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Yes, you read that right,  I’ve been going to the same YMCA camp for the last thirty-one years.  I started going as an excited giddy girl when I was sixteen, accompanying my then boyfriend with his parents, and I continued on until I got married to that boyfriend at twenty one and have been going every year since then for the last 27 years.  Whew.  My husband loves it, I tolerate it.  Don’t get me wrong, it’s not all that bad-I have had years where I enjoyed it more than others, but in general, I’ve grown terribly tired of it and I long for greener pastures-er…turquoise waters and palm trees on the vacation front.  Who knows when those dream vacations will come true, but until then I suppose I will make the best of it.  Here are some photos of things that caught my eye this year.  I had a lot of fun jazzing up my photos using my Instagram App for iPhone 4.  In fact, I have nearly come to completely abandon my Kodak fancy camera and almost exclusively use my iPhone 4 now for taking photos.  The apps are a blast.  It was the most fun I had on my vacation.  Not.  🙂

 This year only two of our five children came with us. For a variety of reasons our three oldest kids (23, 21 and 19) opted to stay home.  This didn’t sit well with my husband who has a hard time dealing with change and the prospect of his kids growing up and out, so after much bluster, begging and badgering from him to go, they won out, stayed home and had a vacation of their own away from us.

(I wish I could have stayed home, too.)

…But as the wife, I have a somewhat obligation to stick with my husband and alas, so I went again.  My hubby started the week off on Monday by having a little bit of a pout because no one wanted to do anything with him (like a boring boat ride), so he stormed off on his own with his thermos of ice and pop and a smirk on his face and bade us an indignant farewell.   I left and drove into town on my own to buy much needed groceries, and for a bit of retail therapy as respite from the mosquitoes and the (yawn) thrills of campdom.  When I returned almost three hours later, he had just beaten me back by a few minutes and was as red as a freshly boiled lobster.  It seems that in his little snit,  he was so intent on getting his thermos, pop and book that he forgot to bring the sunblock.  So, for the rest of the week he was in “don’t touch me!” pain, blistering and almost unable to do anything much except puzzles,  keeping to the confines of the cabin…{{sigh}}…see what  I mean?

So, I took to the beach by myself and tried to make something positive out of this sunburn saga that would bring me a little peace, solitude and a good photo or two.

The highlight of our trip was watching how much our dog enjoyed the freedom of running around the area that surrounded our cabin, the woods and the lake just behind us.  He was suffering from a case of unadulterated joy.  It made my heart happy just to watch him.  He behaved so well, and stayed right by us, never straying once.  He loved to catch the frisbee by running off the dock and going ‘PLOP!” into the water after it.  He swam and ran and chased chipmunks-And didn’t get one tick all week.  Love that dog.

In my leisure I read a wonderful book about how to nurture my soul.  In it I read something very profound and it went like this:

“The key is to give up the project of making yourself something shiny and big and to recognize that we are very ordinary people. By learning to discover and value our ordinariness, we nurture a friendliness toward ourselves and the world that is the essence of a healthy soul.”

I’m a little more natural, less makeup and a little worse for the wear.  For I’ve survived another year of the same old, same old vacation spot.  Maybe next year I’ll be donning a French scarf and walking around Paris, or maybe I’ll be reading books on the beaches of Bali.  Until then, I suppose I’ll have to keep to the ordinary vacation spots, because like the Soul Handbook says, there is value in the ordinary and that is the essence of a healthy soul.  We’ll see.

I went thrifting yesterday and I spotted this really sweet turquoise Sonoma skirt for $3.99 on the rack.  I just couldn’t not take it home.  It won’t fit me, but as I looked it over, I realized this could very easily be made into an apron.  I love the clean country print with such nice touches at the hem.  Easy Peasy!

I made this collage at an art gathering at one of my Meetup groups a few months ago. I really love the theme of the middle aged woman. The wax gives it a bit of an ethereal affect.

It’s been raining fairly regularly here over the last week, and when that happens everything just suddenly greens up and looks spectacular. This is the first week of summer and here inmy backyard it’s beautiful. When we first moved into this house 13 years ago we had this Weeping Willow planted as a tiny tree in our back yard. It’s taken all this time to grow and stretch out it’s wide arms to look as majestic as it is now and we just love it. This tree is one of the things I love most about my house.

Of course it wouldn’t be summer with out playing Fisbee and Xander lives for it. The weather is perfect here, breezy and temperate and right now as I type this, it’s almost Autumn like.

