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a gentle unfurling

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Started on this piece last night while catching up on a whole backlog of videos from @februaryandjune (my Watch Later list is LONG). Been wanting to dive deep into slow stitching for a while now and my gosh it's such a meditative practice! I've always added random stitching to my snippet journal covers, but never like this. I just went with the flow and did whatever felt right. This piece will probably turn into a journal cover, but for right now, it's just a piece of layered fabric that I'm stitching to my heart's content! So far there's no machine stitching on here and hopefully, it stays that way. I am going to add some beads to it though. Already have a few laid out and waiting to be threaded. Felt very drawn to the blue/green/teal scheme for this one, but I've got some gorgeous pink/coral/beige linens that are calling to be made into a similar piece. I'm thinking I might do a series of them...IDK! That would keep me occupied for a while. Hopefully, by then I'll be all caught up on watching Youtube videos! xx

Gathering some pretty things to start on something new:

✩ Antique linens
✩ Fabric ribbons
✩ Embroidery floss
✩ Morganite chips
✩ Aqua glass beads
*need to find some pretty papers to match

I have an idea but haven't figured out how to begin, which means that I just need to do it and start from where I am.

I hope you all had a great holiday weekend. xx

I'm quite behind in sharing my journal pages, but here are my March pages in my #unravelingjournal.

March was all about learning about myself. I like doing this every year to take stock of who I am. I usually review my personality types—Myers-Briggs, Enneagram, Love Languages, my birth chart, etc—and journal my thoughts and revelations. I'm always amazed at all the new insights I gather when I do this—I call them epiphames. Because we know all of this about ourselves already, but depending on where we are in our personal journey, studying ourselves over again always brings with it new insights and ah-ha moments we hadn't recognized before.

I've been really interested in Astrology lately, so for this month, I reflected on my birth chart again. I recently learned about two things—The Four Elements and our North and South Nodes—how you can find out your own from reading your birth chart and what they mean.

I share what I've learned about myself over on my blog, but in a nutshell, I have to be more like Water. I have to learn the practice of stillness and the art of letting go.

I have to learn how to flow. xx

Books 4/20: Yesterday I was The Moon by Noor Unnahar
Rating: ✩✩✩

I've been collecting a lot of poetry books lately. A few weekends ago, I purchased four collections from Strand and one of those books was Noor Unnahar's Yesterday I Was The Moon. I've been wanting to read her work for a very long time now, so I was happy to have found a copy at Strand. IDK, I didn't enjoy it as much as I thought I would. But it was still a nice read and I love the tile poem very much. xx

Stillness—the act of intentionally pausing; of being mindful and present.

I feel like we're all one of three people: one focused on the future, stuck in the past, or living each day in the present. I don't think either is good or bad but the latter is definitely ideal. I feel those who are constantly living for the future forget the good they have now, and those living in the past can't recognize the good right in front of them. The balance between the two is living in the present. Being mindful of all you have and being grateful for it.

I struggle a lot with "living in the moment." I wouldn't be surprised if we all do. Life comes at us fast. There's always something that we need to do, see, or take care of. It's difficult dealing with what's going on in your life plus what's going on in the world. Sometimes we don't have time to slow down and pause. And honestly, I don't think we'll ever have enough time. That's where the intention comes in and when mindfulness comes to play. Like Ferris said, "If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.”

I've enjoyed exploring stillness, this intentional pause to take note of the things presently around me. I find it so hard to do living in a busy city like New York. There are just too many distractions and too much noise. Everything is always "go, go, go" and it feels odd to just stop. I personally struggle with being stuck in my past, something I work hard at being mindful of. My mind can sometimes spiral down that hurt hole and get stuck on what someone did to me or what awful luck I've had—things from my past that I never had any control over in the first place. I try to be mindful of this and I've noticed that practicing gratitude for what I have now helps pull me out of that spiral.

I've learned that I need to take more time out of my day to pause. It's almost like when you're packing your bag for a huge trip. You're on automatic as you're packing but you always need to pause and take stock of what's on your list. I think we should all pause and take stock of the greatness in our lives right at this moment. It's far better than what we've lost or what we don't have yet because it's here. xx

Oh hey, it's #thursday3 and I've got a new portrait of myself that I haven't shared yet...

✩ I took out my paints the other day because I had a whole basket of acrylic gouache that needed to be added to my swatch book. I sat down and swatched them, then purposely left them all out because I will only use things if they are out in the open on my desk. I gessoed a page in my current journal too AND since I had all of that prepped, last night I actually got messy in my journal! Worked on the Expand prompt from Messy May. Honestly, it felt very good to create an art journal page again!

✩ I've been looking for places to escape to this summer. I really just need to get out of the city and since I work remotely, I definitely could take advantage of traveling and working from wherever I am. Been looking at places in New England because it's easily accessible by train. Not looking to drive long distances (if at all really, which also sucks because this country is just built like that). But IDK, it's probably not just me, but everything has gotten so ridiculously expensive and it seems like everywhere I look the crime rate has gone up (and what I mean by this is gun violence), and society, in general, has gotten more mean-spirited, and it all just makes me want to just stay home and never go anywhere ever again and save up my money so that hopefully one day I could buy myself a small home in the middle of the forest and live peacefully amongst nature. I want to say that my brain is exaggerating about how bad it's gotten out there, but also...no.

✩ I've been very deep into my personal self-care/spiritual practice lately. Working through @lizelayne's Water Your Soul course has been a delightful pause in my day. I'm reading @debrasilverman_astrology's The Missing Element, which is very enlightening, and I've been listening to the audio lectures of @alanwattsorg. LOTS of journaling happening in this corner. I sometimes wish I had more time in my day to do more of this. But lately, I've been having to find little pockets of time to read, work on a lesson, or listen to a lecture while I work. But it's been good.

Anyway, I hope everyone is well. Happy May the 4th! xx

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