Get your hands dirty

Unfortunately, the last few weeks have been more difficult than I would have liked. Moving house and town and changing my lifestyle while the manfriend is away working has been difficult. I started prioritising all the boring things I thought were necessary for some stability, such as buying a new chopping board, painting the bedroom, mopping floors and paying bills.

Since the new moon two weeks ago, nature has been calling and I really don't think she has been very happy with me. I spent most of Spring and Summer in the garden, getting my hands dirty, regardless of the rain-soaked skies. My whole body has been crying out with emotion and angst as I have let inconsequential tasks get in the way of doing what I want and enjoying the things that I want to do WHILE I am doing them. Being in the moment is one of the most difficult tasks I find to complete. Amidst all my note taking and post-its stuck on walls, doors and book covers, not once do I write, "do what you love" or "be in the moment". It all sounds too hippy dippy but I'm beginning to realise that they are the most important tasks of the day.

Two nights ago, mother nature called again with a whopper of a full moon and I retaliated like a child, hiding in bed and mooching around the house all day yesterday in a depressed stupor. My mam then told me of an Indian full moon tradition where all Indian women place a bowl of rice out under the full moon each night to invite pure ideas and cleanse emotions and the spirit. The moon last night was a beacon of clean light and as I left the curtains open to let the light into my room, I knew things were going to be different.

 I woke up alert and eager to live out the day with purpose and spent all day in garden in the crisp autumnal winds. The dogs bounced around the garden, making me smile so easily. My hands were dry and caked with mucky soil, my nails were black with mulch and dirt and by the time I had finished sweeping up the leaves outside my house and roadway, I felt like I had swept up the badness and confusion of the last few weeks and instead of hiding them, I found a use for them.

I piled barrells full of beautiful golden, amber and yellow leaves onto my parents' raised garden beds and gently tucked the soil and the worms and all that nutrient potential into the ground for the winter. I lovingly threw the leaves in the air while I played with the dogs, I didn't try and pick up every last leaf and took time to enjoy leaves flying around the air out of my bucket. It doesn't matter, I thought. I wasn't trying to control everything. I was letting things just happen.

 

I've got a few pics and videos to show you how to mulch and use those free beautiful leaves to make free beautiful compost.

 Enjoy! X

 

Video 1



Video 2

                                                                         Video 3


There is a website called http://glad.is that had an article about 10 Things to do to Make you Happy. One that really stuck with me was daily altruism and I remembered with great love the Maori word 'koha'. Koha is a beautiful practice celebrated by kind people that simply means gift or gifting. You give willingly of time or energy or seeds or food, expecting nothing in return. I gave koha of my time and love for the earth and gardening to my parents. But I also gave koha to the earth, giving thanks to it for producing our summer food and to the worms and all the other small life making the soil better for us in the future. I tucked that soil under a blanket of golden leaves as if it were my own small child going to sleep and it made me so happy. I wasn't tired or sore or cold from being outside. I was invigorated, healthy, happy and calm.

Mulching made this girl very happy. As my Dad says, "Everything comes to those who wait".

because sometimes words are not enough

This blog post is being written because:

 

I have been cheeky and haven't stuck to my 'one-post a day' so making up for it :)

In a lot of cases, pictures are worth more than a thousand words

The photos I found today made me smile from ear to ear

The photos I found today produced a deep calm in my mind, heart and soul

There's the dream of a garden becoming a reality

with nature having room to be beautiful and breath

There are amazing, light-filled, beautiful friends who fill my world with love

 

     There are sunsets and waves and unusual creatures

There are beautiful works of free art I think are the furthest thing from vulgar vandalism

 

There is simple food                                               Simple times

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

&

 

 

Simple love of a silly manfriend-TBC

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

blow the cobwebs and the fear away

I'm very full. I just had a yummy warming roast dinner with the man friend, chatting and giggling and exchanging stories with my new housmates, the beautiful Ver and Alicia from Spain. Ireland is so very small. Ver has a boyfriend who's from my home town. He's the son of one of my Dad's friends. As my Dad is so very fond of saying, 'You can't go anywhere', complimented with that hearty laugh of his. My Dad's laugh makes me laugh, it makes me happy.

