Playlist

Yay! I had a piece of writing published in The Guardian!  :)
Ok, so it's a reader contribution called "Playlist" they have each week in the family section, not like some professional feature article, but still yay! For the Playlist feature, readers are asked to send in a short piece about a song that reminds them of a particular event or time in their lives.

You can see it here:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2012/nov/17/family-photography   (scroll down the page a little; it's below the video) ♥

My Etsy shop is open again after my maternity leave. I'm loving full-time Mama-ing with my gorgeous little boy but it's good to have more crafting time too whilst Dylan and his Daddy have time together. To celebrate my return, I've made two treasury lists, Seaside Baby Boy (Dylan means "from the sea") and "Autumn Baby Boy". The second has a woodland theme as Dylan has my husband's surname which translates as "of the woods". Click on the titles to see the treasuries; so many beautiful finds from clever crafters!



I've got some new stock in my own shop too inspired by the world of babies. I got taken back to my own childhood using the remnants of the Beatrix Potter fabric my mum made my nursery curtains with. I adored the Beatrix Potter stories - I even went to a fancy dress party as Mrs Tiggywinkle once -  and look forward to sharing them with Dylan.

Take a look! http://www.etsy.com/shop/HeartShapedHands

♥

Diwali

On dreary, rainy days like today has been in South West England we understand the cross-cultural prevalence of winter festivals of light. Jews will start their Hannukah celebrations on 8th December, with pagans and those leaning to nature-based spirituality welcoming the suns rebirth after the winter solstice, and Christians celebrating the birth of their light of the world on the 25th.

Light and warmth aren't just brought to us by the physical strength and hours of sunlight; my life feels brightened by (among other things) company of loved ones, a cosy home, comforting food and pursuits and general merriment. All typical features of the holiday season; falling in the season of nurture.

Ayurveda - stemming from the same part of the world as today's Diwali celebrations - aims to heal through regaining balance. So during these months, to rebalance the cold and dark of winter, we must increase warmth and light. I look to what represents this to me, perhaps by wearing gold jewellery and glitter, or eating an orange. I use what has a warming, brightening affect such as using spices like cinnamon and ginger, taking baths, lighting candles, going for a walk on one of those winter days where the air bites cold but the sun is so warm and feeling my skin drink that sun in and through all of my body.

Find what represents warmth and sunshine to you and, on days when family aren't coming around for a festival and feast, brighten your winter with it.

Happy Diwali!   ♥

Frost!

On Tuesday this week we were kissed by our first hard frost. Oh it was worth the numb fingers to go outside and admire leaves, grass, flowers and trees in their crystal finery! Childishly watching my breath and grinning like it was Father Christmas rather than Jack Frost who had called, I teetered on the pain-pleasure border as I took these shots. This is a thin, brittle line nature plots; beautiful in its sparkle but dangerous in its slipperyness. Slightly sadistically, I welcomed what this sharp glitter would do to the garden pests whilst nervously pondering what it will do to the polytunnel's inhabitants. This year has seen me become less benevolent towards slugs and snails, and a little obsessively overprotective towards the veg patch (which is currently looking its most productive all year).

I recently worked my first massage session following maternity leave. I encouraged each client to be aware of their shoulders in the cold weather; there's a natural tendency to hunch them up and curl them forward. It's like we're hugging that warmth in, that last scrap of warmth. Pulling ourselves in to keep us all together; nurturing, protecting our heart space whilst spreading our back as a shield. It's understandable. 

But to tense shoulders this hunching will probably lead! We need to circle, shake out, squeeze up and stretch; creating space between our bones and feeling it. We also need to wear long, chunky scarves, In this season, where we see our landscape harshly stripped back to its bare bones, we have the chance to feel space. Space that follows the busyness of springtime sowing, then the headyness of summer and then after the exhaustion of the rains, winds and/or work of autumn. November can seem such a miserable month; cold,wet,dark and – in the UK – with no festival yet to brighten and warm our hearts and homes. 

An alternative celebration can be to find and welcome that space; what has been lost or sacrificed to make way for the new? What can be created in these long evenings? What can be dreamt of for the coming year – and beyond? What can be nurtured, maintained or repaired so that it is ready to be reborn all freshened up and shiny? How exciting!

