words for your weekend

"There are days I drop words of comfort on myself like falling leaves and remember that it is enough to be taken care of by myself."

-Brian Andreas

Isn't that such a happy, gentle reminder? I hope you're able to show yourself some love this weekend, no matter how small or simple that act may be. See you next week, friends! XO

words for your weekend

"The ancients are right: the dear old human experience is a singular, difficult, shadowed, brilliant experience that does not resolve into being comfortable in the world. The valley of the shadow is part of that, and you are depriving yourself if you do not experience what humankind has experienced, including doubt and sorrow. We experience pain and difficulty as failure instead of saying, I will pass through this, everyone I have ever admired has passed through this, music has come out of this, literature has come out of it. We should think of our humanity as a privilege. "

-Marilynne Robinson

Have you read any of Marilynne Robinson's books? Housekeeping is my favorite, but I am looking forward to reading Home and her most recent non-fiction work, When I Was a Child I Read Books: Essays. You can also read a fascinating interview she did for The Paris Review, which is where I found the above quote. Her thoughts on religion, the writing process, education, nuclear pollution, and Hitler's vegetarianism (!) make for an interesting peek into  her life, mind, and writing. 

I hope you have a lovely weekend, friends! XO

words for your weekend

 

"In the afternoon when the sun lights the stucco buildings across the street, it's possible to count a dozen different colors of paint, all fading together on the highest parts of the wall: yellow, ochre, brick, blood, cobalt, turquoise. The national color of Mexico. And the scent of Mexico in a similar blend: jasmine, dog piss, cilantro, lime. Mexico admits you through an arched stone orifice into the tree-filled courtyard of its heart, where a dog pisses against a wall and a waiter hustles through a curtain of jasmine to bring a bowl of tortilla soup, steaming with cilantro and lime. Cats stalk lizards among the clay pots around the fountain, doves settle into the flowering vines and coo their prayers, thankful for the existence of lizards. The potted plants silently exhale, outgrowing their clay pots. Like Mexico's children they stand pinched and patient in last year's too-small shoes. The pebble thrown into the canyon bumps and tumbles downhill.

Here life is strong-scented, overpowering. Even the words. Just ordering breakfast requires some work like toronja, triplet of muscular syllables full of lust and tears, a squirt in the eye. Nothing like the effete "grapefruit," which does not even mean what it says."

-Barbara Kingsolver, The Lacuna

I'm missing Mexico like crazy this winter. In this cold, dry place I think often of humidity on my skin and twisting through my hair, and long to hear warm, deep languages spoken in crowded markets. The sleepy rhythms, sounds, and smells of rural fishing villages are calling to me, and Barbara Kingsolver's The Lacuna isn't helping much. Mexico, Frida, politics, and art make for a colorful, thoughtful read - perfect (though slightly heartbreaking for the landlocked) for these short, dark days of winter.

Happy weekend. Hope it's a lovely one.

words for your weekend + some help needed

Let's Celebrate
by Mandy Coe

the moments
where nothing happens
The moments 
that fill our lives.
Not the field bright with poppies, but
the times you walked, seeing
no leaves, no sky, only one foot 
after another.


We are sleeping
(it's not midnight and
there is no dream).
We enter a room - no one is in it.
We run a tap,
queue to buy a stamp.


These are the straw moments
that give substance
to our astonishments;

moments the homesick dream of;
the bereaved, the diagnosed.

These days I spend a lot of time thinking about this concept of the moments before; the moments before tremendous loss or some unforeseen, forever kind of change - the moments before our stories, our lives, are irreversibly altered. One moment we're living our normal, quiet lives - tucking our kids into bed, answering a phone call from a friend, cleaning up from a long, busy day, and the next moment we're staring at impossible, heartbreaking change.

In the past two months our family has experienced a lot of changes. Sela was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes the week before Christmas, and we also learned that our new baby (a girl!) will most likely be born with club feet. Our life looks and feels so very different than it did just a few short weeks ago, and we are all different people than we were in those moments before. As awful as it was to learn of Sela's diagnosis and to spend 3 days in Primary Children's Hospital, there were so many tender, sweet moments that I will never forget. Curling my pregnant body around her tiny body as we shared a hospital bed, I marveled at the strength of her spirit and the bravery and insight she showed during those early, difficult days. Given the chance to better know my daughter and see her ability to accept and do hard, hard things, is a gift - a gift I couldn't have received in any other way.

