I’m loving the relaxed summer life that makes people focus a little less on work, and little more on what is really important to them. I’ve recently had some great weekends spent with friends. Lots of fun and laughter. Why don’t we live like this all year round?!
This weekend is a continuation of the fun. Tonight I’m going down to Virginia Beach. Hopefully I will be able to find a not-so-crowded spot to rest by the waves and enjoy some reading, writing & napping. After the beach I will take my sunburned self to a friend’s house for an evening of beer making….and drinking. On Sunday I will do some much needed housework after having brunch with ladies who are interested in starting a book club. A few of my favorite things, with a few of my favorite people.
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For several months we have been hosting a weekly potluck dinner on Thursdays. Each week we pick a theme and friends come over to sometimes cook, and then devour food and drink. We share recipes with each other, introduce each other to new foods and friends, we drink, we laugh, we share life’s struggles and we eat a lot of dessert. As a group we’ve celebrated a lot of birthdays, marriages, job changes, and many other happy life moments together. In less than a year our potluck dinners have formed a family.
Last night our potluck family showed their extreme kindness and generosity by giving us a composter! I can’t tell you how long I’ve wanted to get a composter! For months we’ve been saving up stinky food scraps in a tupperware container and then transferring them to a trash can outside. I don’t know how they did it. For weeks they have secretly been planning this, pooling their money and waiting for it to be shipped. I’m not surprised that they would do something like this because they are some of the kindest people I have ever met. What started out as a weekly dinner has grown into something much more – we are a family.
UPDATE:
I have a few minutes to share with you some details about the amazing NatureMill Automatic Indoor Composter we received. Let me use some pictures to describe it.
This is what it looks like, note the cute tray that it dumps the miracle dirt into:
This amazing composter can create fresh fertilizer in 2 weeks :
This is what it can look like in a cabinet, but we don’t have white cabinets and our kitchen will never be this clean.
And, this is what my garden will look like after the composter creates the most amazing dirt known to man, and a cute little gardening lady:
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One of the cutest, and sweetest couples I know had their first child yesterday. I got to meet Lucy tonight. She slept most of the time I held her, but woke up just in time for a few family pictures.
As you can tell from the picture, Momma Jan is doing great. I don’t understand how Jan looks so “fresh” after having a baby.
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It seems that each season of depression and loneliness changes me a little more and takes me a little further from the person I use to be. This last bout of sadness zapped my motivation and inspiration. Its scary to see myself lose interest in the things that I usually can’t get enough of, and the relationships that normally make my life worth living. But, right now it feels like some of that is turning around. I’m looking forward to a weekend of pool lounging, reading Sylvia Plath, writing and some of those other things that usually make me feel a bit more secure, a bit more grounded….a bit more like myself.
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After another day spent digging grass, leveling ground and move about a ton of rocks – we now have a walkway. The big brown spot you see beside the patio is where the pool will go.
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Transforming our backyard into enjoyable, livable space is becoming a reality. Here’s a pic (taken with my mobile) of the completed patio & fire pit bowl. Tomorrow 2 flower beds will be added and a walkway. Then on Monday I will finally tackle the vegetable bed.
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I’m expecting a good deal of back pain to set in on Sunday or Monday. That is because I am going to spend most of tomorrow moving 2 tons of rocks to make a patio and a walkway through our backyard. When it’s finished and I’m laid up b/c of the back pain – I’ll post some pics.
Happy 3-day Weekend!
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Here is an example of why I have the most amazing friends…
Last night a few friends gathered for a bbq. After we ate, we sat in the hot tub for a bit. Yeah, I had to put on a bathing suit – only to discover that the year of storing it away with the rest of my summer clothes had made my bikini bottoms shrink about 1 size. Oh, well. I was not going to worry about and just go have fun with my friends. And, I did. Especially when one of my girlfriends commented that I have a “cute butt”. Then another girlfriend, who knows that I sometimes think my chest is too small, said that she was surprised at how large my boobs looked in my bathing suit. Seriously, I will love these girls until the day I die.
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I spent a little over 8 hours doing yard work on Saturday. Right now everything on my backside from the top of my shoulders to the heels of my feet hurt. And my reward? Three leveled, mulched flower beds. Only one more bed left to take care of – the raised vegetable bed (which I still need to build), then Phase 1 of my Master Plan for the backyard will be complete. The next phase in the plan is to build one large stone patio & some walkways. My goal is to finish them all before we open the pool in June.
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I’m so excited about today that I woke up at 7:30. I never get up that early on the weekend. Dan is going on a fishing trip today with a couple of guy friends, so I get full run of the house! Right now I have covered our dining room table with beads and jewelry making supplies. I’m going to spend most of the morning making jewelry to sell at the Strawberry St. Festival. It will be the first time that I’m selling my jewelry to the public. I’m very nervous about it.
After the jewelry making I will clean house, garden, go to a beer festival, hit up a girl’s night and then crash onto my bed. Oh, Saturday, I love you!!
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Over the past year I’ve attended a few too many ceremonies and memorials, most of which I have thought were a waste of time and didn’t come close to capturing Jarrett’s spirit and life. But, this week I had the privilege of attending a ceremony that I enjoyed. It was attended by people who played important roles in Jarrett’s life & mine.
The video below contains the most beautiful speech I’ve heard about Jarrett, given by his advisor/teacher, Marc Edwards. Following the speech, Craig Whittaker sang the song he wrote in honor of Jarrett.
The Bridge Builder
By Will Allen Dromgoole
An old man, going a lone highway,
Came, at the evening, cold and gray,
To a chasm, vast, and deep, and wide,
Through which was flowing a sullen tide.
The old man crossed in the twilight dim;
The sullen stream had no fears for him;
But he turned, when safe on the other side,
And built a bridge to span the tide.
“Old man,” said a fellow pilgrim, near,
“You are wasting strength with building here;
Your journey will end with the ending day;
You never again must pass this way;
You have crossed the chasm, deep and wide-
Why build you a bridge at the eventide?”
The builder lifted his old gray head:
“Good friend, in the path I have come,” he said,
“There followeth after me today,
A youth, whose feet must pass this way.
This chasm, that has been naught to me,
To that fair-haired youth may a pitfall be.
He, too, must cross in the twilight dim;
Good friend, I am building the bridge for him.”
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I have decided to build raised beds for my vegetable garden this summer. I want to build the beds using wine bottles. Please drink lots of wine and save your bottles for me. If you need help emptying the wine bottles, just call me.
Love,
Alicia
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Earlier this week I was wasting time by playing on the internet and came across Hope Revolution, a project that was started in NYC to spread encouraging thoughts. Essentially, people are creating notes with positive, hopeful words or phrases on them and then hiding the notes for others to discover and be encouraged. I was instantly inspired by this project, so I invited my friend Alisha over and we spent the evening making Hope Cards, which we will soon place all over Richmond.
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