Spring Thief

Whoever stole spring and hid it back in late winter, would you kindly bring it back?  It is beyond time for me to be working in my yard and flowerbeds getting things planted and moved around, but that is rather difficult to do bundled up in mittens and winter coat.  That and baseball games were not meant to be watched from underneath a heavy blanket while drinking hot chocolate.  You must have gotten that confused with another sport.  The poor flowers and trees are sorely missing the warmth of spring as well.  They are sitting in a half stage, not knowing whether to put on more leaves or drop the ones that have already come out.

So, if the thief of spring would be kind enough to leave it on the front porch, no questions will be asked and all will be forgiven.  Your identity will remain confidential and we will all, plants, animals and humans alike, get on with the daily working of our lives.

Post #101

My attention was drawn to an interesting little tidbit in my stats this morning.  As of my last post, I had made 100 posts since starting this blog.  This is 101.  Amazing!  Has it really been that long?  Have I really had that much to say?  Wow.

All of the euphoria and high energy of the weekend has finally left and I settled back into my weekly routine only to have it all interrupted by another bout of sickies.  I have a house full of sick kids and at the moment just want to curl up on the couch for a really long nap.  That more than likely isn’t going to happen.  The weather isn’t making it any easier to stay awake either.  It is over cast and threatening rain that will probably not fall, at least not here.

It is definitely one of those days where you just want to crawl back under the covers and forget the sun came up.  Maybe if I can get to my second cup of coffee I will have a bit more energy to do something besides yawn.  Seriously!  I have a pile of luscious beads just waiting for me to come and play and here I am being lazy and unmotivated.  I did manage to put together a few things last night, though, so I don’t feel quite so bad.

I did decide that one of my new product ideas just isn’t all that feasible.  Besides the huge amount of time it takes to do, it is just torture on my hand and wrist.  Considering it is basically just another version of my other idea that is working, I think it will be okay to scrap that one.  I’m still a ways off from getting to the point of creating these.  I want to finish up some of the things I already have going before moving on to the next.  That and if I don’t get some of those things finished and out of the way, I won’t have any room left to get anything else started.

So, how was that for a totally random, rambly post? 

 

Weekend Awesomeness

I had a really amazing weekend.  Things worked out just right so I was able to attend a bead show, my first ever.  I had fully intended to just go on Saturday so I would have it out of the way and have the rest of the weekend to get things done around the house.  Well, for a bead addict lover, that just wasn’t possible.

I had been really iffy on going since one of my sons had a baseball game on Saturday and I knew that if I did go, 1) I wouldn’t have a lot of time to really look and 2) I would probably end up spending a fortune.  Well, the game ended up getting canceled because the storms earlier in the week did some damage to the lights on the fields so that freed up my day and made my decision for me to go.  On a bit of a whim, I called a friend and fellow bead lover to see if there was anything she wanted me to look for and pick up while I was there.

Hubby and I dropped the kids at the grandparents and headed over to the show.  I don’t really know what I expected, but I was overjoyed at some of the booths.  Many had a wide range of beads, glass, lamp work, ceramic, on and on.  Some had mostly findings.  Then there were a few lovely booths that had nothing but strand after strand after strand of gemstones.  Needless to say, I was practically drooling over myself.  A couple of the booths were carrying the same things I could get anywhere and I wasn’t hugely interested in them, even though I did look and feel quite a bit.  Then there was the one booth that I couldn’t get out of.

This wonderful gentleman had an amazing selection of all kinds of stones, both common and more rare and hard to find.  To top it all off, his prices were pretty darn good, especially if you spent more than a certain amount because you would then get 50% off those already decent prices.  Poor hubby, he was bored out of his mind, especially since I spent half the time there on the phone with the friend I had gotten a list from constantly asking if she wanted some of this and that and oohing and aahhing over the selection. 

