Desert Magnolia

Today dawned cold, cold, very cloudy, with a promise for very bad weather over the next few days, and feels wintry. This is our first wintry day..we've had some rain, which has been really lovely, but not so cold. Days like these make me crave homemade soups, hot teas, hot chocolate, and comfort in the form of snuggling, and soft, fleecy blankets. Oh, and fires. We're going to make a fire tonight for the first time this year. I can't wait. Fridays in general, I'm finding, are about attempting a balance between work/school/personal. The toll of the first four days of the week I tend to feel by Friday, so I'm finding I take some time to nurture myself and pamper a little just to kind of restore what I can of my strength and focus. This morning..breakfast with hubby, quick cleanup after that then a grooming session. Much needed, as it turns out. Eyebrows are now in check. Skin looks and feels a little better after nice scrub and moisturize. Body feels sleeker af...

After several months of learning more, and mostly adhering to a Primal diet, I'm finding that some interesting things have happened. Warning: If you just aren't interested in this aspect of my life, leave now. There's not too much else in the post besides more talk of music, some thoughts on studying for my first exam and the soul deep concentration required to choose a color for the pedi I intend to get on the way home today.  Ok, then. If you're still here, you care about what I've noticed since embarking upon this Primal journey. Or you care about what color I'm thinking for a mid-Winter toe treat. Either way, hi. So at first the Primal thing is weird. We spend a remarkable amount of time baking, enjoying foods full of grains, eating rice and let's not get started on soy. No sirree. There is a lot of creating a new awareness of what to avoid. Which feels a little restrictive, but that goes away pretty quickly. Breakfasts can be a little monotonous...

Never accuse me of being deep. I am capable of superficiality of stupendous proportions and manage to derive intense satisfaction from focusing on issues NOT of substance whenever possible. Life is intense; finding joy in simplicity requires skill. Kind of like meditating and learning how to steer your brain back to your heart energy when it veers off on some random tangent again. And again. And again. It's a discipline, really. So I found an amazingly beautiful deep winey garnet polish, Stop Whining, by Sonia Kashuk, that will become the icing on my toesies' cake this weekend. Now that I have my pedi plan in place, I need to focus on wrapping things up here at the office, then head out and wrap up things in my personal life before I head out once more. DC weather forecast seems reasonable, mid 50-60's with a chance of rain a couple of the days I'll be there. So I'll pack an umbrella. And take my favorite black bomber jacket and a fun scarf. Checklist bef...

You know how when stuff just kind of falls out your mouth as you think it? No passing Go, no thinking through it, it just exits in a stream of consciousness way? Happens to me a lot, more since I've begun looking at 45 in the rear view mirror, for some reason. I take vitamins. Exercise. Stimulate my brain with new information. Do crossword puzzles. Encourage my creativity in both culinary and other ways. But still, the words tumble with no apparent plan behind them. This weekend, while enjoying our new buddha garden, Hubby and I were chatting, enjoying our glass of wine, the serenity of the garden, the evening. Me: [Wiggling my toes as I'm sitting in my Adirondack] , 'What do you think of my flower, honey?' Hubby: 'What flower? Oh, pretty. Nice toes. Did you paint that on yourself?' Me: 'Um, no. I'm not that talented. ' Hubby:  [Wiggling his eyebrows] 'Oh, I wouldn't say that...' Me: [Flustered] 'Geesh.  But thanks...