I want to share this with you…I saw it today and it really touched my heart. I’m so heartened by this sweet dog’s ability to adjust and make the best of life with a little help from some kind humans.

This blog is giving away a dream trip to Paris!  Go to  http://ohhappyday.com/2011/06/goes-to-paris to enter to win.  Good luck and Bon Soir!

Em

I took a little trip to Goodwill on Thursday, birthday 25% discount in hand, in search of  my favorite find-books.   I got really lucky and scored some awesome titles.  I think Target and the Borders that went out of business donated some of their castoffs to Goodwill because there were tons of paperbacks shelved there that appeared new.  I love when I run into unexpected treasures; it makes the hunt that much more fun. So, here’s my pile of goodness….see anything in there you would have snatched up?  Click on the photo to make it bigger if you are really interested.

I also scored three cups like the one pictured…I love these extra large mugs they have that vintage yellowware look to them.

“Only in quiet waters do things mirror themselves undistorted.  Only in a quiet mind is adequate perception of the world.”  ~Hans Margolius

Finally, after so long my husband and four boys just left to play volleyball and the house is quiet.  I may have two hours of peace and quiet.  No blaring tv, no talking, no music…just the trickle of the fish tank that is home to our two shelled pets.  Sitting on the sofa, I can hear the soft exhales of my dog breathing in sleep as he, too, enjoys this little bit of quiet.  Tis wonderful to have peace, something I crave and rarely get.  Most women I know seek out solitude, if only for a half hour or even fifteen minutes carved into their day.  I need this-some soul time-to breathe, reflect, pray, hear my thoughts. and just do whatever I wish…be it nothing at all.

I completely understand the essence of the quotation I placed at the top of this post.  My life tends to be like the distorted surface of the water after a rock is tossed into it.  On these rare occasions where I do get a real taste of solitude, the surface of my ‘water’ becomes still and reflective just like a mirror.  And in that stillness I can think clear thoughts and see things like I can at no other times.

Ah, sweet solitude.

Like most women, I struggle with body acceptance.  There isn’t a day that goes by that I’m not thinking about, obsessing over or self-loathing about my weight and how I appear in the eyes of others.  I’m not really happy with my size.   I have to admit, though, I do love myself.  I adore me, what I’m about,  how I view the world, my artfulness, and my tendency to think in flowers.  I do, however, find it difficult to smile down on my ever expanding waistline and blossoming butt.  If I could change three things about me it would be to grow a longer chin, stretch out my neck and have thin upper arms.  I could deal with the rest. 

Trying to find a positive, healthy way to look at my external self has gotten a little easier since I read Anne Lamott’s book Travelling Mercies…Some Thoughts on Faith.  Her chapter entitled The Aunties was like a breath of fresh air.  It brought tears to my eyes and made me realize I am being much too hard on myself.  She discusses the way she has dealt with her own body image struggles (she hates her butt and thighs and the nappy hair she was born with) as a middle aged woman and while on vacation at the beach with her son she adopts a loving, whimsical way of looking at her imperfections and ultimately accepting herself that is both funny and enlightening.   

   Anne on applying makeup to cover her aging face:

 I wasn’t thinking that I looked awful and wanted to look like someone else; that is the point at which you can come dangerously close to female impersonation.   I just remembered that sometimes you start with the outside and you get it right. You tend to your spirit through the body.  It’s polishing the healthy young skin of that girl who was there just a moment ago, who still lives inside.  It’s saying that sometimes maybe one looks a little pale and wan and wants to shine a little light on oneself.  Then, when you’re in that honoring place, it’s almost like makeup becomes a form of light, just as on those days when a little cloud cover makes you really notice the sun’s rays that come slanting through.  Maybe the key is simply a wry fondness for the thing you’re slapping this stuff onto, instead of a desire to disguise; so it’s not that you’re wearing a coat of paint, but a mantilla.

If you haven’t read Travelling Mercies, I suggest you take a copy out at your library, cozy up on the sofa and read it.  Anne is a genuine person whom I believe speaks the truth.  She says it the way it is and I embrace that.

Anne implied something that resonated within me and enabled me to think for the first time that despite the fact that I am not a thin woman and I have issues and struggles with my body, I should love my physical self and embrace my body because it is the very thing that houses my spirit-my lovely, perfect spirit that is the essence of who I really am.