it to become a year of near-silence here..but the silence has been helpful to me. 

We'll be altering the blog slightly in the next month or so. Seth will be sharing more of his own thoughts and I will be forming some of mine, as well as visually tidying up the place. 

For now, know that we are safe and happy in our home among the trees: shoveling snow, feeding poultry, and preparing the place to welcome our newest little bundle of need in just about a month!

photo courtesy of L.C. Photography..and my dear friend, Christie,
who met us on a late autumn trip to Florida and captured so much joy.

Today

Feeling..warm. We're still at the in-laws' house, running hot baths, baking, and sleeping late. We'll head home tomorrow (now that the cold has finally broken, re-stock our wood, kick-up the stove, and pay the plow-guy. I'm looking forward to it, but we've had a wonderful little break here.

Seeing..my beautiful Parmesan and garlic loaves turning gold on top in the easy, gas oven..I've baked a lot over the weekend, and it's such a wonderful feeling to know I can just turn a knob to do so..

Smelling.. cheese browning, bread baking, coffee steaming...all the indulgent scents of life.

Tasting..a bit of cinnamon tea-cake...another bit of easy baking fun!

 Listening.. to the sound of gas-heat running through the house, and the soft, needy little snores of Luba on the couch.

 Grateful...for a place to spend the coldest nights that required nothing from me to keep it warm. I love our home, but this winter Seth and I've decided to go back to our original plan - we hope to have a strawbale house built within the next five years. The yurt's insulation is good enough to keep us warm (even through -10 degree nights) but we want a house that doesn't need so much attention while it's keeping us warm.

Reading..cookbooks, I didn't think we'd be staying long, so I didn't bring much else, so I'm stuck with finding new recipes to try and love!
 

Loving..the Theotokos..I'm dedicating 2014 to the Virgin of the Passion, not with any particular prayers or ceremonies - though I may do something new with the Icon when I get home. 
 
Hoping..for consistency in this new year, and for many blessings on all I know and love.

Studying.. I took Christmas off from study, tomorrow I'll be back to books and goals, and life in general - we're still on holiday today!

Working on..  a mess in the kitchen...hopefully Seth and Yarrow are planning to work hard at eating it all, because there's way too much for just me.

New Year

 2014... 

Amazing really, to see the time go by..like the sun on a winter's day it seems like no time at all has passed since the dawn of last year. It's three o'clock on a Saturday and already the sun is hidden behind the trees, the shadows are long and lonely looking, and we are warm and quiet at  my in-law's closed up house (they are south for the Christmas season). It's a blessing to have somewhere to go that isn't home, a house with none of the demands of home, and yet not a hotel, not an impersonal, lonely place of strangers and weary travelers. Here in this home that is not mine, I'm catching up on all the sleep I've missed through these past few nights of sub-zero temperatures and wicked wind-chills - sleeping and showering and setting resolutions (a few days late) that will come into being on Epiphany. Resolutions to sew more, buy less, pray & fast & dream & live, write, eat...

I haven't quite put my actual resolutions to writing yet, but my hopes are:

To Sew more..

at least a third of the skirts and pretty dresses I've pinned - while at the same time cleaning out the clothes I don't     wear, or don't like wearing. Streamlining my wardrobe a bit and wearing the same old things less often, and with more attention to detail.

more of Yarrow's clothes as well as some of the adorable things I've seen around, like these:

via stitchinginthedark.com

 ..and a quilt. I really want to make a nice quilt for our bed!


To Buy Less..

because I fall into consumerism so easily! 

I want to start making some of my own makeup, all my own bath products, lotions, and creams. I want to get back into baking regularly..it's a bit of a challenge in the winter with the kitchen, but I'm trying to set a schedule for myself, regular breads and house-cakes, and healthy, good things to eat that aren't just on the stove-top.

and to clear out all the extras..the things I don't love, need, or cherish:

 



 Pray & Fast...

I want to grow into a person who delights in prayer and consistently fasts. I want to set up Wednesdays and Fridays as days of particular fasting for particular intentions, and I want my days to fall into mini-seasons of prayer: We do the Angelus in the morning, but I'd like to do it at noon, and my good friend from college and I are committing to do the Divine Mercy with and for each other daily..a sort of long-distance community of prayer I'd love to welcome others to join, after all, prayer doesn't really dilute down, it grows with the numbers.

Regular confession is something I'm working on as well..monthly is the goal, I've failed for December, but January is a new month, a new year, and a new chance to heal.

I've decided - thanks to the ladies of Soul Gardening Journal for the idea - to dedicate 2014 to The Virgin of the Passion (another title of Our Lady of Perpetual Help)..I'm trying to think of a good way to keep this dedication going throughout the year..perhaps with a new tattoo??

not this as a tattoo..something more symbolic..obviously..

 
 & dream...

I want to indulge my dreams this year, without fear and without negativity..I'm going to fill my house with dream-flowers and sleep with basil under my head, then wake and walk toward the dreams with my eyes wide open...

walking toward dreams means living life fully awake, rejoicing in the goodness, mourning the sorrowful, and letting each moment have it's chance to color the world I see..

& Live...

in other words..send all the letters I keep meaning to write, play in the sunshine and in the rain; let Yarrow's love of walking slowly down the lane to collect all the rocks and leaves and stones, and snowflakes she can along with the mail delight me instead of frustrating me with it's slowness.. 

Write..

my heart out..send out those poems, finish that story, journal like I always intend to..have a record of the year that I can reflect on - with stories, poems, daily things, pictures, and quotes all mashed up into books that belonged to each and every day.

Read the books I've piled up for reading..and write my thoughts on each one..even if it's nothing more than.."no! no no no no no no o o o"

 Eat...

..Real food. Not too much. Mostly plants.. (Thank you Michael Pollan).  
       pretty basic...but I think it'll end up being a bit of a challenge. I'm looking forward to getting our eating back to something that compliments our way of life better, and is less lazy, less sugary, less gluttonous than it has been.

Happy 2014 everyone!  

What are your goals for this fresh new year? I'd love it if you shared!  

2013

I’m not setting specific goals this year. But I have a direction, and I have my ideals set more firmly before my eyes as I move forward. I am making more from food, fabric, and the little bits of beauty in my home. I am wearing lipstick that works with my (Very New!) pretty brown hair - orangey reds and pinks and things I could never really rock as a blond. I’m learning to enjoy each experience despite distractions that grate on my compulsive little nerves and laughing more at myself. I’m older in more ways than time can give than I was last year. Older, more joyful, and a little sadder. I’ve become that person wounded by the violence of others - I have trouble discussing tragedies: abortions, shootings, wars. I cry at country songs, and Christmas songs, and even Christian country songs (an awful hybrid designed solely to make the weak among us (me) weepy). I swear more and drive slower than I did ten years ago. I also think more and talk less (really, I do) and am more and more uneasy spending time in big cities, or among too many people.  All in all, I can't wait to see where the year goes.