Of course, I didn’t make it out of there without breaking the bank, both mine and my friend’s.  I did manage to walk away with some pretty amazing stuff.  I realized after I got home the first day, that there were some things that I had wanted to go back and look at, but ran out of time before I could.  I decided to head back again on Sunday, this time leaving hubby at home, much to his joy.  I ended up doubling the total amount I had spent for myself the day before.  All in all, I got several strands of some really gorgeous beads, several new stones for pendulums and a couple of amazing stone pendants to put in necklaces, one of which is a piece of Amazonite in a beautiful shade that I don’t run across very often.

I was really itching to sit down and start putting some pieces together when I got home, but I had to go out and help hubby get some work done in the yard.  That and I realized that I needed a few more storage bins before I could break down the bead strands and get them ready to use.  I ended up getting out and getting a few more flower beds de-weeded and cleaned up instead.  Now all that is left is to work on the front and all of my existing beds are back in maintenance mode.  At some point I’ll need to go plant shopping to try and finish filling out the new bed, but that isn’t at the top of my list of things to do (that never ending, very long list).  I think between the new beads, the new design ideas and the flower beds, I am going to be very busy for a very long time.

Hate Nights Like Last Night…

I really hate nights like last night. It started earlier in the evening, probably around 6:30, with the first round of potentially severe storms rolling in. Hubby was off playing darts and was supposed to bring dinner home with him as I once again didn’t manage to get to the store. When he called to let me know he was leaving, he told me that the sirens were going off in his area and it was pouring pretty bad. I told him to skip getting dinner, I would see what I could scrounge up, just get home safe. Right after I hung up, I heard that a store nearby where he was at had made everyone move to a safe location. That just set the stress and worry bells to crazy.

I am a bit of a freak when it comes to severe weather. I love to sit and watch a storm roll in, especially an electrical one, but when my house starts to really creak, the TV goes on and my eyes are glued to the weather. I have been in too many close calls over my life to not pay attention when the weather gets bad. I think I am even more aware of what the weather is doing now than I ever was before I had kids. Hubby and I have even joked that if we didn’t have kids, we would probably be one of those crazy storm chasers running around the country looking for tornadoes. It is very much a love hate relationship when it comes to storms.

Well, after Hubby got home and it was looking like the worst of the weather (a few tornado sightings) was in another part of town and wasn’t going to hit us, I was able to go off alert mode and relax. Unfortunately, we only had grilled cheese for dinner since I wouldn’t let Hubby go back out into the crap to get us anything else. The weather guys were calling for more storms to come through later in the night, but we decided to go on to bed.

I ended up getting up around midnight to shut our bedroom window since the wind had really picked up and it was sounding like it was trying to rip our window off the house (I hate my windows by the way). That made the room really stuffy, so it was hard to sleep. Then, around 1:30 we were startled out of sleep by some pretty strong wind and pummeling rain hitting the front windows. It was hitting them hard enough it made me really uncomfortable, especially since my daughter’s room is in the front of the house and her bed right by the windows. We decided to grab the laptop and the kids and head to the basement. That is always fun, you know. Going into your kids’ rooms where they are obliviously sleeping to shake them awake and drag them into the chilly basement while the wind is howling crazily outside. It makes it hard to convince them that there really isn’t anything to worry about after that.

On the way down stairs, the sounds the wind and the house were making were horrendous. It felt as though the house was going to be ripped to shreds like a piece of tissue paper. We got to the basement, whiny kids and all, and turned on the TV. I was really shocked that with as hard as the winds were blowing that there weren’t any tornado warnings anywhere near us. As we watched and listened, though, I was even more shocked at what they did say. This massive line of storms was traipsing through town and blowing at near hurricane force winds. Some winds had been clocked at around 85 miles per hour. I was floored that our house was still standing. They did say that in our area, the winds had measured in the 65 mph range, so that is probably why I get to sit here this morning and complain about how bad it was, instead of sitting in a soggy chair stunned at what was left of my house.