I think the greatest gift we have is knowing that Sela will live a happy, healthy, and normal life, and that our baby girl will have perfect, fully functioning feet with just a little extra attention, planning, and the right medical care. I saw many families in the time we spent at the hospital whose stories and journeys are far more difficult and lengthy than ours will ever be, fingers crossed.

I guess the reason behind sharing this with all of you is that I am looking for people to talk to about these new changes in our lives. I would love to hear or read real-life stories of babies born with club feet, and to have a chance to talk to moms who have made it through. Also, if any of you know a cute, diabetic, five year-old girl, could you send her our way? Sela is desperate for a diabetes buddy to talk and play with. :)

words for your weekend

When You Come to Love
by Ann Fisher-Wirth


When you come to love,
bring all you have.

Bring the milk in the jug,
the checked cloth on the table -
the conch that sang the sea
when you were small,
and your moonstone rings,
your dream of wolves,
your woven bracelets.

For the key to love is in the fire's nest,
and the riddle of love is the hawk's dropped feather.

Bring every bowl and ewer,
every cup and chalice, jar,
for love will fill them all-

And dazzled with the day,
fold the sunlight in your sheets,
fold the smell of salt and leaves,
of summer, sweat, and roses,
to shake them out when you need them most,

For love is strong as death.


A dear friend sent me this beauty of a poem early in the week, and I've read it every single day. My life is so full of good friends, long talks, laughter, and exciting opportunities these days that I can't help but feel lucky to be surrounded by wonderful, tender people and the love and wholeness they bring into my life.

I'm a lucky girl, indeed.

Thank you for following this funny little space, and for all of your kind messages and comments. Internet bonding is the best, right? Hope your weekend is a long and relaxing one. See you soon. XO

words for your weekend

 

“From the standpoint of daily life, however, there is one thing we do know: that we are here for the sake of each other - above all for those upon whose smile and well-being our own happiness depends, and also for the countless unknown souls with whose fate we are connected by a bond of sympathy. Many times a day I realize how much my own outer and inner life is built upon the labors of my fellow men, both living and dead, and how earnestly I must exert myself in order to give in return as much as I have received.”
-Albert Einstein

Hello, you! Any big plans for the weekend ahead? Brian and I are sneaking down to Zion National Park for a few days of hiking, sleeping, and really, really good fish tacos. I'd be lying if I didn't admit I'm the most excited for the hours of uninterrupted sleep. :) Catch you soon, okay? XO

words for your weekend

I can't feel you anymore, I can't even touch the books you've read
Every time I crawl past your door, I been wishin' I was somebody else instead
Down the highway, down the tracks, down the road to ecstasy 
I followed you beneath the stars, hounded by your memory
And all your ragin' glory


You'll never know the hurt I suffered nor the pain I rise above
And I'll never know the same about you, your holiness or your kind of love
And that makes me feel so sorry


Idiot wind, blowing through the buttons of our coats
Blowing through the letters that we wrote
Idiot wind, blowing through the dust upon our shelves
We're idiots, babe
It's a wonder we can even feed ourselves


-Bob Dylan, "Idiot Wind" from Blood on the Tracks (1975)


No one writes heartbreak and longing better than Mr. Zimmerman. I've had this album on repeat for the past few days, and I'm sure it will continue through the warm weekend ahead.

Happy Friday, you. Hope your weekend is a sweet one. XO

P.S. I'm also loving this "Buckets of Rain" cover.

words for your weekend

 

"Meeting a woman anywhere teaches you more about the world than reading Balzac. Whether it be a wife, a woman encountered by happenstance, or a prostitute, she will teach you about the world. In fact, I build my life on meeting women and I have hardly read a book since primary school. I think that all the attractions in life are implied in women."

- Nobuyoshi Araki

Happy weekend, darlings. I hope it's a good one. XO

Photo Credit: Fa by Obragruesa.

words for your weekend

  

“Often a man wishes to be alone and a girl wishes to be alone too and if they love each other they are jealous of that in each other, but I can truly say we never felt that. We could feel alone when we were together, alone against the others … But we were never lonely and never afraid when we were together. I know that the night is not the same as the day: that all things are different, that the things of the night cannot be explained in the day, because they do not then exist, and the night can be a dreadful time for lonely people once their loneliness has started. But with Catherine there was almost no difference in the night except that it was an even better time.”

-Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell To Arms 

I'm going to spend my weekend hunting down and rereading my copy of A Moveable Feast in honor of Mr. Hemingway's birthday. I love reading about the "Lost Generation" of writers and artists (Fitzgerald and Eliot, in particular) and all of their adventures in Paris during the 20s.