Stay cosy   ♥

Samhain-tide

For me, each cross-quarter festival gets celebrated as a lunar month starting from the time when signs of that season are appearing in nature, and the sabbat's corresponding moon phase comes around. So I'm right now in the middle of Samhain-tide. On Sunday 14^th October I awoke to our first frost; nature's clue to the start of winter. The moon was in the dark part of its cycle: the time the crone, the empty time, the “space in between”. With the next new moon, I'll move on from this festival.

I marked the start of Samhain-tide by decking our alter in appropriate decorations and making a pie of seasonal veg which we ate drinking a purple fruit juice whilst I wore black clothes and smoky eyeshadow. During a chilly walk in the fields near our home, my husband and I admired the majestic autumn colours and shiny berries as we reflected on the year's harvests, the transformations in our lives, our dreams and our insights. We honoured the Samhain colour of black by gathering many, many blackberries – undoubtedly our son's favourite part of the celebrations!

Samhain is also a time to gratefully remember our ancestors and those who have passed on. Whilst in our garden this year's harvest has been very poor, in other areas of our lives it has been so very rich. We have learnt much about the things that we hope will shape our life in the future; sustainable living, living more simply and permaculture among them. We have also learnt much about ourselves and our true values just from becoming a family. The reading we've done, support we've received and people we've talked to or met brand new have only enhanced that, as well as introducing us to new ideas that we now couldn't imagine living without. This year has truly been one of transformation! I guess I'm honouring ancestors here as not just those who have passed on but those still alive who have more experience and wisdom who we “inherit from”. We will need some small tweaks as well as some major transformations on our path to treading more lightly upon the earth and we will use these dark months to reflect on what changes are right to “birth” in the spring.

This week has gone colder here in the south-west UK. Outside, I see everyone wrapping up in their scarves and thick coats. In our home, our winter-cold potions are made, we've got our heating on a little in the evenings and we're attending to improving insulation and heat retention. I love this season of nurture and taking care of ourselves, each other and our homes. Perhaps we need the extra hour that the clocks going back gives us to rest – or to catch up from the busy harvest season. This time I the perfect opportunity to build that sense of camaraderie that comes with snow and approaching Christmas, and to extend it further than this season and further into our communities. As Satish Kumar said in the talk of his that was one of my highlights of this year, when we improve how we connect and take care of ourselves, we will improve how we take care of our planet.

Happy Samhainide; welcome winter!

♥

Recycling update

The first week of this month saw National Recycling Week with the plea to us all to recycle just one more thing. http://myzerowaste.com/zero-waste-week-2012/ I know that there's more we can do as a household to reduce waste but we're working on it. Here are some of our favourite reuses for things before they end up in the recycling or rubbish bin:

• We generally use cloth nappies and washable wipes for Baby D so don't often have need for nappy sacks. When we do, plastic packaging does fine. Packaging for bagged supermarket veg (salad etc), the packaging loo roll/nappies come in, plastic mail packaging...sure it then goes to landfill but at least it gets one more use before it does.
• Yoghurt pots make good candle moulds, or cloches for young seedlings. Sometimes we cut the bottom 4-5cm off and use it as a holder for plant pots with drainage holes in if we've got them indoors.
• We use just an empty jam jar with the lable soaked off to store our toothbrushes and our dishbrushes. I like its simple rustic look. Every now and again we pop the old one in the recycling and divert a new one from its route there.
• We once found a lovely pine bunk bed ladder in a skip. We use it as a shoe rack!
• Old newspaper or paper bags line our food waste bin.
• We avoid takeaway coffee cups as a rule but there's the odd occasion where we fail. We make a hole in the bottom and use them for seedlings.
• Tights and socks beyond repair get used for stuffing, as do tiny fabric offcuts and thread offcuts from sewing.
• I'm right now making a mobile for Baby D out of old CDs and a metal ring that had broken off from our kitchen bin.
• And here's a piece of recycling art! My husband found the desk fan in a bin at his work and brought it home to see if he could fix it. Unfortunately he couldn't but he did save some of the electronic components for his It-Might-Be-Useful-One-Day box. I saw potential for a flower, and here it is!