When we saw that the worst of the storm was passed and Mother Nature had moved on to wreak her vengeance in another area of town, we decided to get the kids back in bed. At that point, something hit the side of the house pretty hard right near where we were. We had no idea what it was and it was still storming outside so we weren’t going to go and investigate. It didn’t appear to have done any damage, so we just went to bed.

Morning came way to early today after last night. After we got up and moving around, I looked out back to see that one of the swings on the swing set had been blown around so much that it was wrapped around the top of the set. As bad of storms as we have had in the past, that has never happened. We also found out that the noise we heard of something hitting the house was one of our splash guards that had been blown into the side of the house, so nothing major. The neighbor’s trampoline was blown and pushed up against their swing set. Hubby called right after he left to tell me that a small tree in a neighboring house had blown over, another house had had all of their patio furniture blow UP a hill and across the street while another house had had their trampoline demolished by the winds. He called again when he got to work and told me that just outside his office building there were a couple of large trees, 6 inches in diameter and bigger, that had just been snapped off a few feet from the ground, just completely broken in half.

I guess if all I lost in last night’s round of temper tantrums was a few hours of sleep, then I can consider myself extremely lucky. I have yet to turn on the news to see how bad the damage was in other parts of the city. I just hope that the Goddess decided to spare them as she has me.

Playing with New Ideas

I have spent the last couple of days playing around and trying out a few new ideas of things to add to my product line. So far, I have been pretty pleased with the results. I still have some work do to on them to really perfect the ideas and make them work the way I want them to, but I am getting kind of excited about it. I am hoping it won’t be more than a few weeks before I have a few of them done up and listed.

One of the things that excites me about these new ideas is that there is a good possibility (if I can work out the design) that I will be adding another one of my creative talents to the mix. One of the reasons for my shop is to have a focused creative outlet for a large chunk of the things I enjoy doing (and there really are just way too many). I don’t want to go overboard, but I like the idea of having a really diverse line of products that cover many different areas. Now that I have a pretty good handle on stock for my existing products, I can begin to look into other areas as well.

Blessed

Last night I had intended to sit and stretch my energy muscles as I have been honored with the opportunity to learn more about using them.  I had barely sat down when my mind decided that I needed to do something else entirely.  It ended up being a time to sit and look at all that is in my life right now and to appreciate how truly blessed I am.  It isn’t that I have become complacent and unappreciative, I do know that I am a very lucky person overall.  I had just never taken the time to really look at all of the different aspects of my life to see how lucky I actually am.

Besides the very basic and the obvious of the wonders of marriage and motherhood and running my own business, I realized how impressive the other people in my life are.  I know they are wonderful and amazing, but I was awed when I stopped to really look at the lovely women that have come into my life over the last several months (some have been there even longer) at how much richness they bring into my life.  They are, every one of them, incredibly strong, solid, open, caring, and honest in who they are and how they present themselves to the world.

I look around at them and see the vast array of personalities and backgrounds and experience and am humbled that I am able to count myself as one of their number and even more so when I realize that I am, at least in part, responsible for bringing that range of beauty and wisdom together.  I realized that that is what spider has been trying to tell me all along.  It isn’t just the creation of physical tangible things that I am to be doing.  It is also the creation of the intangible, but very much felt, connection and bond between individuals.

Beweave mentioned in her post yesterday that not only do her interactions and relationships bring lessons into her life, but she brings lessons to those that she interacts with.  This is something that I haven’t been able to see.  I have only been able to see what lessons I needed to learn, not what I am here to help others learn.  Now, I am beginning to see that and I feel even more blessed and honored than ever that I am where I am right now and that I have such amazing women surrounding me in such warmth.  Each one of us bringing our own lessons to the table to be shared with all.

