Outside of love and belonging, safety, good food, and a warm shelter…what I crave most is depth.  Not only in my relationships but in my daily living.  In how I dress myself and what food I put into my body and how I watch the dark-eyed juncos perch in the blue spruce only to dive down and eat the black oil sunflower seeds off the ground with gusto.  

I want to immerse myself in beauty and slow my hustle…and get deep into it…the art of living.  

Spend time at the bird feeder learning the personalities of my new feathered friends on my new bit of land.

A friend of mine once stated that she wanted to know a place in the world, one view of Lake Michigan from the shoreline, so well that she could track its moods and how it shifted daily and seasonally and from year to year.  To know it so deeply.  With such presence.  To witness and in witnessing be known herself.  (that last bit is my add) 

For years in my journal, I’ve written that I want to “Keep it simple and do it well”.  To make one beautiful, thoughtfully designed garment really well, rather than 6 t-shirts pushed out on a Saturday afternoon because all my t-shirts are beyond wearing.  To wash the dishes with reverence.   To make a meal full of so much love and so little hurry.

I don’t know about you, but I’m tired of rushing through life to get to the “good stuff”. This year and a half have taught me on a very deep level the value of being here now.  Tomorrow can change in the blink of an eye and truthfully I’ll never get “there”, it was always here and now.  

I’m easing into this new year, slow and steady. 

Newly in my home on my new land.  Just beginning to experience days without a giant to-do list to get things up and running.  Settling in.  And, surprisingly, not getting ahead of myself and looking at the new “must do” list without giving this last push its due rest.  

To be clear, thoughts like…Where will I put the garden, the bees, what about the apple trees and berry bushes, when can I build the woodshed and the car port.  How will I pay for it all, how much energy will it take?  Oh, and the chickens, they’ll need a coop.  How much of this can I do after adding the addition this coming year?…flitter through my mind.

And they get added to dreamy little lists..none of this is new, I’m a dreaming-ambitious-list-maker-and-doer from way back, but what is new is this sense of ease, this sense of “not now” and this sense of “I don’t have to know how”.  

Now’s the time to settle in and let the best garden spot show itself. To get to know the Pileated woodpecker that already put 9 holes through the wooden siding of my new maker’s studio revealing the pink insulation to the winter air.  To see where the full moon in January will peek through the trees.  

To allow this newly planted human to germinate and root into this land that is hers. 

Ohh!, Did I tell you there’s a storybook creek off the back of the property, not on my land, but mere yards from it?  The man who owns it has walking trails on his property and has graciously allowed my son and I to use them…a gurgling creek has been on my wish list for a long time.  We’ve got a pint of golden honey to share as thanks. 

The neighbors to the west, the lovely ones I bought the land from, are patiently waiting for us to settle in before they burst over here and welcome us in earnest.  The neighbor to the east…well, he’s not happy.  I hope our chasm can be bridged, but I’m giving it time after the weeks of raging, body-shaking shouting, and anger from his yard and often in my face at our arrival. 

Change can be so very hard.  I have space for that, but I also have boundaries…my safety and my wee one’s safety are paramount.  I trust though that sometime when we’re in eye shot and the weather is warm and new, a well-timed smile and wave and perhaps a bit of golden honey just might help smooth things over.   After all, he put up the most charming winter lights around his home and they bring me delight every single day.

In this place of ease, I’m craving depth.  Mastery of my art.  Carefully set snaps in time-worn leather, wool vests made to fit, donning my waxed canvas work apron as I produce little chips and threads and dust to be swept away at day’s end.  That familiar smile that spreads on my face as I hold up a creation and think, look what I did!

?what I’m loving…

• I was gifted the most sweet folding candle lantern? made of brass.  It hangs by my door and I can not wait to snow shoe with this beauty!
• I have secret dreams of making wee books? for all my big thoughts.
• Tomorrow, the 11th, is the new moon in Capricorn and I plan to honor it with this ceremony?.  Ritual and ceremony add grounding and soul to my life and my 2024 is going to have more of that!
• Now I want to make one of these? with sweet messages for me wee fella!