Back to Nature

Whenever I feel stuck, miserable or get a case of the blues, I head over to where it is blue… the place where blue skies meet the deep blue water.   When I was about 14 years old, I visited California for the first time and got to visit the cold and windy Ocean Beach in San Francisco and ever since that day I have had this longing to be nearer and nearer to the ocean.  If I had to choose, I would be on the beaches in Maui but most days I will settle for any coastline with sand, sun and surf.  There’s always something magical about a beache’s vastness, sounds and smells that dampen out my blues and melt my stress away.  Mostly I like to stare out towards the horizon and see nothing but also see so clearly.  

Last week I finally made some time to get to the coast for the first time since the studio opened 6 months ago.  The kiddos and I went to explore a new beach in Santa Cruz, Natural Bridges State Beach Park.    It’s no Maui beach, but her beauty was breath taking.  Although the winds were strong that day, there was no other place I wanted to stay that day even if it meant throwing an extra jacket and beanie hat on.  

All the questions, the doubts, the fears, and the uncertainties I’ve had brewing in my head disappeared for that day.  I didn’t even have to ask them again, the answers were pretty clear to me… let it go.  And it was easy to just let the wind blow them all away and it was hard not to be present in the moment with all my senses being awakened by the sounds, textures and smells.  

 

We walked around the cliff to a little cove area.  There was one family hanging out with their kids.  I walk past them towards the cliff because I’m drawn to the colors, the green moss and mussels growing on it and the shield it could provide from the wind.  

 

 

 

As I lookekd closer, I see a lump roll lying there on the sand and wondered if it was a dead animal.  I get closer and saw him:

 

He was sleeping soundly.   I took a few pics and left him alone but wondered where the rest of the Harbor Seals were.  About 10 minutes later, a lady walked towards us shouting “Have you seen a baby seal pup here?”   She was with the marine mammal center and came to rescue the pup who was abandoned.   Apparently seal mothers often abandon their young when they are hunting for food and see humans on the beach near her pup.   Awwwww!!!  Look at his whiskers…

 

 

 

The lady let us choose a few names for him.   I choose Chocolate Chip  don’t know if they will use it but that’s what he reminded me of… or maybe it was because I was craving chocolate chip ice cream at the moment.  I was happy they were going to care for him before releasing him back to nature. 

The encounter with Chocolate Chip and the feelings of joy, wonderment, and happiness stayed with me the entire day.   Nature does that to me.  Here’s promising to not waiting too long again before I go back to nature.

An artist and her canvas.

Love can always be found in nature.

Lots and lots of beauty around… we just need to open our eyes.

 

Happy Earth Day 2013!!

Earth Day

“There are no passengers on Spaceship Earth.  We are all crew.”  ~Marshall McLuhan, 1964

Red Worms Compost Bin

In celebration of Earth Day this year, my family has made major changes to our lifestyle from eco-friendly cleaning and personal products to supporting local and organic and recycling as much as we can.  The newest addition to our eco practices is vermicomposting aka red worms.

$20 for a pound of fresh red worms and we made our own bin.  Drilled holes for ventilation.  Added a nice comfy bed of damp newspapers and the best food a worm could ask for:  my veggie scraps from juicing.  Even creatures as small as worms can be picky.  The class I took on composting suggested that I separate their “living room” from their “dining room” and warned us that they might try to escape the bin the first couple of days.  Sure enough they did try to escape.  I woke up the next morning with a cluster of worms hanging off the lid of the bin.  I learned the worms not only had to get used to their surroundings but also the food they were being fed.  These worms apparently don’t know how lucky they are to get organic food scraps   The solution?  Put them back and keep the lid off and force them to stay down because they don’t like light.  About two days later, they stayed down.  They even started to migrate to the dining room.  A quart of food should take about two weeks to be eaten during the initial break in period.  I check back in a week and surprisingly found a tiny bit of food left over.  I knew they would love the organic scraps Can’t wait til they ramp up their appetites and eat faster and poop more cause I need those castings for my garden that I’m attempting to grow.  Crossing my fingers that the compost will balance out my brown thumb.

Here’s some pics from our visit with Mother Earth today:

Did you hug a tree today? We barely got our arms halfway around this big redwood tree.

Mommy, the moss tickles me.

A simple little beauty.

Lunch time for this bug.

The best thing about Earth Day is receiving this note from my 7yr old.   Upon returning home from teaching 7am class today, I find this note she made me before she left for school.  I am so proud to say that Jasmine is the recycling monitor in our house.  The pic she dug up was taken when she was just 2 yrs old.  I remember a near meltdown she had when she was 3.  We were at starbucks for a hot chocolate treat and after finishing the drink, she refused to throw away the cup because it had the recycling triangle on it.  I told her they didn’t have any recycling bins there for these cups and suggested she put it in the trash instead of leaving it on the table.  She refused.  I told her we can’t leave it lying there.  She refused.  I couldn’t believe I was having this conversation with her and having to explain that it’s worse to leave our trash lying around.  Before the meltdown began, I asked her if she would be ok with us taking the cup home to our recycling bin. Whew!  Fast thinking!  Thank you caffeine for kicking in when I needed it

“There is hope if people will begin to awaken that spiritual part of themselves, that heartfelt knowledge that we are caretakers of this planet.”  ~Brooke Medicine Eagle

Love your Mother starting NOW otherwise we might be singing this:

Oh Beautiful for smoggy skies, insecticided grain,
For strip-mined mountain’s majesty above the asphalt plain.
America, America, man sheds his waste on thee,
And hides the pines with billboard signs, from sea to oily sea.
~George Carlin

Connecting to the Earth

After a long week of spring break with the kiddos, I thought I would add another task to my long to do list today:  garden!  While everything I do is all about green this and green that, my thumb would otherwise argue.  A brown thumb sounds more like me… killing everything I attempt to grow.  Well this year, I am not so determined to make anything grow but more importantly is introduce my kids to some level of consciousness and responsibility around nutrition and the importance of connecting back to simple wholesome foods that nature provides us with.  We’ve planted grape tomatoes, romas, kale, green and red romaine, strawberries, and zucchini mix. Now we wait…

Preparing the soil was half the fun.  Who would have thought the kiddos would enjoy pulling weeds.  We found some earthlings inhabiting our soil:

Rolly Pollys are so much fun

We kept this little guy to follow him through his journey of transformation

We even rescued this poor little ant who almost drowned in a drop of water

And what garden would be complete without a bee

How fast hours fly by when basking in the presence of simplicity.  We’ve enjoyed connecting to the earth and playing with our new friends (except the bee).  We’ve also realized how grateful we are for farmers and farmer’s markets.  We can’t wait to taste what the earth may provide us.