 

 

I'm back in Sligo after nearly a week at home getting my head around our move. My mum said something very interesting. Most other people are not risk takers, they are afraid of the consequences of making a leap of faith and cripple themselves with the anticipated said consequences, wondering if they will be able to live with them or not. You am different, she tell me. "You are aware of the consequences but you just take the leap of faith anyway, without the fear. Then, after you have made big leaps with seemingly little effort, you freak out at the decision you have made and fear takes over". I never saw it like that but now I can think back to decisions to travel to Spain for a three week holiday on my own and freak out the first night as I lay in my hostel bed, thinking what the hell have I done? The first night I stayed in Bali, having been collected at three o'clock in the morning and not having any idea where in Bali I was, had the same fear-inducing qualities.

Our move to Sligo had the same effect and it overwhelmed me, or rather I have a tendency to overwhelm myself. I have a mind that never stops, that floods itself with ideas of things to do, to see, to read, to make. I have a mind that won't calm down and a lot of time the fear is that I will never just go and DO the things I want to do and enjoy it while I'm doing it. To be in the present. That is really all we want, in the end.

 

Today, my mind was racing with new thoughts of new ventures in this town on the wild west coast but I now have an anti-anxiety shield:the manfriend, who holds my hand and tells me to breath and who today brought me for a completely unplanned two hour walk through the sand dunes in Sligo. I keep telling myself  "I should take more photos, embrace spontaneity more, get outside more, explore Sligo more". Well today I did and I stopped thinking "should" and just did it and it felt awesome.

Coming home, I thought more photos need to be taken and more activities need to be delved into. Uploading photos from our phones, I realised we've been doing that all along. I have over 600 photos from the last six months of gardens, Amsterdam, compost course projects, new people, tents, surf, sunsets and clouds in the sky. I have been doing what I thought I should have all along. I'd just forgotten.

That walk dusted the cobwebs away and let all the"shoulds" fly away with it into the clouds and off into the sand-whipped skyline. Friends, flowers, tents, family, adventures and the wonderful surprise of a bunch of photos of memories I never thought I had popping up out of nowhere. These are the things that make this girl very happy.

follow your dreams

Amazing friends who follow their dreams. There is nothing in the world like them. Friends who follow their hearts and their creativity to find what they've been looking for, even though they many be scared that it might not work out. These are the people that I admire and feel so lucky to have in my life.

Anna and Niall

I first met Niall and Anna in Raglan, New Zealand. They were travelling and adventuring around New Zealand in their campervan with surfboards in tow. This couple really made me think about how you can change your life around and how your life changes you, how it is constantly evolving and changing, carving new curves and forms. They had great jobs, lived close to home, had travelled plenty but they were still looking for something different. Work and a house was simply not enough and though they had rich lives at home, close to family, I guess they were looking for something a little different for themselves.

Solscape-the ELLA project is just one of a million amazing things Phil and Bernie do

They stayed in beautiful Solscape, then stayed with us in our halfway house, parked up in our back garden. They left to see more of NZ and then came back again. I knew I'd see them again. I knew they'd follow their dream and they did. They returned home, determined to make New Zealand their home and in the end, Raglan was the perfect fit. That doesn't mean to say they didn't work hard but seeing their new video for their company, PiwiWiwi, I couldn't be more proud! They have succeeded in creating an amazing business for surf campervans, living the life they always dreamed.

This is their latest video, showing exactly what this beautiful couple has achieved in just a year.

Anna and Niall and their happiness makes me very happy.

Take the first step

Sun going down and messy waves at Strandhill

I've just moved to Sligo. I lived in a beautiful surf town called Raglan in New Zealand for nearly a year two years ago and it made me incredibly happy to know that the surf and the sunsets, the sound of waves, the sand between my toes and the anticipation of a surf check were a mere ten minutes from my little house on the hill. Now I have an apartment for the winter, close to town so the road rage can be calmed down. Now, I can drive ten minutes and repeat the Raglan process on the wild west coast. I moved only a week ago and already got numb toes and a silly smile from a quick surf two days after we had moved from the Big Smoke. My boyfriend looked on, thinking I was mad. He was wrapped up in hat and scarf and wooly jumper. I was racing around like a five year old in my wetsuit and bare feet, trying to remember how to surf. It all lasted forty minutes but made me smile and breathe again. Afterwards, I rinsed my wetsuit in the shower and smiled quietly to myself as I watched the sand run off into the shower tray. Soon, I'll have sand in my bag again and my dripping wetsuit drying in the shower will be a permanent fixture. Soon, I'll feel like I'm living the life I've always wanted. Everything is slowly getting back to being ok.