In The Pink!

Lavatera "Barnsley" In The New Garden

Welcome New and Old Friends to "A Year Of Finding Love," my blog that is a daily practice I've developed to find love and beauty.  I find its the little things, the simple, the overlooked that imbue my life with awe and love...,  Usually found in nature, children, art...  My camera with me always, forever on the lookout for love...  ~ Thank you for joining me.

So I'm happy to report that there is a profusion of pink in the garden at our new house plenty of fodder for future 

Beverley's Pink Saturday  ~ Thank you Beverley for featuring my blog in this week's posting.

I truly appreciate all the support you give to us budding bloggers:)

  

Since moving into our new home last week friends have written and called to ask how I'm doing with the huge task of unpacking and settling in... Actually, I'm doing quite well, all things considered - (gone for 3 days racing in the middle of the move, arrival of friends from out of town with their 2 girls for 6 days, CG dropping a chair on his foot and breaking his big toe...etc.) I'm feeling really quite "In The Pink!"

I've decided to share some of my pink images from the new garden, and one of an adorable cottage just a few minutes away that had an entryway just smothered in baby pink roses... I couldn't resist taking a photo...  Hope you enjoy...

Love, 

Neinah

Pot of Impatiens with Vintage Basket

The dusky pink of Nicotiana "chocolate Smoke" from the

Chocolate Flower Farm on Whidby Island

Pink Valerian Covered With Spider Webs

This little bird and his family lives in the pink rose bush - a handy spot for the feeder!

This little cottage has such a beautiful entrance...

Happy Pink Saturday!!!

Evening Time...

View Across The Harbor

I'm really starting to settle into a rhythm of living at our new home.  After dinner and clean up, I love to just sit and look out across the water, I watch the changing light and reflections on the homes, and trees, if you look carefully you can just make out the outline of the city (at the top of the photo between the tree tops.)  The skyscrapers turn a beautiful shade of dusky pink just before the sun dips below the horizon, and the cities lights turn on and begin to twinkle.  

Even though I still have many boxes to open and sort, I feel calmer as the days pass, and find myself allowing for more time to wander outside and enjoy this new beautiful garden...

Here's a few scenes of this new magical place.

Belonging....

My New Perch On The Front Porch

Already I have found a favorite place to perch and ponder for a while..., the front porch, late evening as the sun is going down...  Now with a special perch, I am beginning to have a sense of belonging again.

And in that vein of thought, I am reminded of David Whyte's wonderful poem ~

The House of Belonging

I awake

this morning

in the gold light

turning this way

and that

thinking for

a moment

it was one

day

like any other.

But

the veil had gone

from my 

darkened heart

and 

I thought

it must have been the quiet

candlelight

that filled my room,

it must have been

the first

easy rhythm

with which I breathed

myself to sleep,

it must have been 

the prayer I said

speaking to the otherness

of the night.

And 

I thought

this is the good day

you could

meet your love,

this is the black day

someone close

to you could die.

this is the day

you realize

how easily the thread

is broken

between this world 

and the next

and I found myself

sitting up

in the quiet pathway

of light,

the tawny 

close grained cedar

burning round

me like fire

and all the angels of this housely

heaven ascending

through the first

roof of light

the sun has made.

This is the bright home

in which I live,

this is where

I ask

my friends

to come,

this is where I want

to love all the things

it has taken me so long

to learn to love.

This is the temple

of my adult aloneness

and I belong

to that aloneness

as I belong to my life.

There is no house

like the house of belonging.

~ David Whyte ~

A New Home...

Front Door Knocker

Well, we have arrived, and boxes and boxes litter every corner of our new home on this little island in the Puget Sound.  From the kitchen window we have a tiny view of the harbor and even a little view of the distant city.  But I only allow myself a moment here and there to gaze that far into the distance, as I have so much at hand to do. 

The beautiful grounds of this house call out to me, inviting me to wander and explore and photograph, and so when the movers came and went leaving the boxed up guts of our previous home in the new strange rooms,  I found myself wandering outside for fresh air to breath and a moment or two to de-clutter my mind and make creative space to handle the work ahead of me - thereby avoiding a full on panic attack!

Like our old house before the garden is proving to be a source of quiet,  solitude and peace.. 

The new house however contains a hundred boxed voices that yell at me as soon as I enter, demanding attention, wanting order.. 

I open the windows and let the outside in, and feel the warmth of the sun, and know that all is good, all will be well.

It feels very good to have our own home again.

Taking a Trip...

