Everyday Inspirations

Personal freedom is something I hold very dear to my heart, possibly due…no; make that probably, due to the lack thereof I have occasionally experienced throughout my life.

But then, isn’t that the way life is? Upon experiencing what it is you don’t want, what do want becomes blatantly obvious!

At my very own “Freedom Space” this month, over at The Calm Space I share my thoughts on taking appropriate actions in your life’s journey.

So why not head on over there now and say hi to the wonderful Káren Wallace while you’re there? Feel free to explore some of the other amazing articles in Káren’s online magazine. You can come back over here, to thank me for steering you in her direction, later.

Oh, and don’t forget to breathe! Deep breaths…

I know, it sounds crazy, but someone just reminded me to keep the blood circulating by taking some big, deep breaths of cleansing air, and you know what? I feel much better for it!

Whatever it takes, to keep you in a tranquil, calm space.

Tweet This Post

Being the creature of habit that I am, when the thought of taking a holiday pops into my brain, I have one point of destination in mind.

But no, today I will not be sharing stories of the place that I refer to as my home away from home. Nor will I be relating to you tales of the sun, the beaches, walks along the river, or any other physical aspect of enjoyment, although I could write multiple articles on the subject.

The holiday unit at the resort where we spend a week, sometimes two, more often than not during the steaming summer month of January, has all the basics we need; three bedrooms, two bathrooms, a kitchen, laundry, lounge and dining area.

The kitchen is kitted out with the basic pots and pans, cutlery, crockery, kettle and toaster. The laundry provides a washing machine, dryer, clothes airer, bucket, broom, mop iron and ironing board.

Basic bed linen, blankets and pillows are provided in the bedrooms, along with bath towels and bath mats in the bathrooms.

All we need to provide ourselves with is food, purchased from the supermarket just up the road from our holiday unit, in fact, its walking distance away.

Before leaving home, all we pack are our clothes, usually summer clothes at that, so we travel light in that regard, although by the time the kids have packed fishing rods, boogie boards, footballs, iPods, mobile phone, etc., we do actually end up with a loaded car.

For the sake of their outdoor enjoyment, however, I don’t mind their various water activity and sporting related bits and pieces. Holidays are for enjoyment, right?

And enjoy ourselves, we do!

Many times I have pondered the why’s and wherefore’s as to how it is that I seem to find more time when holidaying. Why do the days seem longer? There’s still twenty-four hours in every day wherever you are, so what gives?

After a meal, washing up the dishes is easier.

I hang my washing on the clothes line faster.

My ironing is finished in a jiffy (even in summer!)

The beds are made faster.

The floors are swept in next to no time (yes, we have to sweep the floors daily, after we have carted sand in on out feet, from the river or beach).

We end up with more time in every day. That doesn’t happen at home, so what have I been doing wrong at home?

Really, I simply cannot believe that it took me a number of years, multiple holidays and an overdose of brain-strain to realise what we were doing differently when we went away. The answer is so obvious….

When we go away on holidays, we are not bogged down with all of the material stuff we have at home. Our holiday unit is probably less than half the size of our home, and yet…

Some of the best days of our lives have been enjoyed whilst temporarily possessing only the bare necessities in life!

Once this realisation finally hit me, I wanted to re-create the holiday feeling all year through. Yes, even while I was at home.

And so began my task of discarding unwanted stuff around home, sorting through cupboards, purchasing only the essentials.

Minimising doesn’t happen overnight, but then again, the excess stuff around home didn’t accumulate overnight either. It took years, many years, of growing into our larger home. Our larger home came into being due to our growing family.

Funny how these things creep up on you, when you’re not looking, isn’t it?

When I’m holidaying, I enjoy the freedom and the lightweight feeling I carry with me every day. Life is easy, even if only for a week or two. Therefore, is it any wonder that taking a holiday is such a popular pastime?

We can, and should, treat ourselves all year round to this lightweight, heady freedom, when our souls can sour through the days with as much ease as a feather being carried along by the wind.

And so, with the memories of weightless, carefree days held close to my heart, I continue to discard the excess “bulk” from my life, thankful for the days spent in a holiday unit, where, unbeknownst to me, life’s lessons were being learned.

Tweet This Post

Winter is just simply the most heavenly season of the year in my part of the world.

I  could make a list of the advantages of cooler days and nights, in fact, I’ll do just that! Here’s my “Winter Appreciation” List.

