Life

Spring – New Lease on Life

/ still a dreamer

Ripping apart an existing workspace, cleaning, and putting it back together – with a new rug – is a very satisfying thing. And I thank Spring for this. With the longer daylight hours and warmer temps so I can open the doors, I was finally in the mood. Ahhhhh – a new work space!

Having a clear workspace to write, edit, sketch is, I think, critical to an artist – at least, this one! I have a studio space upstairs, and a nice area for my computer/graphics work, but on my main workdesk, all my children’s book stuff was in stacks, hanging on to corners, etc. I knew it needed re-organization, but those short days and always-too-quickly-arriving winter evenings were not conducive to tackling the job. I’d bought a nice new area rug to fit in the U-shaped workspace last September, but there it stood, rolled up and leaning against a bookcase. Then Spring hit!

As the rug was too wide for the space, (I had eye-balled it, not measured), I had to take my desk apart. I built my desktop years ago out of a birch veneer flush door to which I attached 1″ square molding all around, to fit snugly on top of 2 file cabinets. Heavy file cabinets. So there was no choice but to take it all apart and start all over so I could make room for the rug. EVERYTHING got sorted, cleaned, re-organized. Now, all my children’s book stuff is at my fingertips. Stuff that I no longer work on got trashed or relocated so I can sit and be inspired the second I sit down, surrounded by everything I want to be working on.

I’m amazed at how exciting this is, but now I have direct access to my dreams, all the time. My friend said I Feng Shui’d my office. I know a little about Feng Shui, and if I did? It was a fortuitous accident. But there it is.  Woo hoo! Thanks, Spring!

And .. if you hadn’t noticed … the new set-up immediately got the Claude Seal of Approval.

New Year’s Intentions

/ still a dreamer

Do you make New Year’s Resolutions? You’re not alone; many people do. I used to make them, too, until I realized I pretty much knew what it was I had to do, commit to, change. But then, recently, I came across something in a local metaphysical-type publication called natural awakenings. It was an article about setting New Year’s intentions.

Tony Burroughs talks about how New Year’s intentions are infinitely more powerful than resolutions and how they put the laws of manifestation to work. He talks about how positive and powerful words, serving the highest and best of the Universe, will manifest not only the greatest good for ourselves, but for all mankind. Understanding that our thoughts, words and actions create the future  and that we use them for the highest and best will bring us the joy we seek.

I visited Tony Burroughs’ web site and found it to have a lot of information about how to buy books and DVD’s or to join Intenders’ circles. But The Code itself has its own page, and here are the Ten Intentions for a Better World that inspired me to write this post. Check out The Code: Ten Intentions for a Better World and see if they resonate with you as a way to start 2010.

Happy New Year!

The First Signs of Christmas

/ still a dreamer / 2 Comments

December begins and my house is seeing the first signs of Christmas. Take a look – see it?

Not my desktop – that Christmas mug over on the right. See? Yeah, that’s it.

Each year in my house as the Christmas season begins there are two small items that lead the way … my red Christmas mugs from Germany, (bought so many years ago when I lived in the city that I can’t even remember where I got them),  and my wonderful dollar store Christmas plates. They’re the first hints that soon the holiday placemats will sit under meals, festive touches will soon start appearing all over the house and that soon … there will be lights and pine  boughs gracing the front porch.

I think a little tradition is good nowadays. How about you? Do you have something special at your house that whispers about the magic of Christmas or the holidays?

Just an Old Folkie at Heart

/ still a dreamer / 2 Comments

FolkGuitarSometimes in the middle of the work, sometimes in the middle of the stress and nonsense, something just keeps shining through. And for me, that is music. Does music do it for you, too?

I love many forms of music, and certainly have several favorites, but what always feels as comfortable as a pair of old shoes, a cozy easy chair, is acoustic folk. No doubt growing up in the 60’s and 70’s in the whole folk scene has a lot to do with it, but what could be better while working to suddenly hear Jesse Colin Young, Bob Dylan, James Taylor? The sweet voices of Sarah McLaughlin, Lucinda Williams, Bonnie Raitt? Acoustic guitar music and folk span decades – it just never gets tired.

And the best of all … it comes streaming through my computer in iTunes. How wonderful is it to have access to hundreds and hundreds of radio stations playing whatever music you feel like hearing on any particular day? Just the best. Thank you, Apple! (and yes, I am on a Mac.) The folk stations that serve up the best, if you folkies out there are reading and are unaware of this gem on your computer, are Radioio Acoustic Cafe, Folk Alley, Grassy Hill Radio and GotRadio-Folk Lore.

Sometimes it’s the seemingly small joys in life that become the rich tapestry backdrops to the rest of our lives … when is there not music?

Honored to Receive the Honest Scrap Award

/ still a dreamer / 2 Comments

honestscrapawardI recently found I was chosen for an award by a fellow blogger, The Battered Trunk.

I readily found what I, as a new recipient, needed to do, but was unsure exactly what the award was about. A little online delving, and I found the following definition of the Honest Scrap Award on Buddhist Minister Rev. Danny Fisher’s, site. He says the following:

This award is bestowed upon a fellow blogger whose blog content or design is, in the giver’s opinion, brilliant. This award is about bloggers who post from their heart, who oftentimes put their heart on display as they write from the depths of their soul.

Wow! A special thanks for the award, then, Marstead!

And the instructions for the award are as follows –

THE HONEST SCRAP AWARD:

1. The Honest Scrap award must be shared!
2. First, the recipient must reveal 10 true things about themselves in their blog that no one else knows.
3. Second, the recipient must pass along this prestigious award to 10 more bloggers.
4. Third, those 10 bloggers must be notified they have been given this award.
5. Those 10 bloggers should link back to the blog that awarded them the Honest Scrap award.

OK – first the 10 things –

1. I was pretty much sewing all my own clothes starting at the age of 11.
2. In high school, I was accepted to all the top NYC/Phila Fashion Design Schools until I had that duh! moment and realized that I would be snuffed out like a bug under a stiletto heel. What was I thinking?! And I went back and re-applied to art school. Whew! That was close!
3. I don’t think there’s a creature on the planet that I wouldn’t find fascinating given the proper introduction (or distance, depending on the animal) I’m remembering an all-too-close encounter with a baldface hornet a few years ago.)
4. I miss the ocean.
5. I thought Howdy-Doody was an incredible waste of time and never ‘got’ the Three Stooges.
6. Notwithstanding the health implications, I could happily live on homemade bread and sweets, the best array of cheeses, and really good coffee.
7. I easily embarrass myself doing mental math in front of people (thank you nuns with flash cards starting in first grade.)
8. I always believed in angels.
9. After seeing the movie On the Beach as a child, I really believed the world could end. Like then.
10.I remember the flute passage in Seven Beauties playing in the courtroom while the proceedings went without sound being one of the most lovely pieces ever, but am not sure I could watch the movie again right now to listen to it.

OK – the blogs – let me say first, I have very little time to check out others’ blogs, and barely enough to keep my own freshened up regularly. I am not a big blogger, and honestly don’t know a lot of blogs to even list. However, that said, here are 4 that I visit regularly or periodically that I will say put their heart on display, and yes, two are dog rescues. I may add more later – this is what comes to mind right now.

Diary of A Children’s Book Writer

Writing for Kids While Raising Them

BAD RAP’s Blog

French Bulldog Rescue Network’s Blog

And thank you again Marstead of Battered Trunk for noting me for this award.