A few months after starting our Plastic Chauffering Service, my estimate is that on average we get a carrier bag of empty TetraPak cartons and plastic pots/punnets dropped off almost daily. So about 6 carrier bags weekly. I initially felt a little disappointed about this amount but worked out that's about 25 carrier bags a month and over 300 per year which equates to a huuuuuge pile of plastic rescued from landfill!!

Mo   ❤

Oh YAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! for some sunshine! I have to write this to rebalance my whinge about the rain in my last post. We now have a bounteous three tomatoes in our mini-greenhouse thingy, one courgette coming along and the end room of the house (that faces south-west so becomes like a sauna on a sunny day) is Seedling Central. 

This room, our growing room/office, is our baby-unfriendly room. Our other rooms are babyproofed so that he can romp and explore fairly freely; in the end room he is closely supervised. This way, the computer stays working and Baby D unelectrocuted, seeds remain in their pots and soil out of his mouth, Mr Heartshapedhands' wordwork tools remain untouched and Baby D's fingers remain attached to him and things I have made to sell remain in a hopefully saleable condition.

He is my sunshine son. It's so much easier when we can spend time outside in our garden, at the park or on longer walks with relaxed facial muscles and freely swinging arms (as opposed to the scrunched face, stiff arms and hunched shoulders that I typically don on windy rainy days). Of course, not every day is sunny here in South West Blighty. This can be hard on my sunshine son who seems to get bored and fractious when indoors a lot. Which is hard on a Mama Mo whose energy level range tends to be somewhere between tired and exhausted anyway!

Perhaps I will discover some rainy day activities for an energetic baby- I'll share them here if I do. He seems a bit too young for a lot of creative activities and isn't always in the mood for his books. Last week we did make our first visit to a soft play centre, Veritas in Keynsham. £1.50 not badly spent; lovely staff, Baby D had a whale of a time and I went in a ball pool for the first time in, like, 15 years! Motherhood's way too exciting. ♥

Garden woes

We had dreams of a productive garden this year, but seem to be suffering the challenges that many gardeners in this country currently are. Whilst it's reassuring that it's not just us, it's worrying in terms of our future; if, as many say, the difficulties in growing and the boom in slugs is due to the wet, changeable weather - and climate change is likely to bring us more similar summers – growing food here is going to be a challenge longterm. And when the oil runs out then importing is hardly going to be the answer.

Slug munched veggies (and, on the left, the slug who I caught redhanded. Oh how my vegetarian, pacifist principles have been pushed!) The runner beans were our 3^rd planting of that crop; the other 2 hadn't even germinated.

Struggling cherry tree (possibly due to ants).

Decimated dianthus flowers....

and others that started to open but then died when still in bud.

   

But there are some fruits! (Plus loads of juicy tayberries I didn't photograph - and a few strawberries. Yum yum yum!)

To be fair, it could be said that nurturing energies have been been centred on another direction as well this year...

♥

update to the camping post...festivalling with a baby

An important milestone- Baby D's first festival! Just to make sure that he got the true festival experience, we picked a super-muddy one. Well, actually we hoped it would be sunny. After all, it was called Sunrise Celebration (man how the celebratory cheers went up across the site when the sun did rise above the clouds!).

The first day saw me sitting on a camping chair under a brolly breastfeeding Baby D whilst Mr Heartshapedhands and my mum put tents up in heavy rain, Baby D was a bit confused and grumpy, we adults were soggy and grumpy and I considered bailing out and going home early (like, 3 days early) for the first time in my festivalling history. However the weather did improve, my mood and the general enjoyment level with it. Yet the mud got muddier -  to the point where my mum was coming up with at least 5 different categories of mud. TIP: although I admittedly didn't try pushing a buggy around in the mud, it looked not at all easy. I was very glad of our sling!

Something else I was very glad of was my mum. Nana-of-as-much-unlimitted-energy-as-Baby D was fun to festi with, and great to have around for entertaining him, changing the odd nappy and enabling Mr Heartshapedhands  and I to have some time on our own. Time to squelch about feeling someone was missing and not quite knowing what to do with ourselves, and vaguely remembering how to have a conversation where we could give our whole attention to each other. I'd definitely recommend having a helper-outer about!

