In So Many Words 3.29

This quote popped up on my Pinterest today. What else is that website of epic time-wasting good for--other than to give you a little moment of inspiration. And today, this quote gave me exactly that moment. Some days, we all just need a reminder to try a little harder, take a different road, opt for a happier day.

image source: pinterest

Spring Has(n't) Sprung

Hiking Catoctin Mountain

So, I'm beginning to wonder if spring is ever going to fully arrive on the East Coast. Glimmers of warmer weather appear here and there-- robins skipping across the lawn, daffodils blooming on the roadsides, and a new, bright blueness to the sky--but none of these glimmers seem to last. We'll experience a beautiful Saturday--50* weather and a gentle breeze--and then wake up the next morning to a sludgy sky spitting snow flakes.  To me, March seems to have entered as a lion and now also be leaving as a lion. No lambs have been involved this year.

I'm beginning to wonder if spring is ever going to actually happen. I know this weather isn't just occurring in Maryland.  Apparently this lingering winter weather is happening in Virginia, North Carolina, and Georgia-- I name these states because these are the states I'm in the most, where most of our family resides. But I can tell you that I just straight tired of the howling winds and sideways rainfalls. This Georgia girl is starving for some sunshine. I think I would even welcome the springtime pollen, if it means winter is over.

I grudgingly acknowledge that clouds and rain are necessary for spring's blooming--but let's hope April brings gentler clouds and rainfalls than March brought.

Reasons to Smile 3.3

Wandering around in D.C.: The city of Frederick is only about an hour outside our nation's capitol, but Mark and I have only driven into the city one time since moving here. So yesterday morning (after a good, healthy dose of sleeping in) we decided to bundle up and head for the big white city on the river. The great thing about DC: you can wander around, meandering in and out of the museums and monuments all day long and not spend a dime except on your metro pass and your lunch.

Standing there in the museums, looking at these iconic and priceless items--the Hope Diamond, Julia Child's kitchen, Michelangelo's David-Apollo, or Rembrandt's Portrait of a Gentleman--it astounds me that all this is made available, for free, for the public. The front doors are unbarred and wide open to you. Well, admittedly there is that grumpy old security guard with the wand he pokes around in your purse or camera bag...but otherwise those doors are pretty much unbarred and wide open to you.

So for this week, that was my reason to smile: chilly March weekends, exploring with my husband. Strolling along with my hat pulled low and my scarf pulled high, coffee in hand, I couldn't help but smile. 

Order, Order in the Court...I mean, Kitchen!

image source

If you know me at all, you will have picked up on the fact that I am a very meticulous and organized person. I like things to be precise, to have things arranged in neat little rows by color, by size, by content. This penchant for orderliness manifests itself most often in the form of lists-- lists for everything. Literally, people, everything.

Packing lists, grocery lists, graduate program lists, workout lists, knitting project lists, book lists, essay-topics lists, pros-and-cons lists (for any and all decisions).

 It could go on and on. My journals typically turn into very dry, sparse collections of...yes, you guessed it, lists. I start out with good intentions to write journal entries containing real, creative worth...or at least the mucky origins of creative worth...but instead somehow, my journals into great beasts of list-making. I don't know what this says about me... other than perhaps my thoughts churn through my head in vast, calculator reels of information...? I hope not.

Understanding that aspect of my personality though, may help you understand my horror, my chagrin, my downright perpetual irritation with that no-man's-land called under the kitchen sink. 

Insert dramatic pause for effect, as I glare pointedly at the cabinet doors.

Ladies, I don't know about you... but I hate the space under the sink. WHAT is going on down there? I try to keep things so orderly. But here's what I find every time I open that cabinet door: the cleaning bottles all tilted over, like a mess of bashed bowling pins.  The trash-bag box somehow always has one trash bag trying to escape, flopping around on the cabinet floor. There's one isolated, lonely sponge. Just ...there. And don't even get me started on the plastic grocery bags...which apparently breed and multiple with the same ferocity as rabbits.

I make genuine efforts to tidy this sloppy space up--but  I feel like some mischievous little gremlin sneaks in there and rustles everything around again. (Husband, it better not be you! Just saying.)

Then, poking around on pinterest I find inspiring organization blogs (yes, that's how bad my organizing needs are...I read blogs about it) like this one and I get all inspired to make drastic changes.

So: this weekend may start with a mission. To tackle and clean and sort and tidy (somehow permanently) that dratted under the sink space. Wish me luck!