Lines of Personal Responsibility

Isn’t it funny how you might run across an instance of something that doesn’t seem to be all that much at the time, but as the days and weeks go by that same message keeps cropping up in various different areas.  Each time being a bit more prominent and more complex than the last.  The big one that keeps tapping me on the shoulder lately has been the concept of personal responsibility.

This is something that is a very basic, but important tenet for most (not all, by any means) Pagans and Wiccans.  This idea that we are each responsible for our own actions and the consequences of those actions, whether they be positive or negative.  It was something that was discussed recently in this post on The Green Witch’s blog.  Taking responsibility for ones actions is something that I find hugely important and really adhere to paying attention to how what I do spreads out to effect others, so having this concept come up in conversation is not overly surprising.   What is surprising, is where this discussion (along with a few others elsewhere) has led me.

The idea of personal responsibility is, on the surface, a very simple concept.  You think before you act and take the weight of that act along with you.  Simple, right?  Well, no, not really.  You can never fully anticipate how your actions could spread out or what they could effect.  You have to be willing to take the unseen as well as the seen.  Again that seems on the simple side and somewhat obvious.  What about those that take the concept of responsibility too far?

There are those that will never take responsibility for a thing they say or do, always trying to place that on someone else.  They are the ones that like to lay blame, always in the mindset of “If this didn’t…” or “if they hadn’t…, then I wouldn’t…”  There are also those that take responsibility for not only their own actions but those of others as well, but only when it can benefit them.  Like the person at work who you had to help with a project and he takes all the credit.  That same person will probably not take responsibility at all if that project ended up a failure. 

Then there are those that take the concept of personal responsibility too far the other direction.  They still take responsibility for the actions of others and the resulting consequences, but they are very rarely the positive consequences and it is not done for self gain.  They are the ones that tend to take on the responsibility for the negative actions of others on top of what is truly their own.  These are the people who, whether they realize it or not, are basically blaming themselves.  They have a difficult time finding the line of where their responsibility ends and another’s begins.

I had thought that I was a rather balanced person when it came to taking responsibility for my actions.  Thanks to some rather wonderful friends and a few gentle (and not so gentle -  hey, I’m stubborn, what can I say) bonks on the head, I have seen that I’m not as balanced as I thought.  I fall squarely into the group that takes on the responsibility of others and carry around a whole lot of self blame.  It has been rather eye opening and thought provoking.

Like so very many things in life, there is a very thin line between self blame, personal responsibility, ego stroking, and blame for others.  Also like many other things in life, it takes practice, balance and a conscious effort not to cross that line into unhealthy behavior.  Maybe now that I am aware of where I tend to walk, I can take a few steps the other direction and find that balance.  Maybe now I can see that even though I play a part in this lovely, crazy thing called life, and even though I have the responsibility for that part, I am not responsible for the other characters or their actions or the results of their actions.  They are their own to carry, willing or not.

Finally!

It has finally gotten warm enough to be able to have the windows open again.  It has been an incredibly refreshing last couple of days, clearing out all the stuffiness of winter.  It is for this reason that spring and fall are my two favorite seasons.  It has even been nice enough to get to sleep with the windows open.  It always takes me a bit to get used to the sounds of the night again after a long winter of being sealed off from the outside. 

I remember when I was a kid, laying in the middle of my bed at night with the window open and a cool breeze being pulled in by the attic fan.  Most nights I would lie there awake just listening to the sounds of all the insects calling to each other and watching the lightening bugs dancing against the background of trees across the street from my house.  The peace that comes with moments like that tends to last for a long time after. 

I am thrilled to know that the wonderfully open area around our house, that is so similar to the area I grew up in, will not be developed for a few years more.  I loved the fact that I grew up on a street with lots of houses, my friends living just a few away, all the while being just a short walk away from being able to get lost in the quiet of the woods.  We do not have quite the same set up where we are now, but it is close enough to satisfy the desire to be close to that kind of peace.  It is close enough that I still get to see the graceful dance of the lightening bugs against a backdrop of trees and hear the song of the insects.