I am getting in just under the wire to wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving! Today got away from me with table preparations, last minute cleaning and keeping the chef on track–between Naoto’s cooking skills and my nagging and timing reminders, we somehow get the meal on the table!
So, I’m going to sleep with a thankful heart…
Almost all of my Thanksgiving invitations in past years have included a quote about being thankful. (The 2008 invitations above included a quote from Willie Nelson.)
I, like most people I suppose, am a big fan of quotes. I love having little bits of wisdom to think about or turn to when I’m stuck or sad, or happy and thankful. I always notice good quotes, but I don’t always take note of them (except for on this Pinterest board), so one of my goals for the upcoming days is to always write down sayings or words of wisdom or song lyrics that speak to me. And actually just yesterday, as I was Tweet lamenting my compared failure at coming up with a good Thanksgiving table, Donovan reminded me of this: Comparison is the thief of joy.
So, while I am digging out our spare room–which by the way is already a complete dumping ground for ongoing projects, hoarded craft supplies, and home improvement tools but now has also become the dumping ground for the contents of one closet and the master bath–please enjoy these grateful quotes. Some I have used for Thanksgivings past. If you have any grateful quotes to add, please include them in the comments! I love expanding my world of words to live by!
Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it. -William Arthur Ward
Courtesies of a small and trivial character are the ones which strike deepest in the grateful and appreciating heart. -Henry Clay
As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them. -John F. Kennedy
Let us be grateful to the people who make us happy; they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom. -Marcel Proust
Piglet noticed that even though he had a Very Small Heart, it could hold a rather large amount of Gratitude. -A.A. Milne, Winnie-the-Pooh
Gratitude is not only the greatest of virtues, but the parent of all others. -Marcus Tullius Cicero
When I started counting my blessings, my whole life turned around. –Willie Nelson
Nothing is more honorable than a grateful heart. -Seneca
God has two dwellings; one in heaven, and the other in a meek and thankful heart. –Izaak Walton
For each new morning with its light, for rest and shelter of the night, for health and food, for love and friends, for everything thy goodness sends. -Ralph Waldo Emerson
Gratitude is the fairest blossom which springs from the soul. –Henry Ward Beecher
It’s Election Day here in the US! I am feeling proud and thankful to be able to vote for someone I believe in. I am thankful for the women in history who fought for my right to vote as a woman. I am thankful for those who fought in our history’s wars so we could continue to enjoy the right to vote today (especially the World War II veterans, who always have a special place in my heart). I am thankful for the men and women who are still protecting our freedoms and the freedoms of others.
I am also feeling anxious, nervous and scared to see the election results unfold tonight during our Election Party. Naoto has already told me that I shouldn’t cry in front of the guests. I couldn’t make him any promises.
Election Party prep is in full swing around here. On Thursday I packed up all of the Halloween stuff and the weekend ahead promises to be full of cleaning and craft projects of the red, white and blue persuasion. Those guys up above (a plastic elephant and donkey from the toy animal bins at Michaels) are going to get a glitter treatment. We are still deciding on food and I’m trying to motivate myself to get the cleaning and decorating and shopping out of the way so I’m not rushing around on Tuesday while I’m trying to vote and obsessively watch the election coverage on television.
And, while everyday life goes on here, everyday life has virtually stopped out East. My heart is breaking over the devastation there. Cecelia, my longest-running pen pal lives in Manhattan and I am anxiously awaiting a letter from her so I can hear how she fared in the storm. Of course, I understand that it might take awhile as she focuses on adjusting to the new normal there, but in this age of instant communication, it’s weird for impatient me to have to wait for news in the mail…like we’ve turned back the clock 100 years. Cecelia and I have never exchanged email addresses or phone numbers, so I’m relying on John-the-Mailman to bring me news.
In the meantime, I will be hoping for the best for Cecelia and everyone who is affected…
Last week I made a hair appointment on a whim, thinking I would just get the usual inch or two cut off again. My hair has been really long for a really long time. But instead of doing fun things with it, I usually kept it knotted up, or in a pony tail. Totally boring. And, even though I always had good intentions of learning fun long hair styles, I didn’t have the patience to keep practicing. I rarely braided it or put it in a sock bun…never anything really wild and crazy (except for the occasional fish bone braid, which I love!). And, I hardly ever wore it down because it just got in the way, or got all tangled and I just looked unkempt.
So, lately I’ve been feeling the why-bother-with-long-hair thing. Fall felt like the perfect time to chop it all off, because it would grow again to pony-tail length in time for summer (in case I decide that I miss the pony tail thing).