Have you ever been inspired by a book or a magazine?  I have,,, on numerous occasions...

Magazines about  nature, gardening, organic lifestyles, crafts, keeping chickens, bee's, cooking are a constant source of inspiration.   One magazine in particular "Mary Jane's Farm," is one of my favorites because it rolls into one magazine so many of the subjects I care about.  Its the creation of Mary Jane Butters, whom I have the utmost respect for,  as she LIVES the things about which she writes, from her home/farm in the Palouse region of Idaho.

So when we were invited to attend a friends party in Coeur d'Alene Idaho, I suggested that we take a little detour on our way there, to stay over night in Moscow, Idaho and to take a look at the beautiful farming region knows as "The Palouse." Where Mary Jane lives and works...

Many beautiful barns and farmhouses nestle quietly into the landscape...

Miles and miles of rolling green hills, fields of chickpeas, wheat and many other crops grow...

In the charming resort town of Coeur d'Alene, we spotted  one of MaryJanes Farm Shops..

Of course I had to take a look, such fun..., she even makes camping glamourous (AKA "Glamping")

This trailer is so cute and can be pulled behind a car..., ah the possibilities.. a life on the open road... your house going with you wherever you choose... tempting... yes???


P.S  sorry for not writing sooner, I spent 8 days on this vacation mastering the art of doing NOTHING... In fact, I got so good at it, and was so incredibly relaxed and living in the moment, I didn't even blog!!! Hence my absence...


P.P.S  I'm back now and readying myself to move into our new home this coming Thursday.  I will blog when I have the time and energy.., please know I am thinking of you, and miss your comments and funny notes:) xox Neinah

Bowl of Cherries...

Cherries In A Bowl...

I love cherries, they are tart, but not so much they make you pucker, a little sweet but not so sugary you can only eat a few, a little crunchy but not too much.., and a bowl of these little gems is a joy to behold... 

Life is like a bowl of cherries so the song goes..., In my case, I  would have to agree and say that its true, life is mostly sweet, with a few unripe, sour fruits now and again, and a few pits along the way, but mostly... Life is beautiful. Life is good.

Moving was the "pits", and another move is coming in two weeks, yet,  I am thankful for the love and beauty I experience on a daily basis, including the amazing support I receive from you dear Friends and Family by your comments, emails and phone calls.  Doing this blog has enabled me to reach out and share..., something I've not been particularly good at till recently.  So thank you for listening, reading, watching, supporting.

With love,

Neinah

Cowgirl at heart...

Horse and Cowboy Sculpture on the road to "Sisters" Eastern Oregon

I spent the last morning of my trip to Bend on the road with my friend Gioia..., she wanted to take me down the road a ways to get up close and personal with the Three Sisters mountains and see more of the beautiful high desert countryside around Bend... Wow it is just gorgeous - beautiful meadows, clear bluest of blue sky, majestic mountains in ever direction, horses real (and otherwise) grazing in pastures at every turn...  What can I say?  It was so stunning, so spacious, the air clean and pure..., it got me thinking about what it would be like to live in this place, have a horse (I LOVED horses as a young girl and wanted my own so very much...,) as I near my 49th birthday I ask, am I too old to learn to ride and or have my own horse at this stage in my life, too old to have some land to call our own???

I am so very drawn to the desert, and western way of living, maybe I'm just a cowgirl at heart...?

I love the wildness of the desert, the way it smells, the way I feel in the vast open- ness of it all...

Whilst looking for a poem about wild horses, I came upon this one,, hope you like it.. I love it:)))

When I am Old...

I shall wear

turquoise And a 

straw cowboy hat

that doesn't match

and doesn't suit

me.  And I shall 

spend my social 

security on white 

wine and carrots

And sit in the 

alley way of my

barn  And listen to

my horses breathe.

I will sneak out in

the middle of a 

summer night  And

ride the dappled

mare  Across the

moonstruck

meadow,  If my 

old bones will

allow.  And when

people come to

call, I will smile

and nod, As I

walk them past the

gardens to the

barn  And show,

instead, the

flowers growing

there.  In stalls

fresh-lined with

straw I will learn

to shovel and

sweat and wear

hay in my hair as

if it were a jewel.

And I will be an 

embarrassment to

my only

child Who will 

have not yet found

the peace in being

free  To love a 

horse as a friend,

A friend who

waits at midnight

hour With muzzle

and nicker and

patient eyes For

the kind of person

I will be When I

am old.

Patty Barnhart