• The feeling of the soft fluffy fabrics of my jumpers against my skin is pure luxury.
• I enjoy knitting to my heart’s content, without fear of sweaty fingers.
• Have I mentioned I wear jeans, just about every day? Jeans in winter are so comfy with my fluffy boots, or clogs.
• Ironing isn’t quite the chore in winter that it is in summer!
• I sleep peacefully each night, without waking up all hot and sweaty.
• The heat of the oven when baking warms the house.
• My baking satisfies hungry tummies!
• My cats and kids are all far more cuddly in winter!
• Hardly any weeds grow in the garden and those that do grow are tiny.
• Gardening is a pleasure under the warm winter sun.

Okay, that’s ten points. I could go on to one hundred points, but I think you get the drift…

Little “Cutie Cat” and I enjoyed a wonderful wander around the garden this morning; with me photographing all of my green crops, nearly ready to be picked, and she pouncing out from behind bushes to grab at my hand, startling the daylights out of me as I stopped to pull out a weed here and there.

Coriander is definitely at the top of my favourite herbs list and I have three plants growing, one of which is covered in delicate little flowers right now, much to the bees delight. And the spinach that I had all but given up on has had a new lease on life, now looking fresh and green and ready for the picking.

Coriander in flower

Baby spinach

Here’s a view of some old laundry tubs which make wonderful planters pots. This is where my spinach is thriving, along with some recently planted bok choy. We harvested some of the most carroty tasting carrots I have ever had the pleasure eating from these tubs, only about a month ago. Imperfect, but beautiful.

Recycled tubs

New carrots

The cauliflower and broccoli were planted at the same time, although the broccoli has overtaken the cauliflower by a long shot. We’ll be enjoying the first of this season’s broccoli tonight.

Broccoli and Cauliflower

Ready to eat.

I’ve taken a freshly picked lettuce inside and we have an ample supply of flat leaf parsley on standby, flourishing away happily in the winter sun.

Home grown lettuce

Flat leaf parsley

Our garden is extra green at the moment. This is one family you can rest assured  will be “eating their green’s” for the rest of the winter.

Cutey gardener

Sunning herself

Tweet This Post

One of the things I enjoy the most about blogging is sharing thoughts and ideas with others. As is the case in the “real world”, like minded people are drawn together throughout the blogosphere, sharing inspiration from all corners of the planet.

Yesterday, Robin, from Bogs of Ohio, told us the story of “The Scrounger’s Garden” which is one of the garden displays at the Cleveland Botanical Gardens. In the garden, various items have been recycled, such as old boots and shoes, and even an unused bicycle has been included in the display.

Robin is a wonderful photographer and has included a number of photos in her post, so do pop on over and have a read of the story and admire her photographic skills. And make sure you scroll all the way down to the last photo, where you will see a lamp, made by Robin’s husband, ingeniously sculpted from old used books. I love it!

One of the links in Robin’s story takes us to The X Facta, where Kel shows us how she has made a keepsake journal, by binding together plain old brown paper bags. It’s another ingenious idea and Kel’s artistic talent is apparent when you see the beautiful artwork on her journal. Go on over to Kel’s “Art Attack” and admire her work for yourself.

Another link included in “The Scrounger’s Garden” takes us to the site of Kathy, at “Lake Superior Spirit”, who is another one of Robin’s bloggers friends. Kathy has written an article about the benefits of reusing old cards and calendars. You will find this story at “Taking Back the World, One Card at a Time”.

Kathy’s story really struck a chord with me. It reminded me of my childhood days, when I would save all of the old cards given to my family for birthdays, Christmas and Easter. I had a box full of cards stashed under my bed and when the new school year began, my elder sister and I would cover my new school books with old brown paper, then we would choose a picture from a card to glue on the front of each book.

My sister also taught me how to press flowers, just as Kathy describes, by squashing them for a lengthy amount of time between heavy books.

When my own two daughters were just little girls, each had their own flower press, a more sophisticated manner of pressing flowers than the heavy book version, although both methods work beautifully.

You can imagine my delight when Hayley, my eldest daughter, presented me on Mother’s Day this year with a framed picture which she had made herself. She had found a verse on the internet “How God Created Mother”, which she printed out, glued to a sheet of pretty purple paper, and added pressed pansies along the side.

Here’s a photo of Hayley’s creation ~

Be sure to run the mouse over the photo and click on it, for a closer view.

Hayley apologised for using a second hand picture frame! Can you believe it? It’s such a beautiful gift, from my beautiful daughter, which I will treasure always.

There’s a lot to be said for saving old cards, calendars, magazines and left over fabric pieces, along with pressing pretty, colourful flowers from your garden. The possibilities are endless when considering the number of hand-made projects we can put together, if we just give some thought to recycling, as opposed to discarding.

