Saturdays

I love Saturday mornings.  I wake up with a thankful heart, my lips praising God for a good night sleep and for life, and my ears, opened to the voice of Infinite Love.

For you are my God and my strength, my heart trust you and I will praise you, my Father, my God.

This morning, I made up our bed and brought in another area rug that I love and just only yesterday discovered tucked away in one of the upstairs closets.    

What lovely surprises these little occurrences are to me—when you find something beautiful that you either were not expecting to find or looking for... 

I don't know why husbands don't love plants as much as we do, but the thing is, they just don't. Ugh! So, on this side of the bed, I'm not allowed to place any of my beautiful live plants... only this little fake thing here, in case it gets knocked down ;)  

But I can't complain... you see, at least the husband still helps me with all that wall and ceilings hanging of plants that's going on around here, which is a big help! ;)

Today, we woke up to another chilly morning with the sky in the color of steel.  We are bound to more rain and cold and I felt like making some Mediterranean chickpea breakfast with chocolate caliente.   So I did!

 

We ate it all... If you asked me, even leftover dishes look awesome on a table where love and peace abound... don't you think so!

can you find me inside Monalisa?

Hope you are having a beautiful day!

Layering

I love going to thrift stores and second hand shops; particularly, on my first day off right after a tedious long work week. Which, for me, this would be Fridays.  Thrifting always seems to bring my sanity back.  This time, I was in search of cute little treasure; particularly for some cute skirts… you know the kind:  long, flowy, colorful, bohemian or gypsy style, and if they had pockets, even better!

The kind of skirts I’m always after don’t necessarily have to be ‘cute’ or pretty in anyone’s eyes.  Even if I’m the only one who may like a certain piece of clothing, that would be good enough for me.  However, I too have a few rules myself, and that is, I’d really, really have to be swept off my feet by it at the very first glance…  If that’s not the case, must probably I'd end up not buying it or leaving it behind.

So this crazy thing here with pockets is what I found… happy happy!

I’m always looking for odd pieces of clothing that, not only I'd love, but can also use in my layering style.  I don’t about you, but I seem to be drawn to this eclectic style of layering things on me... some people may call this style, clothing for a boho look, or a chic look or artsy style or lagelook, as it's known in Europe. I simply like calling it, a creative style of my own! 

I also found this other skirt in red with cute little flowers

I couldn't leave behind this beautiful, colorful scarf with blue parrots… 

can't wait to wear it with a blue skirt.

This is how I styled that cute skirt, with a different scarf

Must go thrifting again this weekend! 

See you soon my friends! 

Spring cleaning

Donaldo and his boys showed up early this Sunday to help with the chores in the garden.  In just a few hours and $100 less in my pocket, they were done.  I am thankful for their help and thankful for being able to afford such a commodity… however, sadly I’d have to say that the job wasn’t well done, or at least not what I had expected or wanted to see.  

The dead ornamental grass stalks, the spent perennial stems, and all the autumn leaves collected along the fence and under rose bushes were left intact… which means, I had to do the job myself. 

As the days get warmer, there will be more and more gardening chores to do:  The painting, cleaning  and refurbishing of furniture, floors, water fountains and flower pots.  I have decided that this year I am finally going to be discarding all ragged or broken garden ornament and statuary that are no longer looking good. 

I have so many ideas of I want to do and see this year in the garden...  For example, I'd love to see some kind of protection from the sun or shades for the uncovered porch.... and I'm thinking that these ideas below are just fantastic! 

I think we can do something like this on both ends of the porch

In the mean time, inside the house I have been bringing in more plants—an inevitable hobby of my heart, this love affair with houseplants is; I should say.  But, something that makes me infinitely happy.  

Plants, soil, water and sun are in my genes. I got my love of the outdoors and gardening from my father’s Canarian gene pool of farmers and lovers of the earth.

To make everything in the room revolved around the colors on walls, I bought a bedskirt for the bed and a marigold yellow bedspread that I’m loving.  Yellow is such a pretty, happy color and I’m loving how my bedroom is looking these days… 

These eclectic mixture of colors, plants and pretty pictures on walls make me so happy...

I hope you are all doing great!