I did go to a few talks, although invariably missed some of each of them due to Baby D's feed needs, his wanting to be walked outside, or his being "chatty" and potentially restricting others' ability to hear. I even got to have a bit of a boogie, although felt very guilty about doing so when I met up with mum, Mr Heartshapedhands and a screaming Baby D.

This festival differed from previous ones in my level of sobriety (limited to having a small dash of spiced rum in a hot chocolate, and a bit more caffeine than I usually would). Another lovely new aspect was the sharing of knowing smiles - and some kind of sense of community - with other parents. Not just the other mums and dads with dinky ones in slings, but those with older children too. The smile they'd give me when Baby D was snuggled into my chest that said "ah, I remember that" and the smile I'd give them when their 4 year old fell into the mud which said "oh no! Good luck with cleaning up, I'm sure I'll be doing similar in a few years".

Other tips:

• It's easy to lose sense of time at festivals, particularly when "nipping back to the tent" involves walking the distance from your home to town. Baby D had quite a grump one evening which we realised was quite possibly because we hadn't yet had dinner and it was 8pm.
• See Camping with a Baby post for what we did about keeping him warm at night. Being a month later and further south, it wasn't as cold. We didn't have the futon mattress with us but he and I slept on 2 very think blankets and 2 thinner ones on 2 yoga mats.
• We had a chair from Mothercare that's designed to strap on to a dining chair, but we just out it on the floor (needs supervision as he could probably tip it over if he tried). We've previously found that Little Mr Wriggle won't eat if he's just sitting on the floor with us, he'll just crawl away to explore. But having a chair to strap him in (it has a table too) meant that he stayed put and ate! It folds up and is light to carry.
• As much as we try to avoid disposable products if possible, I just couldn't have taken our washable nappies, And thank goodness for wet wipes!!
• If using a sling, think how baby will keep dry. I'll let you into my shameful neglectful parenting secret here; I tend to forget about his feet sticking out! Often I wear a coat that goes over them but I had a different one with me and the first night they got soaked, poor little dude! However, I managed to find a stall selling some thick felted little booties with tiger face on- so cute! 
• Plan nappy changes (if possible!). The tent was the only really viable place to change his nappy and there were a couple of times when one of us had to dash back and miss some of a talk because we realised the current nappy had been on a while and D was seeming uncomfortable. That said, if there had been an emergency I'm sure someone in the main area would have let us use their van etc.

♥

The Plastic Chauffeuring Service

Plastic seems so omnipresent, even for our household actively trying to avoid it. Food packaging, flower pots, toys, computers, the front door, the kitchen sink. It's EVERYWHERE! In the UK, we generate approaching 5000,000 tonnes of plastic waste annually. (www.ecoforce.co.uk).

Packaging seems to be an area particularly liberal in plastic use, such as food often coming in a plastic punnet/tray that is then wrapped in a plastic film. Some councils are starting to be quite generous in the amount of plastics they collect; Bristol's doorstep collections now take plastic tubs, trays, yoghurt pots etc as well as bottles. Our address comes under South Gloucestershire Council and bottles are the only plastic they collect for recycling. They don't even take other plastics at any of their recycling centers so most people probably put it in their general waste to go to landfill where,according to ecoforce.co.uk, it will take around 400 years to break down.

However, we often pass or visit places where you can recycle plastics and have been taking ours for some time. It occurred to us that we could encourage our neighbours to drop their plastic waste round to us (after giving it a quick rinse, and we can take theirs. Likewise with TetraPak waxed cartons, which South Gloucestershire's recycling centers do take. So flyers were printed and posted through doors, and a receptacle was made by Mr Heartshapedhands for people to leave their plastic in if we're out. So far, about 5 households are taking us up on the completely free offer (about 100 cards delivered). We hope the number will increase but, judging by the amount I took to a recycling bank today, it will still save a lot going to landfill! 

If you live around Bitton and would like us to chauffeur your plastic and TetraPak to the packaging paradise, ring/text 07595 043860.

♥

i heart hearts

"I heart you Mac"  Martin Dear, Green Wing

Why "HeartShapedHands"?

