be like a bird

Be like a bird
who halting in her flight
on limb too slight ,
feels it give way beneath her,
yet she sings
knowing she has wings.

one of my favorite singing rounds :)

Friendship threads

Today , and always I am feeling so grateful for friendships in my life and the love and connection . Honestly I don't know where I would be without my sisters and their sweetness , joy and creativity in my life !
Connected with two long time friends yesterday ( one has been my soul sister for 20 years) and I am reminded again to take even more time in my life for this kind of time ...
Friends are like these colorful threads, we all sort of hold everything together for each other , weaving in love and so much beauty along the way.


A quote from one of my favorite Frog and Toad stories...

Frog and Toad stayed on the island

all afternoon, they ate wet sandwiches

without iced tea.

They were two close friends sitting alone together.

Easing in to summer

Easing in to Summer,
and with part of that I am making some changes that are a big change from what I have been doing lately in the online world anyway.
I have deleted my twitter account which had almost 900 followers. I deleted my Honeytree photography Facebook Fan page.
I do love my blog so it's staying put , and I hope to put more of my energy here .
I just need more time in my life for some more of the nurturing things I love like being outdoors, being in the garden, making art, taking photographs, and playing music.
I will also be removing some of the ads I have on a few different blogs since keeping up with them financially is not so easy right now..
So we'll see how it goes, I feel so much lighter and less psychic pull from the internet. it's great !

I also just started a Celebrate Summer Buy One Get One FREE Sale in my photography shop :)

Hope everyone has a great weekend !!

Summer !

Yay summer is here and we are off today to go soak in the mineral pools in Sonoma..
what a treat !

last days of spring ...

Summer Solstice is just a few days away :)

a little reminder....

You are perfect and divine just the way you are .....

when the voices from the past or old beliefs get in my way...
this is my mantra
this little saying uplifts me to a different place of self compassion and keeps my heart open
keeping the channels open for more love , creativity and beauty :)

Anyone have a saying that helps you navigate back to mindfulness or centered-ness ?

.

in the mirror

me trying to get a good picture for my avatar ... these always turn out sort of funny but I liked this one.. I did eventually get one for the avatar too :)



Saturday I visited a bunch of Art studios in the area that were open for the weekend .. loads of inspiration !! Sunday was a beach day.. it was sunny this time.. gorgeous waves , and a soft breeze. Heavenly ... until I got to my car and found a ticket for $48.00 . I learned the hard way what "no parking anytime" meant.. duh..
well me and probably 40+ other people got one since the highway was lined with cars above the beach. California closed and reduced services to over 100 parks this year , so it's hard to find parking for some beach and and hiking places... hopefully some of them will open this summer ,
and stay open :)

Celebrating flowers

Every year I plant poppies, and usually the same variety just different shades of purple , this patch was alot darker than I thought they would be and they are so amazing ! They are so rich with purple . I'm so glad there is still tons of buds for more flowers it really brightens up the garden.
Today is our 5th wedding anniversary. One of the things I remember about planning our wedding was my husband kept saying that he wanted was tons of flowers , flowers everywhere , and live music , no d.j.
I love that about him .. and so we did, we had a live middle eastern band, and tons of flowers.

...also wanted to share this poem by Mary Oliver that my Auntie Rosie read at our wedding ...

Happiness by Mary Oliver

In the afternoon I watched
the she-bear; she was looking
for the secret bin of sweetness -
honey, that the bees store
in the trees’ soft caves.
Black block of gloom, she climbed down
tree after tree and shuffled on
through the woods. And then
she found it! The honey-house deep
as heartwood, and dipped into it
among the swarming bees - honey and comb
she lipped and tongued and scooped out
in her black nails, until

maybe she grew full, or sleepy, or maybe
a little drunk, and sticky
down the rugs of her arms,
and began to hum and sway.
I saw her let go of the branches,
I saw her lift her honeyed muzzle
into the leaves, and her thick arms,
as though she would fly -
an enormous bee
all sweetness and wings -
down into the meadows, the perfections
of honeysuckle and roses and clover -
to float and sleep in the sheer nets
swaying from flower to flower
day after shining day.

...............................................................................................................

Thanks for letting me share a sentimental time :)

I hope everyone has a wonderful weekend !

