I’m tired today and though a lot of household and taking-care-of-business things have been done by Tom and me (with some help from Timothy), I don’t have much to say. Thought I’d just share a photo of some of the blossoms on our bougainvillea. It likes the new place it has against the fence, which is only a few feet away from the old place it had against the fence (it’s in a pot), but I will not argue with a bougainvillea. It has thorns.
Tag: random
Bold style
I’ve used Coloring In Style for pages to share on Instagram nearly a dozen times. It’s a go-to book when I want fashion and color but not a ton of detail (though there are some busy pages in it, too). Did these two over the past few days.
Still taking suggestions of anything you’d like to see colored, because…this is my shelf of coloring books. I’ll never run out of pages. Some themes: fashion, seasonal, fantasy, animals, world travel/people/places, sayings, flowers, decades, music, angels, groovy…
Or… Here are some of the random books I sometimes draw from to create posts. Pick a book and challenge me to find something in it that matches a coloring page? I have no idea if this is possible, but I’m willing to give it a try. Coloring somehow always leads me to writing, whether it’s the work in progress, something new, or poetry.
Mindful Monday
Mindfulness means being present in the moment.
Stones/rocks and crystals are invariably part of any type of meditation, mindfulness, or centering I do. Those particular stones are citrine, clear quartz, amethyst, turquoise, carnelian, rose quartz, variscite, and black tourmaline.
I was flipping through one of my Word Search books yesterday and saw “List Of Rocks.”
These were not the rocks I expected to be looking for. =)
Paging through more of the book, I found another list that related to the coloring page I shared the other day, “Grandma’s Attic.” Tom’s father did say the page I colored reminded him of his mother/Tom’s grandma’s attic!
Sunday Sundries
For whatever reason, I’m dragging today. Maybe I do know the reason. I couldn’t fall asleep last night for anything. I tossed and turned for a couple of hours, repositioned a couple of dogs several times, and finally gave up and changed rooms so I wouldn’t disturb everyone else. I wasn’t even thinking of anything to keep me awake or make me afraid to fall asleep. It just wasn’t happening.
But I promised unicorns, and unicorns it shall be. I’ll begin with this little dish that rests on my dresser. No memory of where it came from, but the only thing I’ve ever dropped in it is that magic token. If that’s not an apt description for a unicorn, what is?
The Unicorn Wishes set came with a unicorn, a mat to stand on, four scenic backdrops, and a book.
The unicorn is petite, but surely full of good vibrations. I’ll call her Wishes. And promptly forget her name. (One of many reasons this site exists: to be the Info Repository for my brain.)
I imagine I picked up this beauty at a craft or art supply store when I needed a unicorn for a photo shoot. Maybe during the Katnip series. Too lazy to search! I’ll call her Flower. Today, I used her to text birthday wishes to my friend Kathy: Making Me Laugh Since 1977 ™, including over the last few days.
Does this boy have a name? I don’t remember, but as of this writing, he’ll be named Secret. He has one. It’s harmless.
Now back to this, the OFFICIAL coloring book of The Magical Unicorn Society. Not to be confused with those fake coloring books, societies, and whatnots. This book gives an account of the different types of unicorns: the Gold Unicorn and the Silver Unicorn; the Mountain Jewels; the Water Moons; the Woodland Flowers; the Desert Flames; the Ice Wanderers; the Storm Chasers; and the Shadow Nights.
I colored a Shadow Night in July of 2020, and a scene with two Woodland Flowers in Sept/Oct 2020. As I mentioned yeseterday, I’ve kept the pages in the book, because of how it’s arranged by different unicorn groups and provides history. Which you know is all accurate because it’s from The Magical Unicorn Society. No naysayers need pop off like this is some silly made-up thing. This comes right from Unicorn canon.
Since I’d already colored the first two pages of the first section in the book, the Gold and the Silver Unicorns, back in April of 2022, I decided over the past couple of days to continue through the book in order. According to the history, these were the very first unicorns, born thousands of years ago, thanks to the misbehavior of another of Earth’s inhabitants, a Winter Dragon.
Maybe this fellow who’s been living in the toy chest since he was captured to put on a birthday cake is a Winter Dragon.
This malcontent attacked a pair of horses and chased them through a magical waterfall.
The waterfall transformed the horses into the Gold Unicorn and the Silver Unicorn. The two of them appear on the Magical Unicorn’s Society’s official crest. They represent power and prestige and are matched with the symbols of the four elements: earth, air, fire, and water.
The Magical Unicorn Society Official Coloring Book is for sale from multiple sources. If you or someone you know loves unicorns and coloring, I highly recommend it.
Coloring my way to…something
When I reached the end of the sketchbook I use to save my coloring pages, I began using the reverse sides of pages starting at the back of the sketchbook. I was doing a lot of coloring in May and June, including the drawing below from an old repurposed calendar. But cat and chick took up only the upper part of the sketchbook page.
On Thursday, I looked through my very small coloring books to try to find something that would fit on the bottom part of the page, but most of the drawings are vertical. (Books shown below next to a roll of tape to give a sense of their size.)
I decided to color the drawing on the front of that top book (at the time, I didn’t notice that it was on the cover) because I could place it horizontally. It fit.
Here’s a better look at the finished drawing. I used mostly gel pens and one pencil.
I told you there might be a lot of coloring pages coming up. Coloring is one of the most calming activities I have, other than the email and text exchanges with friends who are constant reminders, along with you who comment here, of how fortunate I am to know so many good, smart people. I have a couple of fun coloring pages, one from 2022, and the other from yesterday, to share soon. Thank you for being patient with me as I navigate extreme anxiety.
Mindful Monday
Wishing you all peace of mind. Happy Monday.
