NaPoWriMo 2024 Day 13

Not sure what the prompt was today but my focus was mainly my trusty thermos. It’s not my first thermos. I’ve had several that have travelled to work and even to Wales with me because there’s nothing quite like being able to pause for a hot cuppa. I’ve learned the pleasure of making a thermos when I’m sick and being able to have a hot cup in bed without the tea-making activities. So my thermos is getting its moment of spotlight these days. Worth every penny. It’s not a damn travel mug. It’s a Thermos®. And it keeps things VERY hot. And it turns out you can actually pour without removing the stopper all the way (oh, the things you learn along the way!)

another day sick
another cup of hot tea
cooling

making myself
a thermos of hot tea
for the afternoon

boil up the kettle
thinking of the endless cups
at grandma’s table

And while outside righting and filling the feeders, I noticed some new developments in the front garden.

NaPoWriMo 2024 Day 13

NaPoWriMo 2023 Day 8

So far so good on painting every day of NaPoWriMo. I’m trying hard to use big brushes and not get caught up in the minutiae. You can’t paint tiny petals when you’re using a big quill brush.

cold sunny April
tempting to turn the heat off
history says no

making chair cushions
juggling numbers and math
measure twice, cut, sew

Sit out in the yard
after dinner golden hour
chickadees scold me.

low gardening stool
better than the cold ground but
now other things ache

NaPoWriMo 2023 Day 8

Thursday in New Zealand

I have zipped my suitcase shut. Thus endeth my labors for this morning. 

This guy did not help me, lol.

Painting for Cheer in Mud Season

Here have some flowers. Patience matters is all I can say about this.

After thinking about the demos of sheep painting (and a different teacher’s reminder that people in paintings can start with a carrot shape) I gave these a try and as you can tell wasn’t quite patient enough in terms of adding background etc. Oh well, still ok with it.

and of course, from the quote box, a reminder to take the time to look:

Mystery is what happens to us when we allow life to evolve rather than having to make it happen all the time. It is the strange knock at the door, the sudden sight of an unceremoniously blooming flower, an afternoon in the yard, a day of riding the midtown bus. Just to see. Just to notice. Just to be there. — Joan Chittister

Today I took a side road, and frankly after all these years I should know better than to take a side road on a gloriously WARM February day – I was lucky to arrive home with wheels and axles intact – and yet for all the tricky driving I was glad to have views like this. Thank you, who ever took the time to put up a snow fence and a red one at that! Thank you.

What I Did Today

Got to work too early so I sat in my car and admired the really big gulls up on the mall roof for a little bit and when that had gone on too long I did this:

Not sure why the gnome looks so crazy-eyed. Looks like he’s coming home with a bag of stuff after a wild night out.

For the Quote Box

Thanks go to @jamesvictore for this great quote (from his How to be Brave and Scared Shitless webinar):

We’re all going to die, all of us, what a circus! That alone should make us love each other but it doesn’t. We are terrorized and flattened by trivialities, we are eaten up by nothing. — Charles Bukowski

Here’s the view here right now – in a few I’ll be off to wrangle fabric. Click for the Flickr Album!

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Day 30, NaPoWriMo the final day

I started a different poem but went with this idea that I’d thought of earlier in the month and then not written down. A little prosie, but I hope it captures the moment.

Long ago, behind Sukie’s bright pink house
we played in woods all oaken, dark and green
Just there, behind a stump, a tiny man
sitting quiet, a greenish hat cocked so.
He knew we’d spotted him, no doubt at all
so we hunkered down behind a log
and waited. We crouched until we could
not match his stillness – not a bit longer.
He’d not twitched a hair nor moved a finger
and us, knowing in our eight year old hearts
that magic was involved, and not speaking
crept away, and resumed our hour of play.
I look for him in the woods yet today
the green cap, the nameless magic, the gnome.