Well, despite having reached my late twenties with a degree, 3 diplomas and various certificates, having searched my soul (a lot) and the advice of various friends, family, careers advisers and tarot readers, I still don't really know what I want to be when I grow up. In truth, the problem is actually the opposite; I want to be many things- a holistic therapist, a craftsperson, a designer, an artist, a writer, a campaigner, a teacher, to return to nursing, to work growing food, to grow flowers, to do something helping new mums, to change the world, to train in yet something else. And, of course, to do what I am doing for most of my waking (and some of my sleeping) hours: being a Mama and a homemaker.

To be fair, some of these can be crossed off the list for now. I should probably concentrate on growing food for the 3 of us a little more successfully before trying to do so for others. I'm not really knowledgeable or experienced enough in anything to teach others. There are various reasons I chose to leave nursing. My own baby is still a bit too "new" to leave for long enough to really help others, (or change the world). And I can't afford any more courses right now!

However, in most of my wished-for job titles, there's a common theme of wanting to help others and the planet. I know that sounds cliched but I think that's a good thing; the more people wanting to do that, the more love going around! That's kind of what HeartShapedHands is- a bringing together of all these livelihoods. Sometimes one role may take center stage for a while (some days right now I don't see far outside the Mama/Homemaker world!)

HeartShapedHands is also a celebration of the heart shape and what it represents, and an indulgence of my borderline obsessive love of it (rivaled only my obsession with yurts. And tea.) This beautiful symbol is, to me, wholesome and rustic, sensual and romantic, fun and recognised by everyone as communicating love and positive feelings. A symbol found in so many places in nature...

...and in my son's chewed food creations!

♥

Camping with a baby

The doubt clouds hovered closely over us last week, particularly closely as we eyed the Pembrokeshire weather forecast. Not because it had too many clouds; because of the night temperatures. "Am I being really irresponsible going camping with a 7 month old?" I asked the imaginary health visitor who lives on my shoulder. I made the mistake of uttering the question out loud when talking to my mother, The Queen of Keeping Warm Enough. Exclamations of fear for the Precious-Grandson-Smallness to Wales-Is-North-Of-Us-So-It-Must-Be-Cold ratio suggested I was. 

Husband took his usual approach; if you have a question, ask the internet. When Googling threw up nothing very definite, we were back to the official stance of shrug. After consultation with Pembrokeshire-dwelling friend  who had previously camped with a baby (and partly based on her offer of caravan to sleep in if it was unbearable), we went for it.

We packed every blanket we own (18, of various sizes and thicknesses. We didn't use them all) plus 2.5 tog Grow-bag, an extra layer than we'd normally sleep him in and his fleecey sleepsuit. Plus hot water bottes to warm bed and details of nearest Travelodge just in case the Arctic came to camp next to us or something. We checked the little man's temperature when we got into bed and set an alarm to do so an hour after. I awoke on our first morning to all three of us being alive,  sunshine and birdsong coming through the bell tent's canvas, and the knowledge that there would be an awesome view outside.

The whole weekend was fun and beautiful for all of us. Baby D was happy and peaceful on our walks, helping our friends plant things on their land and lying on the mat by the tent playing with the grass. He slept well and his soul seemed as lifted as my own by the fresh air, fresh scenery and refreshed joy at being a family that we all shared.

My camping tips: *

• Blankets- sandwich lighter ones between heavier ones. We put 2 lighter ones between our mattress and sheet too
• Check the weather forecast and not just the temperature- rain and wind can make it seem colder!
• Consider where you position your tent; can you get a sheltered spot?
• Have something decent to sleep on- and for baby to sleep in (eg, Gro-bag). Do you need spares?! 
• Place baby nearer centre of tent to sleep.
• Warm bed with hot water bottles (but move away from baby when then get in) 
• Have back-up plan (eg,friends' floors, or have details of nearby hotels/B&Bs). Just knowing this is probably more likely to serve to preserve your own (and relatives'!) sanity than it is likely you'll use it.
• Picnic blanket for rolling around.
• Somewhere safe and dry to put baby if everyone else is needed to put up/take down tent.
• Encouraging engagement in surroundings- this may require you to think about how concerned you are about what goes in baby's mouth!
• Relax and enjoy your surroundings yourself!

* please, please, PLEASE make your own assessment of the wise-ness of any camping trip. This is not a definative guide!

