Sweet Marjoram...

Hot lavender, mints,

savor, marjoram;

the marigold, that goes

to bed wi' the sun,

and with him rise weeping.

William Shakespeare ~ A Winter's Tale

Golden Marjoram and Nasturtium Flowers...

Quite often I get asked about my salad dressing..., its my staple recipe that I can dress up with various herbs and spices.  Above is a photo of the dressing, below is the recipe...  enjoy!

Mix together:- 

2 tbsp    Extra Virgin Olive Oil

1 tbsp Organic Apple Cider Vinegar

1 - 2 Crushed Garlic Cloves

1 tspn Dijon Mustard

Sea Salt and Black Pepper to taste

o~o~0~o~o

Its that easy, tossed over a salad of fresh greens, or tasty little new potatoes...mmmmm good...

I'm not sure why bottled dressings are so popular, when something this delicious and fresh can be made in just a jiffy!

Feel free to add your favorite herbs or spices... 

One of my favorites is Golden Marjoram..., I've loved it since a child, I have fond memories of my sister's cooking, especially Sunday Lunch, and her golden roasted chicken with a savory stuffing made with marjoram...  There's just something sweet and good about this herb... I looked up the folklore of it and found that it was a favorite herb of the greek goddess Aphrodite, Romans believed it promoted longevity.., its associated with Joy and Happiness, which is why they would include it in the head dresses of newlyweds... and Egyptians believed that if it was found growing on a persons tomb, it was a sign that the person who had died was happy in the afterlife... 

Whatever its qualities, it really ads something to cooking ~ and its flowers are beloved by bees and butterflies alike... , and me too, I have a small vase of them on my bedside table tonight...

We Have A Beautiful Mother....

"Mother" ~ street drawing done in chalk

Walking around the local waterfront park along the river in Bend this summer, I came upon this gorgeous chalk painting on the bridge crossing the Deschutes river...I've been waiting to to post it for a couple of months now,  and today as I opened  Alice Walkers  book "Anything We Love Can Be Saved," I came upon this poem,  and after reading it I  thought the painting and the poem were meant for each other...

We Have A Beautiful Mother

~ by Alice Walker

We have a beautiful 

mother

Her hills

are buffaloes

Her buffaloes

hills.

We have a beautiful

mother 

Her oceans

are wombs

Her Wombs

oceans.

We have a beautiful 

mother 

Her teeth

the white stones 

at the edge 

of the water

the summer grasses

her plentiful

hair.

We have a beautiful

mother

Her green lap

immense

Her brown embrace

eternal

Her blue body

everything

we know.

My Quiet Corner...

Since starting "A Year Of Finding Love," I have attempted to write everyday.., which as it turns out,  has been impossible for me to do, due to vacationing, and moving etc... but its not because I haven't wanted to..., on the contrary, I find myself craving the sweet, quietness that I need in order to "find" the love to write about and share.  This is where my quiet corner comes in...  Isn't it funny, by simply having  a quiet corner of a room, it can provide such solace and comfort after a busy, go-go-go day (such as today was for me.)

I think the warmth that emits from the gold colored secretary/desk makes it very inviting.., and though its not organized yet, I have started to fill it with my favorite poetry books, photographs of my children, special stones and art... It has a magnetic presence in the room, and I find that during the day when I enter the room, it seems to call out to me... and I have to rush past and try to ignore it..., but truly, I just want to sit down, put the lamp on and play...

Do you have a special inviting place to call your own?  It doesn't have to be big, I thought I needed an entire room, but actually, this little corner and piece of furniture that I can call "My Space" is all I need.

I feel so very grateful for this oasis -  a little place to call my own where I can just sit and be and listen, then write and share and play...  its a necessity now that brings creativity and balance to each and every day.

Sometimes a poem...

Sometimes a poem can say things so much better than I...

Messenger by Mary Oliver

My work is loving the world.
Here the sunflowers, there the hummingbird—
    equal seekers of sweetness.
Here the quickening yeast there the blue plums.
Here the clam deep in the speckled sand.

Are my boots old? Is my coat torn?
Am I no longer young, and still not half-perfect? Let me
    keep my mind on what matters,
which is my work,
which is mostly standing still and learning to be
    astonished.
The phoebe, the delphinium.
The sheep in the pasture, and the pasture.
Which is mostly rejoicing, since all the ingredients are here,

which is gratitude, to be given a mind and a heart
    and these body-clothes,
a mouth with which to give shouts of joy
    to the moth and the wren, to the sleepy dug-up clam,
telling them all, over and over, how it is
that we live forever.

