In the whirlwind of To Do’s, I am feeling some measure of Ta Da as I stop to deep breath stand still … for a fleeting moment!
What is on your To Do & Ta Da Lists this week?! What makes you stand still? Can you be still in the midst of the journey? Well, for a mindful, meditative moment anyway.
For our part, it’s Feathers Of Freedom Family Camptime! The car is (over)packed; I am playing a library show on the way (sorta on the way!) and then preparing the camp with feathers and footsteps of freedom for all the families coming this Friday and throughout the weekend … This Blue MoonFriday! Yes July’s 2nd full moon is coming up to light our way on the mountain!
In the free fall of a feather … softly standing still … at least for this breath!
The New Thought Families daily Play & Pray Calendar’sfortitude filled July footsteps are walking right into the Awesome arms of August Beauty & Yes Expressed ~ stop by for a playful place to stand still ~ any day! And the Free Shelfhas been restocked … I promise to take you on a mini-camp experience next week in the after glow of Freedom Of Feathers. I also heartily invite you to co-create the freedom of standing still in sacred space whatever mindful moment you can make. I know ~ and am living it ~ that we in this culture tend to value productivity & movement over sitting or standing still … yet let’s all try stillness more often this week! And now … we’re goin’ camping!
Free Laurie StorEBook this week!
May you feel free to be … light as a feather … this moment … and always. Namaste, Love!
Greetings Co-Creative Beings of WonderFULL Wonderment! I SEE YOU ~ I see the divine perfection of you always acting for Love … and yes, sometimes crying for Love. Ernest Holmes said, “Everything is either an act of love or a cry for love.” Our song, Always Love, sings it HEREalong with our upcoming Feathers Of Faith Family Camp song, Circle of Love… Love Always!
Deep breath of Love this divine moment … Stop, drop (into our hearts) and breeeeeeeeeathe. This week’s blog has metaphysical musings sprinkled throughout a show-n-tell of the art creations I entered in our county fair. For anyone who caught last week’s post as I was in the thick of finishing them up … I actually entered 10 of the proposed 14. The fairy garden just HAS TO get finished one of these fine fair days! It’s on the list with LOTS of other unfinished business play! Perhaps some of you can relate? I was heartened by the tireless smiling ones at the fair taking in all of our creations when they said that even they (fair veterans) had not completed all they had signed up for either! Guess that most if not all of us can mis-judge our time.
“REVISITED MEMORIES” ~ I took some of my old favorite t-shirts Jeremiah wore when he was little and put them on an old jean jacket. Waiting for Jeremiah at the airport the night before, as he returned from his first solo flight East, I cut up his old shirts. The next day, he helped me carry in all my creations to the fair.Glass Bouquet from car to display table!
Yes, my Jeremiah returned this week in the middle of my art creation madness … he did a lot of juicing with his dad and lost 20 pounds in the 23 days he was gone. While it seems maybe too fast, Jeremiah remains strong in body and rooted in his heart. In a few months, he will be behind the wheel of our pretty Prius. Of all of my co-creations, I am challenged and fed most by what it is to parent another human from infancy into adulthood. Indeed, always a circle of Love!
The jacket garnered ribbons I strongly suspect because no one else entered recycled wearables!“A VELA STORE REMEMBERED”Remember the family house/store I am cleaning out? I took decades of dust off of some found treasures to honor a small bit of Al’s creations.
In weaving together the many threads of our lives … ancestral, generational, gestational … there is a divine order, always. Yet we have this free will that lets us decide if, and how fast, we manifest the callings of our heart and soul. We can choose to forget or honor the past, as well as shape or deny the dreams of our future. And in the all there is moment of now, we can choose to be present to the gift in gratitude & celebration or do an ego dance of finding what’s wrong in a judgment tango of how it should be ~ different.