 

Spring has sprung

Spring has finally sprung!  Yes, yes my friends, spring had just sprung today! Oh, sunlight, what a spiritual powerhouse you are to my soul!  

This amazing sunshine, this most beautiful brilliance encompassing our blue world—what a delight to my heart these things are!

It almost feels as if a long period of darkness had finally lifted up, finally has my soul started to waken up from this long slumber, this sunshine bathing my body in precious gold. 

This ‘awakening of the earth’ always leave me with a new blank page in my life.  A new start, a new beginning.  Sunshine always making me want to clean up the house and change things around; pushing me out to the garden and start pruning and sweeping dead leaves. 

Every dead leaf still hanging on precious rose bushes needs to be removed by hand, for when new shoots starts to form on old green branches, I would not stand the view of dead mingling with new life... 

I have done this procedure for years, and every spring is the same, although I know this practice might be worthless in the end, I still insist of doing it… the results are always very satisfying and something of beautify to the eye... new red buds on clean bare green limbs!  What hopes this brings to my soul.

It is crazy crazy delightful light bathing my heart around here, however, a few weeks ago while walking the old streets of Venice I stumbled on a pothole, fell down and fractured my left ankle on two different places.  I can only do so much outside.  So this spring we will be calling someone to help us around with our gardening chores.

I am walking with a  huge boot on my left feet, yet I can’t stop myself from working inside the house as much as I can or can't... thus I’ve been nurturing my plants, changing things here and there... 

and my room upstairs has also seen a few changes too...

My gallery wall is up again...

And my big plants are loving this sunny window as much as I do...

I love this upstairs room... it makes me happy and the good thing is, I can decorate here as my 'other' nature dictates.  And I say 'other' because I have to very different decorating styles pulling the strings of my heart.  I would not decorate like this downstairs, but in my secret place of places, I am still a gypsy at heart!

Is nice coming here again!  Glad to see you all!

 

The essence of time

What is time?  Time is a flight in a night's dream.  It is the current on butterfly wings and the swift of movement on bird's wings, it is the writer's hand on the brink of nothingness and even on everything.

What I'm trying to say in human language is 'where has time gone?'  

I know I've been here. Same city, same house, same comfy chair under the Monstera tree... yet, it's been a full three years since I visited this space.  Time, it really is the swiftness in a butterfly's wings.  

And it is hard to believe that we are in the brink of another spring, for April it still seems very far away, it is still cold and dreary around here with yet more snow predicted on the forecast. My brain is telling me that time does not stop for anyone, it keeps pushing forward to whatever scheme life is to bring, but my body is tired and my skin thirsts for precious sunshine and happy days in the garden. 

So, for a longer now, I’d have to concentrate in what gives me pleasure inside—my plants. I’ll fill my house with plants, pretend I am a cat, get up on the chair and settle placidly under the desk lamp beside the chair… the cat will settle down and be serene, with a serenity that passes all understanding. And the tranquility of the cat will gradually come to affect the ‘real’ me and give my mind back the self-command it has lost. You don’t always want to believe you are a cat, you know, but again, I’d have to say that the effect of pretending being one works amazing things on your imagination… on your concentration is remarkable, very mysterious.

  

See you soon, hopefully ;)

Good bye Summer

The end of August symbolizes many changes around here—it means shorter days longer night, night time arriving earlier, temperatures beginning to drop and the garden beginning to decrease its growth.  Animals begin to prepare for the dearth of food that generally comes during the winter, by gathering supplies or traveling to warmer climates.  All happens that soon and that fast.  

Although I love the changes transpiring in late August, this always brings a certain sense of apprehension to my days.  I know that summer is over.  I know that soon, spending time in the garden, or having our meals outside will be ending, and that brings nostalgic feelings and that sense of sadness that comes with every ending.  

Sandals and fleece long skirts are to be replaced by sweaters and boots, leggings and scarves and I just can’t think of anything else other than how much I’m going to miss this place in those long coming up months…  

The garden it is truly a paradise these days.  The cooler temperatures have brought in new roses and mourning doves are still nesting its brood.  It is a confusing short period where spring-time and fall like weather mingles and join hands together.   

It feels like saying goodbye to a friend, and it feels like a quiet slumber and it is also the perfect time to look back with gratitude at all the sweet, summery moments from the last few months.