So I chopped it off–rather, my stylist, Beata chopped it off…literally.
It was a surprisingly calm moment…there was no holding of my breath while Beata tied up the hair and broke out the scissors. No gasp when the ponytail dropped off. I think it was the right decision 😉
Here are the twelve inches of hair, all ready to donate to Locks of Love. It’s the second time I’ve donated hair to them…at least someone might be able to benefit from my laziness about getting haircuts!
And here’s me…a little lighter in the hair department.
Happy Labor Day to all of my American friends! I decided it was only fitting to have the hardest working guy in America pictured on today’s post. Here is Naoto in action at his fun job, Trader Joe’s. After sitting at a desk all day (doing translation management), I know he loves to burn off his superfluous energy stocking shelves and chatting up the customers. And we love that he enjoys bringing home the bacon (both literally and figuratively).
Today, we both have the day off and hopefully we will be enjoying a slow morning with lots of coffee and a busy afternoon of getting the office side of the living room situated…hopefully!
*A special thank you to the managers at Trader Joe’s for letting me bend the “no photography” rule…all in the name of blogging!
It’s been a really dry summer. It’s been bad for farmers, bad for gardeners, bad for people who love green grass…and bad for people like me–people who love rainy nights. Last night we got the best steady, heavy rain, so I poured a glass of wine and sat out on the balcony for a bit. It was damp and chilly enough that I could curl up in a blanket. The cool air reminded me that fall is coming and these warm summer days are numbered yet again…time to check off the last few items of that summer manifesto!
Are you looking forward to fall, or are you still trying to soak up the last bits of summer?
I love Elvis…probably not to the same level as those people who make the pilgrimage each year to Graceland to honor his birth and his death, but I do love him.
My cat is named Presley, I have been to Graceland twice (purely coincidental–both times were with my old job when we were in Memphis on business), and I did dance with my dad to Love Me Tender at my wedding (sweetest song ever!)… And many years ago I did the Elvis is Alive 5K–a race that ends with an Elvis (impersonator) concert (I was a runner back then) and I have been to see another Elvis impersonator in Hawaii (Don’t judge–it was touristy fun!). Oh, and I did have an Elvis impersonator surprise me at my bachelorette party (thankfully he was not a stripper!) But, that’s it…(other than the giant Elvis mug in my cabinet and those Elvis Pez dispensers and……..)
To honor the 35th anniversary of Elvis’s death in our own low-key way, Presley & I danced around to Suspicious Minds (my favorite Elvis song) this morning, and listened to the rest of his music on repeat all day. I’m sure the neighbors loved it!
How about you? Do you love Elvis? What is your favorite Elvis song?
I had an epic weekend: a sausage-centered party at Big Guys Sausages, a letter social with the Letter Writers Alliance & a letterpress class with Rar Rar Press. While the party at Big Guys was fun (I had the Italian Chicken Sausage and I am officially three-for-three with loving what I order there!) and the letter writing social was as lovely as always (I wrote 1.5 letters and one postcard!), the letterpress class was a huge highlight.
I’ve been wanting to take a letterpress class for a long time and Rebecca’s class came highly recommended. Unlike a lot of letterpress printers today who design on the computer and have a polymer plate made for printing, Rebecca still hand sets all of her type using old letters made of wood or metal. Some of her type is from the early 1900s! I kind of wanted to spend the whole four hour class just poking through it all and playing with fonts, but there were posters to print!
We learned a little bit of terminology (oh, there is so much terminology…and measuring & math!) and about setting our type and we learned about her two presses before we got started. It took me a long time to choose my type styles and Rebecca assisted a lot when it came to setting my chase (the frame that holds all of the letters together). It is like playing Tetris trying to fill in each and every inch of the chase so the letters are securely set and ready for print. (Rebecca joked that she can pack a car like no one else!)
Rebecca printed the rainbow background first, then we printed the text on top. Every print is a little bit different, some have darker blue-green rainbows, some are lighter …I love that about them. Naoto said I should sign each one (since they are a limited edition of 25) and I think I will. Guess what everyone is getting for Christmas!
The biggest challenge for me before the class was choosing what I wanted to print. I have a long list of quotes that I love (most of them are pinned here on Pinterest), but in the end, I decided “Comparison is the thief of joy” (Theodore Roosevelt) is a perfect life lesson to have on my wall. It’s a good reminder, don’t you think?
kimberly ah 