A reminder about loving without attachment...

I love this poem...

Giant dandelion, summer 2010, Bend, OR...

To Have Without Holding ~ Marge Piercy

Learning to love differently is hard,

love with the hands wide open, love

with the doors banging on their hinges,

the cupboard unlocked, the wind

roaring and whimpering in the rooms

rustling the sheets and snapping the blinds

that thwack like rubber bands

in an open palm.

It hurts to love wide open

stretching the muscles that feel

as if they are made of wet plaster,

then of blunt knives, then

of sharp knives.

It hurts to thwart the reflexes

of grab, of clutch; to love and let

go again and again  It pesters to remember

the lover who is not in the bed,

to hold back what is owed to the work

that gutters like a candle in a cave

without air, to love consciously,

conscientiously, concretely, constructively.

I can't do it, you say it's killing

me, but you thrive, you glow

on the street like a neon raspberry,

you float and sail, a helium ballon

bright bachelor's button blue and bobbing

on the cold and hot winds of our breath,

as we make and unmake in passionate 

diastole and systole the rhythm

of our unbound bonding, to have

and not hold, to love

with minimized malice, hunger

and anger moment by moment balanced.

~o~o~o~

The Sweet and Precious Art of Bessie Pease Gutmann...

A very happy Pink Saturday http://howsweetthesound.typepad.com/my_weblog/ ~ especially to Collette, who we celebrate and send much love to.

 

Today, I celebrate my favorite kind of pink..., (baby pink.)

The other day I had the delight of seeing a collection of prints by American 20th century artist Bessie Pease Gutmann.  CG's Mom collected her art over many years, she was a very big fan, and I can see why...  I have NEVER ever come across another artist that had the obvious love and adoration of children and babies.  Her paintings and sketches are so very dear and so genuinely filled with love...., take a look at these...

I don't know how much cute I can take (when it comes to children - lots actually!)...  

Gutmann had three children of her own, who often modeled for her work.  She had a very successful career as an illustrator for many magazines during the early part of the 20th century, but her work lost its appeal around the time of world war II...  Sadly most of her originals have disappeared, but what's left of her art is gaining popularity again..., I can see why...  

Here's a few of my favorites..

"Good Night"

"A Chip Off The Old Block"

"Sisters"

Cute, cute, cute...

Love,

Neinah

Pomegranates, Persephone & Full Moon..

Do you ever feel affected by the full moon?  For the past two nights, I have lain awake the full moon shining her light into the bedroom, illuminating the garden, the house, the trees..., my brain...

Full Moon Over Seattle...

Two nights ago, my mind would not be quiet.., I felt tugged at and called upon by the sheer brilliance of light coming in through my bedroom window, shining on me, as I tried to hide under my covers... - trying to ignore, trying to sleep..., it was no good, I could not, instead, I chose to lay there and bathe in the light of this insistent full moon.  I dreamt awake dreams of pomegranates... , richly painted, giant sized fruits on canvas, big and ripe and full... then  dreamt of them in delicious, opulent fabrics of velvet and silk, with gold thread and ruby red beads... and so my night went on,,, and on... wishing I could get up and have all the fabrics and beads and oil paints and canvas at my fingertips... so I might create with my hands what the moon was telling me...., or not...

Perhaps instead,  it was a visceral awareness that my body is having to the end of summer...  The air has that special smell to it..., subtle, but there... the gentle end of one season, the summoning of another...  Perhaps that is why I saw pomegranates...  In the world of myth, we are nearing the time when Persephone must go down underground to be with Hades, master of the underworld, after abducting her and wanting to make her his wife, he tricked her into eating food from the underworld - six or seven pomegranate seeds.. According to the law of the Fates, anyone that eats underworld food is doomed to live for eternity there...,  Persephone's mother Demeter 's love was so strong, and her grief so great at losing her beloved daughter, that Zeus took pity on her and demanded that Hades release Persephone...and so during spring she is released to reunite with her mother on Mount Olympus and the earth flourishes with life and beauty and great harvest, and then in the fall, when she must return to Hades (because of the curse of the underworld food,) all plants die back and return to the underground with Persephone till the following spring...

Do you feel changes in the air?