Hope your weekend is wonderful, friends! XO

words for your weekend

The Tallest Man On Earth has been on repeat at our house for weeks; it just sounds and feels like summer to me.

Happy July weekend to you! Hope it's full of sunshine, great food, and the people you love. We're busy trying to pull together a little birthday party for baby Graham. He turns two on Sunday, TWO! I'm so excited. Catch you next week! XO

words for your weekend

"Be fit for more than the thing you are now doing. Let everyone know that you have a reserve in yourself; that you have more power than you are now using. If you are not too large for the place you occupy, you are too small for it."

-James A. Garfield

Hello, Friday! I'm so happy the weekend is finally here. We are doing a bit of backyard camping tonight, spending time in our garden tomorrow (We have peas! I ate one this morning and it was delicious.), and I'll most likely spend Sunday brainstorming and planning for an exciting new project. I'm still a little too scared to say it out loud, but if i do manage to pull it off it will be awesome. Or it may just deplete my savings account and be a major waste of time and resources - it can go either way at this point! Hope you have a great weekend. XO
 

Photo via Cup of Jo

words for your weekend

“I’m not telling you to make the world better, because I don’t think that progress is necessarily part of the package, I’m just telling you to live in it. Not just to endure it, not just to suffer it, not just to pass through it, but to live in it. To look at it. To try to get the picture. To live recklessly. To take chances. To make your own work and take pride in it. To seize the moment. And if you ask me why you should bother to do that, I could tell you that the grave’s a fine and private place, but none I think do there embrace. Nor do they sing there, or write, or argue, or see the tidal bore on the Amazon, or touch their children. And that’s what there is to do and get it while you can and good luck at it.”

-Joan Didion

Hello, you! Have any plans for the warm weekend ahead? I'm busy working on a few Father's Day surprises (and pretending that I didn't just realize that it is, in fact, this Sunday. eeps.), and spending some time in the sun with my babes - we'll probably squeeze in a few snow cone runs too. XO


Photo Credit : Jackie Luo
Quote Via: Marvelous Kiddo

words for your weekend

"Sometimes a kind of glory lights up the mind of a man. It happens to nearly everyone. You can feel it growing or preparing like a fuse burning toward dynamite. It is a feeling in the stomach, a delight of the nerves, of the forearms. The skin tastes the air, and every deep-drawn breath is sweet. Its beginning has the pleasure of a great stretching yawn; it flashes in the brain and the whole world glows outside your eyes. A man may have lived all of his life in the gray, and the land and trees of him dark and somber. The events, even the important ones, may have trooped by faceless and pale. And then - the glory - so that a cricket song sweetens his years, the smell of the earth rises chanting to his nose, and dappling light under a tree blesses his eyes. Then a man pours outward, a torrent of him, and yet he is not diminished. And I guess a man's importance in the world can be measured by the quality and number of his glories. It is a lonely thing but it relates us to the world. It is the mother of all creativeness, and it sets each man separate from all other men."

-John Steinbeck, East of Eden

Sorry of the lack of posts around here, friends. I'm still feeling a little quiet in my heart and everything is just a little bit hazy.

Grief is hard a thing.

In other news, I'm reading East of Eden again and loved this passage so much I had to share it with you today. I also gifted myself Tina Fey's Bossypants for my birthday earlier this week and I can't put it down. So, so funny. Happy weekending to you! I hope you can catch a bit of sunshine and fun! XO


Photo Credit: Weiferd Watts

words for your weekend

Happy Friday, friends! Hope your weekend is full of warm sunshine, good friends, and even better food. :) I'll see you around next week! XO

Quote spotted on Abbey Goes Design Scouting, but originally from Miss Vu.

words for your weekend

Briana's Words, Briana's Wisdom from Kate and Neil on Vimeo.

I'm posting this beautiful video of my dear friend Briana today for purely selfish reasons. I love hearing her voice, seeing her smile, and remembering our shared conversations that were so very similar to the ones captured in this video. Hearing her laugh has brought healing to my heart during this long, soul stretching week, and I know I'll be returning to this video again and again just to see my friend's face and to hear her wise words.

Thank you, Kate and Neil, for your inspired work, and for creating and sharing such a wonderful gift with everyone who knows and loves Bri.

words for your weekend

The Manifesto of Encouragement

Right now:

There are Tibetan Buddhist monks in a temple in the Himalayas endlessly reciting mantras for the cessation of your suffering and for the flourishing of your happiness.

Someone you haven't met yet is already dreaming of adoring you.

Someone is writing a book that you will read in the next two years that will change how you look at life.