“BOOMING BLOOMING”I was called back to the fair to re-glue my creation after it fell apart … a learning curve that coulda woulda shoulda been navigated well in advance … the glass was way too heavy for the canvas but I was a dog with a bone in my insistence to enter it anyway! One gift of the repair trip was another view of pre-fair ~ what an incredible creation THAT is ~ so many dedicated hours of service!
Like all of life, this week’s adventures have me looking at how I choose to do life and why. I have long been a queen of ‘Creative Avoidance’ yet through my more seasoned heart eyes of compassion and acceptance, I can see clearly the fear that drives them and the Love that holds them and calls them out into the world. So, in the case of this week’s fair art … I have long since wanted to do this. I learned A LOT … about the all important presentation if nothing else! I am showing up in my community with creative contributions. I honored myself, my dad, my ancestor with a nod to his creations. Maybe I am giving ideas or inspirations to others in my sharing. A lot of good to be sure. The avoidance? My web work and business structure that can support me financially and give others creative tools for educational and family literacy. And yes, it is still my life’s work. I continue chipping away at it; I vow to get it done. I know the ways I creatively avoid fully owning it. Divine order timing has me allowing to put full focus there … after the fair and next week’s Feather’s Of Freedom Family Camp!
Photo collages of my little town where we live now and my dad’s ranch where I grew up.Through digital wonders, my dad’s cat Whitey is ‘looking’ at a squirrel I photo captured in the Calavaras Big Trees state park a few weeks back!Excited & delighted to … begin again … to embrace the heart of freedom in the sacred Sierras and co-create this space for the families who are joining us in the circle of Love!
So, this deep breath day, I am off to my yoga class and dad care. I will be bringing dad to the fair this afternoon and back again tomorrow. In the past, he has always gone all 4 days to the fair ~ this year, I’ll take him for 2 days and my sister will take him 1. If his 90th birthday trip to the mountains is any indication, I’m sure he will do great! And whether he wants to see it all or not, I will be wheeling him through Pokerville Hall to see all my creations!
“SHIMMERING SHELLFISH” hanging at the fair!“OH YES IT DOES”Hard to see, but I glued real money on these money trees … an affirmation that, “Oh Yes It Does!”
In the eyes of creation, every note the bird sings is divine. truly, all we do is in divine order. When we allow ourselves to celebrate our choices … and yes, absolutely (lovingly!) course correct when those choices don’t feel good … the sacred perfection of our lives reveals itself and there is no sweeter place to be. 8 of my 10 fair entries have ribbons next to them but believe me when I tell you, it truly doesn’t matter to me. I won the battle with myself to follow through and show up expressing the creative urgings that called me.
I wish the same for you beloved ones. May you celebrate all the ways you are blessed in saying YES today! Namaste, Love.
Namaste holy wondrous hearts & harmonious wanderers! Thank you for spending this mindful moment with me; let’s breathe in mountain beauty & sweet surrendered stillness … mmmm. Deep sacred breath of yes …
In last week’s check in, I was on the way up the mountain with my sisters and my dad to celebrate his 90th birthday. It was a good trip and as one of my blessed caregivers for dad so beautifully stated, “It will be a soft pillow in your memories.”
It had been awhile since I had spent extended family time and I was tested a time or two. While I didn’t like the reactive feelings that came up, I stayed as the observer and consciously did not engage in ‘counter attacks’. All in all, I found it a good barometer of growth. And! I definitely had help; I re-centered in prayer in the gorgeous St. Mary’s church where the birthday boy ~ 90 year old dad ~ also glimpsed the divine … at least for a moment.
It is amazing what a stunning stained glass filled house of prayer and beauty can do for the soul! As any parent or caregiver in any capacity knows, we all need time to rejuvenate and fill our souls. Yesterday I went back up the mountain and did a summer library show in a small library with some lovely peeps. Then I took mountain time for me and it was glorious!
In my second trip up the mountain this week, I took some time to rejuvenate lakeside … aahh!