♥

Beltaine

Beltaine-tide..... some will have celebrated yesterday whilst others will do so/will have done so when they see certain signs in nature. I'll be doing my celebrating at the weekend, to coincide with the full moon and the anniversary of when I met my husband. In May is also the anniversary of when we married.

For me, it's a celebration of passion, nurturing, the faery world, fantasy, sexuality, partnership, beauty, and gestation (so an apt time to have met my soulmate!) The reported tradition of driving cattle between 2 fires at this time gives it a theme of protection too. It's a time to reflect on those goals conceived at Yule and assess if/how they are blooming, and how to nurture them further if they are to survive. The colours I associate with Beltaine are pink and green, the foods asparagus and garlic and the scents vanilla, geranium and cinnamon. The symbols and themes for me are the maypole and crown of flowers, the yoni and the lingam, hawthorn, faeries, blossoms,the pregnant belly ...and hearts!! ♥ ♥ ♥

Ostara/Easter

It may be a couple of weeks since the spring equinox now but I always feel it's best to continue the celebrations (and chocolate egg eating!) until Easter anyway. Especially as my birthday falls around this time too.


So I've felt on a bit of a roll with inspiration and positive ideas for 3-4 weeks and will hopefully soon be putting some of these into action. These include a community recycling idea, planning a non-religious christening equivalent for Baby D, and planning a street party to give an opportunity to try to improve the sense of community we feel is quite lacking where we live. On the equinox itself I planted 4 bulbs, baby D watching me intently from his bouncy chair beside me. The bulbs are for an autumn-flowering nerine called Ostara: perfect! I dressed our altar with a green scarf and green candles to symbolise the fertility and "greenness" of nature at this time. And chocolate/decorative eggs! I bought some daffodils, although now we have lots of lovely grape hyacinths out in our garden so I have been able to have some of them inside. We looked at our goals that we made at the winter solstice and how we are doing with these; a couple have been achieved and most are being made progress on. 

Daily Stress Less plan

Yesterday, via the Daily Spark ( http://paper.li/Spark_Magazine/1316082551 ) I came across Deepak Chopra's 4 daily steps to reduce stress:

http://www.deepakchopra.com/blog/view/356/a_four_step_plan_to_stress_less. Being someone with a tamed tendency to stress and worry about, well anything if I let myself, I thought about what my top stress-management strategies are,

1. I'd really agree with Deepak on nutrition. B vitamins are very important for nerve function and I really believe that my mental health is much improved from taking a supplement (a particularly good idea for us veggies) and eating B vit-rich foods (nuts, bananas, wholegrains). Unfortunately I can't share his enthusiasm about Chyawanprash; I just don't like the taste! But, as it's Vitamin C he's recommending it for, there's plenty of other good sources. Get in the Omega 3's and 6's too for a happy brain. Personally I'm also a breakfast person, and understand that various experts and studies recommend eating breakfast for a balanced mind and weight. However, I'm aware that many people aren't breakfast people.
   
   
2. Mindfulness. I find this great for turning off the internal chatter, which is often worry chatter. Furthermore, if I'm focussing on my surroundings (particularly when outside), I notice their beauty thus getting a dose of positivity and feeding my need to connect with nature and get some fresh air into me.

3. Breathing. Well, you've got to do it anyway so just as well to do so in a way that calms you! Slowly inhale through your nose right down into your belly, feeling your lungs and belly expand as you do so, then slowly empty them. I like to combine with yoga asana's or Reiki and feel so much more peaceful for doing so. But time is limited as a parent and on more days than not I find myself unable to enjoy a decent yoga session. However a little can go a long way for me, for example; a few breaths whilst waiting for the kettle to boil or when I go to the loo or before I crash into bed – perhaps combined with stretching my arms high above my head or slowly circling my hips. Popping outside the back door for some deep breaths of fresh morning air always feels like a good start to the day for me too.
   
   
4. I had some CBT sessions a while ago and still use some of the techniques of questioning my worries and looking for evidence to back them up (which there often isn't). For example, if I'm stressing about something I did that I didn't do quite as I'd ideally like, I might ask myself who is actually expecting the standard I'm imposing, or how important this thing is in the big picture. This is a very crude example. If you're interested in CBT I'd recommend the CBT For Dummies book, www.llttf.com or, of course, speaking to your GP or a private CBT therapist.
   