For me, I hope it’s writing, home, husband, dogs, music, and nourishment. For you?
Was sad to hear about the death of Quincy Jones today, though he lived a long and eventful life. What an impact he had on music and culture. Someone in comments to the obituary I read strongly recommended Q: The Autobiography of Quincy Jones, and just like that, it’s in my Kobo ebooks. Research!
Tiny Tuesday!
From the book of Tiny Pleasures, I spotted this one:
When I did my recent book purge, I discovered that in the past, I had a tendency to grab whatever was handy to use as a bookmark (despite several posts this year featuring the abundance of bookmarks I own).
Here are a few of the things I found tucked into books I’m rehoming:
Three actual bookmarks: one with an inspirational saying, one from the Doris Day Animal League, to which I was a contributor long before I worked in animal rescue, and one with other state and Texas locations of Half Price Books.
Two business cards, one from the bookstore where I was employed as an assistant manager starting a few months after we moved to Houston, and one promoting The Deal and Three Fortunes In One Cookie, with contact information on the back.
A red ribbon decal that was probably part of a donation appeal from an HIV/AIDS-related organization.
A thank-you card from Amy after she spent a summer living on the second floor of our fifth Houston home (The Compound was our sixth, and Houndstooth Hall is our seventh; between our first and third, we spent the summer of 1990 living with Lynne and Craig. I guess we paid their hospitality forward with Amy; then here at the Hall, Lynne and Minute lived with us for a few weeks between homes). So many good friend memories.
I emailed Amy photos of the message she wrote inside the card, and we reminisced about those times. The envelope is postmarked September 1, 1994, when a postage stamp was 29 cents.
Mindful Monday
In 2019, when I began to rewrite what came to be called the Neverending Saga, I did a lot of research for a particular character who has a tendency toward anxiety, panic, and fear. An intensely private person, she isn’t the type who’d go to therapy or easily express those feelings even to people who love her and who she trusts. Somewhere in my research, I learned ways that “laypeople,” that is, untrained to act as teacher, guide, or mentor, can still help someone through a panic attack. I also found people who use art to help people develop coping skills.
I never anticipated all the ways the larger world, and my smaller one, would change in the years after that. I’m not sure who out there on the big Internet should get credit for the seed of an idea that developed into a self-soothing exercise for my character. It has also sometimes helped me when I have insomnia and my brain goes into overdrive.
You (the vague word that applies to anyone) trace your hands on a piece of sturdy paper, and as I developed it, my hands (with poor fingers misshaped by arthritis) take on two different manifestations. My left hand I connect to my heart and coping words. My dominant right hand is connected to the fears and anxiety my brain can throw at me. I always like color, so with watercolor pens, I gave my left hand colors that soothe me: blues, greens, purples. The right hand colors are the ones that stir me up (and rob me of rest and peace of mind): reds, oranges, yellows.
If I match fingers, my little fingers are “playful” versus “fragile”; my ring fingers are “loved” versus “painful”; my middle fingers are “strong” versus “worried”; my index fingers are “intentional” versus “assertive”; and my thumbs are “determined” versus “anxious.”
Just trying to remember and focus on those words, then process them as solutions versus crises, can pull my scattered thoughts into something either distracting or soothing enough to help me finally fall asleep.
Early* Saturday post
*early as in 12:30 AM
I haven’t gotten done some of the things I wanted to this week. When I was taking care of at least a few of those things during Thursday errands, I spotted these on my way home.
A Little Free Library. Even skeletons like to read.
And they’ll also invite you over to shoot the breeze.
I’ve had my eye on this Jolly Grinning Giant for a while. If I ever saw his people, I’d have asked if I could bring my skeletons over for a photoshoot with him. But his people are never outside.
Friday had some sadness. The first time I let the dogs out, they spotted a young squirrel. He barely got away from them, just a few feet up a tree, where he rested in the V where the tree splits. It was obvious he was either injured in some way, or maybe dehydrated, or just terrified. With help from Debby, I was able to get my frantic dogs inside, while the neighbor’s dogs were very vocal on the other side of the fence. We coaxed the squirrel out of the tree so Debby could carry him in a cloth pillowcase outside the fence to the side of the house. Then Tim got him into a box, tucked inside a towel, to take him to the SPCA’s Wildlife Rehab unit. Unfortunately, the young squirrel died en route. At least he didn’t die from either my dogs or the large neighbor dogs attacking him, but in an air-conditioned truck with a kindhearted, calm driver taking him for help.
Also on Friday, I was able to finish this book. Another political thriller that I couldn’t put down. Now it’s time to take a break from reading and work on my own novel.
Abyss
I didn’t date the poem below, so I don’t know when I wrote it. Can’t even be sure what prompted it (other than its suggestion in this book). It’s possible I’ve put it on this site before without using the right tag to find it again. If I don’t remember sharing it, I feel confident no one else will, either!
I was glancing through different places where I can find poems I’ve written, including the “Write The Poem” book, and I realized how often the below phrase, taken from a source on Instagram, is true of my poetry.
“They” say real people from our lives who we write into fiction don’t recognize themselves. I think that’s possibly even truer with poetry. As a form of self-expression, we can generalize in writing things we don’t want a specific person to hear. In my case, it’s usually to express my own pain without causing pain to someone else. Sometimes, however, my lyrics may be coming from one of my characters instead of myself. There are a lot of voices in my head. That can make it tricky for readers.
I’ve known other writers who use words as weapons, most often in essays, but sometimes in their fiction and poems (songs included). How we choose to express our honesty often reveals more about the writer/speaker than the “target.”
ETA: I just learned today is National Poetry Day. Timely.