Today was a busy day of caretaking for my dad and working on my many art projects of the moment. I signed up to take some art to our county fair this weekend … something I have wanted to do for several years. I was so excited and delighted when I signed up … to bring … 14 things. I know, really? 1, 2, 3, 4 would have been plenty?! I will let you know next week ~ with pictures! ~ how many I actually finish by the Saturday deadline! I have been really looking at my tendencies to overcommit, not finish, feel bad … well I feel pretty compassionate these days actually because I am simply doing the (un)worthiness dance … it’s a deep subject but suffice it to say I am ever embracing me, loving me, ever deeper especially when I ‘fall short’. I LOVE co-creation and the infinite possibilities that we can co-create. I was SO excited and delighted for each of the 14 items I envisioned making for the fair … and so I continue to delight in as much of it as I can … and complete what I can. There is plenty of web work still on the proverbial list as well as a fabulous, fun filled Feathers Camp to facilitate this month and the ongoing caretaking of my dad and all else … SO?! BREATHE …. DEEP … LOVE … DEEPER!
The question Oriah Mountain Dreamer asks on the cover of her book, The Dance, came to her in a dream and in the voice of her wise grandmother.
I am reading Oriah Mountain Dreamer’s book, The Dance, with a good friend(s) in an online book discussion. The question on the cover is one I am visiting daily, “What if the question is not why am I so infrequently the person I really want to be, but why do I so infrequently want to be the person I really am?! In deeply loving me, I get to keep practicing acceptance and celebration of who I really am, even and especially when I fall short to prove again how I am not enough. What a wearisome game! In the eyes of the sacred heart, I am, we are, such incredibly beautiful creations. Enough? My goodness, really?! We are loved beyond measure, much the same way we unconditionally love our children or pets.
My 3+ weeks without Jeremiah ends tomorrow night when he flies home from his dad’s. It has been a time of intense trust for me. There is much to say on the subject but we will have to visit the mother dance another mindful moment.
Our daily Play & Pray Calendar at New Thought Families continues to celebrate holy ground and fortitude filled feet with playful reminders … walk, dance, stand with us there! And the Leaping Literacy Online Library Free Shelf is freshly stocked for the week. EnJOY!:
This week’s free singing Laurie StorEBook features Bilbo Buffalo as a replacement for Wild Wilda Witch. In careful consideration of the treatment of women and ‘witches’ throughout the ages + my digital re-illustrations, this water buffalo is a fun replacement/addition to the whacky song. Sign up or sign in with your free Leaping Literacy Library Card and sing for yourself!
Our Feathers Of Freedom Camp is shaping up to be a sacred sharing sanctuary of fun, family frolic!
We can still add you in … begin again … to embrace your heart of freedom!
I am embracing change in the same dance steps with loving what is. Abiding acceptance allows appreciation and abundance.Whatever dance you are engaged in, may your steps be free to know the holy flow that guides you. Namaste, Love!
Namaste Wild Hearts Blooming in whatever Holy Ground you are Grooming or simply Perusing!
I send you this radiant wildflower energy from Silver Lake in the sacred Sierras where our Feathers Of Freedom Camp is set for July 31st ~ August 3rd. At the base of Thunder Mountain, I always feel the holy energy of energized yesness when there. I will be passing through this holy ground in a few hours with my sisters as we take my dad up the mountain in celebration of his 90th birthday tomorrow. It has been a long year of caretaking my dad as he suffers the indignities of an aging, failing body. Hopefully his Spirit will be renewed and his body will allow this trip to his beloved mountains and Virginia City.