   
5. Exercise Personally, I'm not a sporty type but go for a walk almost every day, usually for around half an hour to an hour. Again, my body and soul really do feel better for a bit of daily fresh air. If it's raining heavily or I really can't get out, I'll dance around the kitchen to music whilst doing chores, This also serves to amuse my baby, and perhaps any neighbours who can see through the window.
   
   
6. Gratitude Going over my day and acknowledging what it's given me helps me go to sleep in a peaceful frame of mind. On a Sunday evening, my husband and I also list our gratitudes from the week. It sounds corny but we're really enjoying it as a way to live more positively. 
    
7. Massage. Can I put that in as a massage therapist without it seeming like a bit of a plug?! Now most of us can't afford the money or time for a daily professional massage. Nor do most of us have a partner who has the time or energy to give us one daily. However, with self-massage and yoga I find that one of the many benefits is that it shifts my mind away from its chatter and to my body. Here's 3 of my calming massage tips for the busy bee: *
   - place 2-3 fingers on each temple and slowly, gently circle a few times,
   - make your hands into a claw shape and slowly massage your scalp with shampoo-ing movements,
   - close your eyes. Use your index fingers to slowly stroke up your nose and along each eyebrow to your temples. Then place two fingers in the centre of your forehead and circle slowly.
   Again, use those snippets of time waiting for the kettle to boil, standing in a queue or sitting on the toilet.

* Avoid these if you have a headache or have had any recent head injury or serious condition such as brain haemorrhage or tumour. If you have epilepsy or diabetes which is not well-managed, discuss first with your GP.

Imbolc

Last Wednesday, when I first saw the new moon, I started to tune to and celebrate the Imbolc energy. A couple days earlier, I had seen our garden's first snowdrops burst out their pretty white flowers from their spindly stems. I always think they look like little fairy skirts! Other shoots had been poking their heads up for a while, confused at the indecisiveness of this winter. Indeed, as I write this, it is below -5c (unusual in the South West) and frosty. I just stepped outside our back door to take a few deep breaths of the icy air, to let it bite my lungs. I breathed it back, warmed from where I'd brought it down into my belly, and stretched my hands up to the sky, enjoying the tingle of the subzero haze. Beautiful.

I love the clean purity of this energy, For me, it's the magic of the morning, of the new moon, of this time of year, I see the young goddess bringing excitement and hope for the projects planned and seeds – literal and metaphorical – being planted. I'm t the same time conscious of the shadow side of this: naivety and fear. “What if these plans don't work out?” “Perhaps I don;t have what I need to do these things”. These are the ways I've welcomed where this energy lies in the outside world and in myself:

♥ Through several walks, both urban and rural, mindfully enjoying the signs of spring and pondering what is emerging in my own life right now.

♥ By planting the first seeds of the year; this week I've sown coriander, basil and tomatoes :)

♥ By covering our alter with a cream cloth which has a pale floral pattern and strands of silver, and decorating it with white and green candles, some glass icicle-like decorations, a silk worm cacoon, a small snowman jigsaw, early daffodils from my native Cornwall and some offerings of seeds, lemon cake and water from the Chalice Well in Glastonbury. Burning ylang ylang, lavender and melissa oils in my burner,

♥ By eating foods that represent to me the new moon and of the first stirrings of life- for example, by their shape (bananas, cashews), seasonality (root veg, leeks) flavour (lemon, vanilla and maybe a bit of cinnamon/ginger to represent the strengthening sun) or nature (seeds, beansprouts). Wearing the colours I associate with this season and this aspect of the goddess (silver, white, pale green/yellow/pink).

♥ By looking back at the goals we made at Yule. How are they emerging? What are doing to nourish them? What challenges are there and what do we need to do to keep them growing? By giving thanks for how they are taking shape.

♥ By reflecting on the maiden goddess aspect of myself, where Brigid and Artemis are found in me.

As I think about the stirrings of life in my outer and inner worlds, I remember with a grateful, happy smile how it was on this date last year that a little stick from Boots told my husband and I that there was a little life stirring inside my womb... ♥

....Happy Imbolc   :)