And think of the amount of joy which can be spread when the time is taken to create your own personalised gift for a friend or family member, just as Hayley did for me.

Between Robin, Kel and Kathy, I have been pleasantly reminded of gardening and craft projects, involving the reusing of old items, that I have enjoyed myself throughout the years, not only from childhood days but also more recently. I’ll make a point of telling you about them, another day.

Right now though, I’m off to get some sewing done. (Which reminders me…I must tell you about the quilt I made, many years ago).

Thank you, Robin and Kathy, for sharing your stories and inspiring not only my day, but also my intended future posts here.

Tweet This Post

Today is the 1^st of August, the horse’s birthday. Although I have not had the opportunity to spend much time with horses I do admire the grandeur of the creatures. And it seems an appropriate day to sing the praises of other domestic creatures.

A friend recently told me a story, a story which had astonished her, leaving her in awe of the intelligence of animals.

A parent from the school that her children attend had spent most of the day in search of her wayward pets. Her two dogs had escaped from her yard in the morning. Obviously enjoying their day of freedom, these canine scamps had not returned.

At 3pm that afternoon the woman had headed to the school to collect her children, whilst still searching the streets for the family’s two fury members, only to discover the dogs already at school and waiting for the children.

Dogs are creatures of habit; they know instinctively when they will be fed, when family members are to be picked up or due home, the time to go for a walk and when it is time to sleep at night. Wishing to please their humans, a dog will go with the flow of the day’s events, taught to them by their humans.

Instinct and intuition are an animal’s only means of communication.

Animals have no use for words. For that matter, they have little use for any of the human requirements that we all seem to feel are a necessary commodity to help us through our lives.

Shelter for any beast is whatever they can find; the canopy of a tree will do, to protect them from the elements, although based on my own experience, my dog prefers to curl up in front of the fireplace on a cold winter’s night, as opposed to curling up on the back veranda! However, my pets show absolutely no regard for the decor of their abode; their concern is far more inclined towards tactile pleasantries.

Animals require so little, yet know so much. If we could quieten our own minds enough to tune into the simplicity of the minds of our pets, what an array of wisdom we would have access to!

Each afternoon in my home, at 3.45pm, my two cats and one dog all head towards the front of my house and wait at the window that has the view towards the street. Knowing my youngest son is due home from school, they are ready to fuss over him when he walks through the door.  This same ritual is repeated with the arrival home of each family member.

A dog’s love and loyalty to its human family knows no limits.

One hot summer’s day my eldest daughter was home alone and decided to go for a dip in the pool, but was prevented from doing so as our beautiful Nellie, a German Shepherd, blocked her way along the path. When a large brown snake (one of the deadliest snakes in the world) reared up at them, the reason for Nellie’s protection became obvious.

Before my two eldest children were born, my husband and I had another “baby”; a German Shepherd named Sire. I trusted that dog implicitly! Sire travelled with us wherever we went.

One hot summer, many years ago, during a trip to Dubbo, in the middle of New South Wales, we took Sire for a swim in the Macquarie River. My husband and Sire swam out to the middle of the river, while I stayed closer to the riverbank. After a while my husband encouraged me to swim out further, but Sire was not impressed.

Dog-paddling over to me, he took my arm in his mouth and swam me back to the shore. Amazed by his behaviour, I swam out again, only to be “rescued” a second time by Sire. Not too long after Sire’s unusual behaviour my husband noticed a current in the river…we all got out!

Sire stayed in our lives for fifteen years, before old age got the better of him. What lessons Sire taught me during those fifteen years! He spoke with his eyes, he protected with his manner, he loved us from deep within his heart.

After my first son was born, when Sire was eight years old, he made it very clear to us that Ben was his responsibility also. We couldn’t have asked for a more attentive baby sitter than Sire.

We are told that we, as humans, are the superior race…but are we really? Perhaps the answer to that question is yes in the majority of instances. But I have to question the use of, or rather lack of use, of our own human intuition.

If we were able to peel back all of the layers of pretence, wrapped around us during the years as we progress through our lives, wouldn’t we discover the same animal instincts, which I so admire in the pets I have had the pleasure of sharing my home with?

We teach our pets the “niceties” expected of them; controlling their natural impulse to lunge at a person in happiness upon seeing them, walking them on the street with the use of a lead as that is what the law requests of us, sit, stay, don’t sniff, don’t bark, on and on it goes.

And then, I’ll be in a room of my house, wondering where my animals have wandered off to, but the wondering doesn’t have to last for long…next moment, they are standing next to me.

Instinct has brought them to me…words are unnecessary. Animals “know”, without any words.

Tweet This Post