Paper lanterns

Paper lanterns we found while were we in japan town.

Which inspired us to buy a piece of handmade paper when we were in an Origami store there , filled with so many different papers and colors and textures..
We decided on this thick paper that had flowers pressed in it, since were were wanting to replace a lampshade that was on one of our lamps in the living room... this is the new shade with our flower paper.
The old shade was purple white gray and black striped and had this sort of alien glow in the room, so I'm so glad to have something much more mellow and so pretty :)

Sunday at the beach

It is dependably foggy at the beaches here in the summer. I had a brief moment of thinking I might not lug my camera down to the beach, since It was pretty heavily misty.. and I'm so glad I did ! The lighting was so amazing , diffused and soft with the fog, so gorgeous. I usually spend time taking landscape pictures, but the little details and the people around caught my attention more than usual ...
It was warm too for here, even though it looks freezing , there were lots of people swimming.
The sand was warm on our bare feet, who needs a pumice stone when you can walk for 2 hours on gritty sand ... nothing like it :)
Lots of people out with their horses too , it was really wonderful seeing them coming down the beach in the thick fog, so magical . At our house which is about 20 miles inland from the coast , it was in the 80's and dry heat ... so we were glad for the refreshing beach day and misty air.

food and flowers

This is a little market on 18th street in the Mission district San Fransisco , everything was so fresh and vibrant. The selection of cheeses was pretty amazing too. Everyone who works there seems to really love their jobs and I can see why.We would have got a snack but we just had the best scones either one of us has ever had in our lives at this little tea house
which was really a sweet little space, they were playing Krishna Das and it was really beautiful all cozy and buddha like inside. We Just got our scones to go though...we were sort of non stop walking at the moment .

Roses

With all the roses in bloom right now I was drawn to these beauties , all spotted and faded.
Our neighbors roses are all along the fence on our dirt driveway , these just glowed in the sunset light when we were on our evening walk.
I'm definitely going to get some more pics of these, I love them !

We just got back from 2 days in San Fransisco... so I will have lots of new pics soon.
We crammed in so much in 2 days, the botanical gardens , the Haight, Japantown, the Misson district,Castro, and we stayed in Little Italy. One of the things my husband and I have in common is a love of food and trying new things, so we ended up eating our way across San Fran...
I'm glad I don't live there though it would be a very expensive habit .

petals...

Just wondering where this week went .............
hope everyone has a great weekend !

Light form the Heart

An impromptu experimental series I did recently .

........................................................................................

Soul receives from soul that knowledge, therefore not by book

nor from tongue.

If knowledge of mysteries come after emptiness of mind, that is

illumination of heart.

~ Rumi ~

May

I've been a little busy lately , this weekend was so full, of wonderful things, and one of them was when we were at the May Madness Juggling festival In Santa Rosa
me juggling in the back there...

and being asked to help do a little performance at the juggling show. Me in the orange hard hat, and Russ the festival coordinator in blue.
We were explaining to our faithful volunteer, how juggling can be dangerous and one could get injured , , and then we proceeded to put on hard hats and juggle around her. got a good laugh from the crowd ..

That evening our Samba group played at a fun gathering.

Yesterday we tried to take a walk on the beach and the wind was SO strong it was crazy, but we found some amazing tide pools that I can't wait to go back to when it's not so windy .

Maples, Poppies, Dogwood

More spring beauties I found at some local gardens the other day ...

I Hope everyone is having a good start to the week :)

Seed Pod Collections

Little shiny acorns

Poppy pods from my garden last year

Acorn top with leaves

big textured acorns

not actually a seed pod but the calyx from a Persimmon.

eucalyptus pods on the branch

I have so many seed pods that I have collected along hikes and travels, this is just a few.
Since it was raining most of the day yesterday , I got into some spring cleaning , which then led me to photographing some of these seeds that are everywhere in the house . The overcast light through the window was perfect so I went with it. Seedpods and rocks seem to be the things I like to collect, I have a lot around on shelves , and also alot in boxes in the closet .... if I had them all out our house would look like a natural history museum or something .
I love them all dearly :) What kind of things do you collect ?

Any artists out there ??
The 'Wemoon' calendars is now accepting artwork for the 2012 publication.
you can download or print the application here .