Nuns in the Alps are in endless vigil, praying for the Holy Spirit to alight the hearts of all of God's children.

A farmer is looking at his organic crops and whispering, "nourish them."

Someone wants to kiss you, to hold you, to make tea for you. Someone is willing to lend you money, wants to know what your favourite food is, and treat you to a movie. Someone in your orbit has something immensely valuable to give you -- for free.

Something is being invented this year that will change how your generation lives, communicates, heals and passes on.

The next great song is being rehearsed.

Thousands of people are in yoga classes right now intentionally sending light out from their heart chakras and wrapping it around the earth.

Millions of children are assuming that everything is amazing and will always be that way.

Someone is in profound pain, and a few months from now, they'll be thriving like never before. They just can't see it from where they're at.

Someone who is craving to be partnered, to be acknowledged, to ARRIVE, will get precisely what they want -- and even more. And because that gift will be so fantastical in it's reach and sweetness, it will quite magically alter their memory of angsty longing and render it all "So worth the wait."

Someone has recently cracked open their joyous, genuine nature because they did the hard work of hauling years of oppression off of their psyche -- this luminous juju is floating in the ether, and is accessible to you.
Someone just this second wished for world peace, in earnest.

Someone is fighting the fight so that you don't have to.

Some civil servant is making sure that you get your mail, and your garbage is picked up, that the trains are running on time, and that you are generally safe. Someone is dedicating their days to protecting your civil liberties and clean drinking water.

Someone is regaining their sanity. Someone is coming back from the dead. Someone is genuinely forgiving the seemingly unforgivable. Someone is curing the incurable.

You. Me. Some. One. Now.

With the all the moving and shaking in world these days it's so good, and important, to be reminded of all the things that are working out and going right. It's good to know that there are people who believe in peace and the goodness of people. It's good to remember that we are not alone.


Spotted on Leigh's Marvelous Kiddo, originally posted on White Hot Truth and so beautifully written by Danielle LePorte. Image from Alice Yoo's Pinterest.

words for your weekend

"No need to hurry. No need to sparkle. No need to be anyone but oneself."

-A Room of One's Own, Virgina Woolf


isn't this photo gorgeous? i can't stop looking at it. happy weekend, you. i hope it's full of good things and wonderful people. XO

words for your weekend

image via mental stability

First, a poem:

i carry your heart with me
e.e. cummings

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go, my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing, my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate, my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world, my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

and now my favorite love song of all time:

Don't Think Twice, It's Alright
Bob Dylan




And last of all:

Have a wonderful weekend! I'll see you on Monday with one last Valentine's Day project (are you sick of them yet?), so make sure to check back! XO

words for your weekend

My Work
By Raymond Carver

I look up and see them starting
down the beach. The young man
is wearing a packboard to carry the baby.
This leaves his hands free
so that he can take one of his wife's hands
in his, and swing his other. Anyone can see
how happy they are. And intimate. How steady.
They are happier than anyone else, and they know it.
Are gladdened by it, and humbled.
They walk to the end of the beach
and out of sight. That's it, I think,
and return to this thing governing
my life. But in a few minutes

they come walking back along the beach.
The only thing different
is that they have changed sides.
He is on the other side of her now,
the ocean side. She is on this side.
But they are still holding hands. Even more
in love, if that's possible. And it is.
Having been there for a long time myself.
Theirs has been a modest walk, fifteen minutes
down the beach, fifteen minutes back.
They've had to pick their way
over some rocks and around huge logs,
tossed up from when the sea ran wild.

They walk quietly, slowly, holding hands.
They know the water is out there
but they're so happy that they ignore it.
The love in their young faces. The surround of it.
Maybe it will last forever. If they are lucky.
and good, and forebearing. And careful. If they
go on loving each other without stint.
Are true to each other—that most of all.
As they will be, of course, as they will be,
as they know they will be.
I go back to my work. My work goes back to me.
A wind picks up out over the water.

the sweetest image ever found on the lil bee. isn't this poem great? i like to think about and believe in the forever kind of love, don't you? hope your weekend is a lovely one, friends. XO

words for your weekend

"A person who has good thoughts cannot ever be ugly. You can have a wonky nose and a crooked mouth and a double chin and stick-out teeth, but if you have good thoughts they will shine out of your face like sunbeams and you will always look lovely."

-Ronald Dahl

happy image by garance via simple lovely. now, this pretty lady obviously doesn't have a wonky nose or double chin, but her smile is so infectious I just had to share. hope your weekend is a happy one, friends! xoxoxo