Taking stock of November

If I was a month, I would be November. And to celebrate my favourite month, nothing better than taking stock(a)

Making: plans, and enjoying it immensely
Cooking: plant-based, oil-free recipes
Drinking: my garden in teas
Reading: My living favourite author's new book "The imperfect path"
Wanting: Lots of non-material things and one material thing: a kindle reader
Looking: through my office's window as autumn unravels
Playing: all year around!
Deciding: on a word for 2018
Wishing: for a simple, meaningful Christmas season
Enjoying: a quiet(ish) month at work
Waiting: for budgets
Wondering: if I will ever write consistently on this blog
Loving: the absence of self-pressure to write in here
Pondering: how much space we really need. No, on how little space we really need.
Considering: selling our house!!!!!
Watching: eagles nearby our house (and thinking I don't want to leave this place...)
Hoping: my hair to stop falling like autumnal leaves, asap
Marvelling: at how many good people there are in the world
Needing: to rearrange my work days
Smelling: obsessively, my favourite five-year-old while he still smells like a newborn...
Wearing: colourful and fun tights
Following: my gut whilst ignoring my head and shushing my heart...
Noticing: on what really makes me feel good
Knowing: 1) I will always be a work in progress 2) progress is not always forward...
Thinking: on this powerful question: what's the One thing I can do such by doing it everything else is easier or unnecessary?(b)
Admiring: small and eco-friendly houses
Sorting: thoughts as laundry
Buying: books, music and toys (though I didn't need to, for sure...)
Getting: nightly cuddles and kisses. So good!
Bookmarking: books to read in 2018
Disliking: myself on social media
Opening: a new day, daily
Giggling: at Siri's responses to my requests
Feeling: hopeful


(a) Original idea and a blank list for you to copy and paste (in case you want to join in) here
(b) From this book

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October

October.
A pink sky.
Lots of unanswered questions.
A moment was needed, but life doesn't stop.
Inhale / Rain / Exhale.
Here we go again.

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|September| Breathing and enduring

For the past years, September was always the hardest month for me. The busiest and unhinged. This year, though, despite the demanding challenges I've had to face,  something was different. Firstly, I decided to try to meditate. I had tried before and to be honest, hated it, it felt like I was being brainwashed with my own consent (no good), so I decided it was not for me long ago. I'm glad I was willing to give it a try again (a nice side effect of my word of the year - play - which I hope to write about soon) and I think the three, five or ten minutes of meditation were so helpful. But the major factor of strengthens I've felt come from food intake. We have been changing our diet and I wholeheartedly believe that it was the key factor that allowed me to go through all the demands relatively positive and sane. Providing I was already quite the healthy eater, I never expected to notice such a difference as I did and it was such an empowering realization!
Even so, I'm glad September is over and I'm more than happy to welcome a calmer, tunned October.

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|August| The special and ordinary moments

If you were to visit my home-town in August, you would be misguided by the French accent everywhere or by the foreign car plates on the road, that this is a touristic destination. It's not. It signals the massive arrival of emigrants for a short period to unite with their Portuguese families. But, as they are arriving with their vibrant energy, my little family usually gets called by the ocean, and we must go. In the meanwhile, there are chores, mess-ups, plans, readings, catnaps and dreams as I try to notice the little ordinary moments that make our life. Thank you, August. You were good to us.

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July | Clarity

Life has been happening offline - this time it was not intentional, but I don't dislike it.

The web brings us so many good things, yet I'm noticing I find more clarity away from it. It is as if my brain doesn't quite know how to process information (even good information) in the new digital life. I can get easily excited and inspired but also overwhelmed and adrift.

July was all about finding/  stumbling on clarity! I feel 2017 has been such a restless year, I've been drifting a lot in so many areas of life... But, as I turn a half year and I enter a new decade in life, things are starting to make sense again, I am with a renewed sense of direction and meaning.

I don't have all the answers, of course. But I've been gathering information, experimenting, playing for the last few months, and just when all this wondering around was feeling unbearable, I found the glue that can tie it all together in the most unexpected place: through an intensive three-day work training on design thinking, which I ended up participating by chance. Life is a wonderful little box of surprises, isn't it?

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A story from June

June started with the perfect pace, living simpler does get naturally easier on vacations. We spend our days by the sea, in the water or walking by the seashore. The days were long, the weather perfect, the water temperature very acceptable and all of the places were rather unpopulated yet, so I got rather convinced that early June is the perfect timing for vacations.

******
I read a book that has been shifting the way I look at trees and plants. The book is called "The Hidden Life of Trees", and it tells engaging stories about how trees communicate with each other, how they support other trees through their roots,  how they educate the younger ones... the stories opened up a new perspective to me.  Trees are presented as truly social beings that live their lives at a pace that makes it difficult to understand for us humans. The author proposedly anthropomorphizes the trees to make his point, but it worked for me: by the end of the book, it was clear to me how little do  I  know about this subject, how little I understand it.  I did not need convincing of how marvellous their world is (I know that since the first time I was in a forest as a young girl) but, the possibility of trees storing information, feeling, communicating, parenting, building communities,  kind of blows my mind in awe. And I'm left with so much to discover and a relentless: What if?

******
I felt drowning as I returned home and work. Loads of duties, demands and "normal" life.  It is very clear to me that I need to redefine my "normal" life.
Usually, I would think that there are no big changes, that change is something you implement slowly but steadily in our lives. I would think I need more time outside in nature, doing nothing. I would think I should redefine my screen time - again. I would think I need to focus on health, rest, nourishing food, family, play.
And I did all of the above. But I'm feeling I run out of small changes to do and the feeling isn't going away. I need a BIG change.

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Opening - a short film

A few days ago, my little family pressed pause and went south in search for some quietness, sun, sea and (especially for me), space to breathe and restore myself.

I had a loose intention of video recording a few moments of our days despite having no experience or knowledge, and I've played a bit with movie making upon returning home. 

Click below if you would like to see my first attempt on film, and of course, I would appreciate any advice you have for me!

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A little photo-journal |MAY|

A few details from my May:

• blooms and naked trees (noting and acknowledging the difference)
• wearing personal notes
• looking up and soaking the hues
• looking inside into the shadows
• looking outside of my window
• being looked after
• deep, deep work
• simple and delicate chamomile 
• night watch

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Me, elsewhere |April|

It's not that I don't want to write in this space - more than ever I'm feeling the need of an active usage of this blog/a blog- as it is the lack of organisation in order to make it happen. It will happen, soon. In the meanwhile, I don't want to leave April out from my monthly journal, so here is a short record of the playfulness I have been spreading elsewhere.

Spring placed itself definitely, time is spent outside as much as possible, our house keeps feeling bigger and bigger and our garden smaller and smaller. April brought serious adjustments, both physical and mental. Though I consider myself to be up for changes overall, I can´t help to notice how much time I need to adjust to any change these days. JP doesn't stop growing (how does he dare?) and I can do nothing but sit and watch him. Nor I would like to do anything to stop him, but still... it all feels too fast...

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Tobias

Seven years ago, this handsome dog decided he was a part of our family. He joined in our walks at first, then,  he stood by our house day and night and took it on himself to be a keeper of our home and of our family, including our cats, standing firm until we realised that he was already ours, that he was meant to be ours, even though we were not looking for another dog.
And for the past seven years, he has earned his cognomen "the kind giant" every day without exception.
So today, as his big heart stopped,  mine shrunk considerably.

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