Dad with Jeremiah at Virginia City 4 years ago …
The many aspects of family caretaking and clean ups continue as I carve out time for my other callings of creativity and business. I squeaked into a very cool contest from Wells Fargo that would really help Creative Spirit Families with working capital and the oh so needed business mentoring! For you good hearted souls who believe in our cause, please vote for our project between now and July 19, 2015 ~ easy click ~ you can vote once per day ~ hooray! Creative Spirit Families on Wells Fargo Works
I just restocked the Free Shelf … a tad early in lieu of the 90th celebration … we are SINGING this week ~ come on & sing along!We continue to chip away at the navigation implementation on all the sites. The summer interns are not working as much as I had thought but there is a divine order to all of it. Our summer camp is right around the corner and these lovely interns will be an integral part of the fun and frolic! I visited the camp this week and felt inspired to issue a kind of last minute video invitation … the wind was moving through it for more of the holy gurgle but I will share it anyway … I want you to know you are still invited to come play! https://vimeo.com/132873414
I have always believed and continue to deepen in the knowing that we are always walking sacred ground. When we bring a mindful, grateful awareness of where our feet are, we align ever more with this truth. Wherever your feet are this moment, this day, may you know the infinite blessing of the sacred ground you are on. If you want some help in remembering or celebrating your path, our New Thought Families Play & Pray July Calendar has our feet forging fearless pathways. Happy trails of blessed yesness to you and yours. Namaste, Love!
This wonderful pixabay picture is the July homepage image for New Thought Families … highlighting our fortitude filled footsteps daily Play & Pray Calendar practice this month ~ forging fearless pathways as we pray & play every day!
Namaste splashing, fearless footprints of fortitude, faith, forgiveness & freedom!
I greet you in the name of passionate persistence, faith filled fortitude & fearless freedom! What pathways are you pursuing this mindful moment?! I just took a wonder-full walk in the sprinkling, tinkling RAIN … which for draught stricken CA on a hot July 2nd, seems like a straight up miracle! At the least it affirms for me that truly, all things are possible. A celebratory reminder, to be sure. And a welcome one in the wake of all that is ~ and isn’t ~ in my little corner of the world. In a nutshell, I am re-learning, re-aligning with the truth of accepting all of it ~ all of me ~ as is … not as *it* or *I* should be. Peace in the moment comes with trusting acceptance. And the fearless fortitude to carry on! Freedom!
Photo Thanks to Melodi2 at RGB Stock.
Freedom comes in many steps … acceptance of what is and moving into more of what it is our hearts call us to ~ and gratefully embracing every step along the way with happy thoughts and acknowledgement of all the blessings that fill our paths!
Words added by Laurie Story to Melodi2’s photo
On the brink of America’s birthday celebration, 4th of July, we celebrate freedom and the fortitude of our forefathers. We are all a mixture of our ancestors and all that humanity has created before us ~ the good & the ugly ~ mixed with all the creations we are breathing into every step this day forward. Freedom does indeed lie in the dreaming and the choosing yet true freedom is in the acceptance of all of it. And can we even celebrate all that is when it doesn’t look like all we want/think it should be?! As we sing in I Am Free on the Trust What You Hear CD, “If things aren’t how they should be, I can still choose to be happy!”
Another great pixabay photo ~ woo hoo!
Our Free Shelf is re-stocked for the week … celebrating rain (can’t help it!), water conservation (living it!) and the affirmation of each day dawning … sing & read rain, save water in small ways in the house and experience a Brigantine Beach sunrise (taped there last year around this time!
Rising Soul! I taped the sunrise for a SoulPlay Camp morning reverie last summer ~ revisiting it now!This singing Laurie StorEBook is in 5 fab free formats ~ enJOY!
So whether your skies are filled with radiant colors, stormy clouds or flying food, may you move under them with fearless feet freely propelling you forward in fortitude! Namaste, Love!
I promise to take you on a mini-camp experience next week in the after glow of Freedom Of Feathers. I also heartily invite you to co-create the freedom of standing still in sacred space whatever mindful moment you can make. I know ~ and am living it ~ that we in this culture tend to value productivity & movement over sitting or standing still … yet let’s all try stillness more often this week! And now … we’re goin’ camping!
New Thought Families 
