Butterfly Mind

We might not play it safe

February 12th, 2016

We’re thinking of doing something bold. It’s been a long time since we’ve owned a house that we can do whatever we want with. A couple weeks ago, I painted the kids’ trim to finally check their rooms off the Finished list. Last weekend, my husband painted our living room ceiling.

Now, we get to paint the walls.

We originally thought we would go with a sand color, to evoke the feeling we get from the Gulf of Mexico and the ocean. We have seaglass colored lamps and are playing with textures and shapes in our furnishings: a rich cream shag rug, a curved white chair, a blocky sofa and chaise lounge with square edges and linen textured fabric. We wanted the walls to add another layer of depth, but when we painted patches of the sample, we thought, Blah. Boring.

The color blended with the furniture, and it did not show off the beautiful floors that are our favorite part of the house. Nothing popped.

So we pulled out the paint chips again, this time holding them against the warm oak floor; wondering which would best punch up the shapes and textures of furniture; thinking about the deep yellow, green, and blue of the painting we bought a couple years ago; and most importantly, asking what will be interesting?

My husband pointed to a dark grey paint chip. “I like that one,” he said.

This color is not a cloudy sky grey, or a silver grey. This is an almost-black grey.

“That’s really dark,” I said.

I looked at it again on the floor. “It would look amazing against this wood,” I said.

“I don’t know, maybe this one’s a little safer.” I pointed at a lighter grey — more of a pewter. I held it up to the walls, the furniture, the floors. It was definitely safe.

It was definitely boring.

Today I’m taking a flex day. I work tomorrow (Saturday), so I’m taking today off to write, read with a kitty on my lap, have lunch with my husband, and go to the paint store. I’m going to get a sample of the dark dark grey. It’s a bold move. Kind of scary. Definitely not safe.

It is the one option that I’m excited about. I can’t wait to see how it looks.
Dreaming of seeds, but — cats.

February 10th, 2016

The seed catalogs arrived! As soon as we brought them in from the mail box, I started poring over them. Our intention is to plant a flower garden out front, but the catalogs begin with tomatoes.

Bright red, juicy tomatoes whose slices drip with the warmth and sunshine of summer. I can’t imagine one of those fist-sized Burger Boys in the afternoon, when the fruit is warm, slicing it into slabs on the sunny porch, sprinkling it with salt, and eating it with a fork. My God.

We don’t have space for a vegetable garden. Well, I should say we don’t have usable space for a vegetable garden. Our yard is large, but consists pretty much of a giant steep hill that’s treacherous to even walk up, much less plant a garden on. Everything would wash away. So, no tomatoes this year. Sadly.

And then I got to the flower and herbs section of the catalog. Emerald sweet basil, spring green lemon balm, silvery lavendar. Happy yellow sunflowers, powder blue hydrangea, purple bee balm. They made me want to buy grow lights and start planting right away.

Which brings me to my dilemma. I’d love to start plants from seed indoors, but I’m not sure how to accomplish it without an extravagent setup: stringing grow lights from the ceiling, scrounging up a large table for flats, and most importantly, finding a place to put the seedlings where the cats won’t destroy them.

I can imagine spending $200-$300 on lights, pots, seeds, and soil, only to come downstairs one morning to a seedling massacre on the floor of the basement. I would spend weeks waiting for sprouts to emerge, then as soon as the green finally arrives, I’d go to bed one night and wake to find pots and dirt and mutliated baby plants scattered on the basement floor, while a cat looks at me with big, “What?” eyes and then licks her paw.

So my guess is that I won’t be planting seeds ahead of time. It would likely be more cost effective, and I’m antsy to get started on the garden, but I’m just not sure how to make it work.
I miss writing

February 9th, 2016

I’m a reader – reading is possibly my favorite past time. But I have to admit that with my focus on reading instead of writing this year, I miss my composition books. I miss my blog.

A friend asked, “What about your 10 minutes per day?” when I told him my blog was sad and lonely. Those minutes are going to consuming instead of producing these days.

But today I’m up early (as always). It’s another snow day and everyone else is sleeping. A cat purrs at my knee, snow clicks against the window, and I hear the tappity-tap of my keyboard and the quiet tick of the clock.

The funny thing is that part of the reason I’m not writing is because everyone else is. January and February are our biggest months in support at WordPress.com as folks follow through on New Year’s resolutions to start blogging. I love that, that we see such a huge spike as people dedicate themselves to publishing online. It’s an extraordinarily busy time, though, and one that I don’t squeeze time in for my own writing.

This morning though, I did. I opted to write instead of emptying the dishwasher.

Another busy day is about to begin, but for now my world is still and silent. I wrote my Andrea Reads America post, and I dusted off this blog as well. It feels good to be here, if just for a moment.
Phoenix in Phoenix

January 27th, 2016

Last week, during the snowmageddon that buried my family under a foot of snow, I was in Phoenix, Arizona, co-working with my team who I usually only interact with online: team Phoenix.

Phoenix in Phoenix.

We named ourselves after the mythical creature that rises from the ashes — not after the city — but somehow we ended up in the city of Phoenix anyway for our team meetup. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but I could not get over the cacti. They were adorable. Cartoonish. I kept expecting them to jump up and run skitter away.

I’m terrible about photographing people, so here are my favorite non-people scenes from Phoenix².

Prickly Pear cactus?

Here’s what I think is a prickly pear, which tasted delicious in the prickly pear margarita.

The cacti on the mountain made me giggle.

Dense with spines, this looked fuzzy from far away.

Saguaro cactus

Also a saguaro? Shaped like a barrel.

Cactus fruit

Spikey ball

Wagon wheel bench in old town Scottsdale

Cave Creek, Arizona

Team Phoenix had one meetup before we changed to a different team structure. Now a portion of us are team Hedwig, like Harry Potter’s owl. Maybe next time we’ll meet up in London?
Weightless on the beach

January 10th, 2016

We travelled to my home town of Tybee Island after Christmas, and there’s something about smelling the salt air and being near the ocean there that makes me feel unburdened. Weightless. The sky was overcast the whole time we were there, which makes the images feel heavy. I, however, still felt light. Here are some of my photographs from our trip for this week’s Daily Post Weight(less) photo challenge.

Silhouette of kids at the beach at sunset.

Afternoon low tide at Tybee beach, December 2015.

Sea foam on a winter day.

Tidal creek at the end of my parents’ dock.

Sunrise on a morning run.
2016 Resolutions: Create Balance

January 9th, 2016

2015 was an exciting year: we bought a house, got kittens, and I helped organize a mini-conference for our company’s annual meeting. My only resolution in 2015 was to dedicate ten minutes per day to writing, and that resolution ultimately provided an opportunity for me to speak at WordCamp US.

I noticed, though, that by the end of 2015 my focus shifted so much towards work that I barely left my home office — some days I never even went outside — and I had little energy for relaxation or projects at home.

I love my job, and I also love the outside world, my home, and my family. This year I want to be mindful of balance in my life. Working too hard can lead to burnout, and it can also exhaust you so that you don’t have energy for your non-work life. I don’t want those things to happen. I don’t want to burn out on a job I love, and I don’t want to neglect my love of the outdoors, our home, or my family.

For 2016, I’ve made a list of a few simple things to do to help me create balance:

Work outside of my home twice per month
I work for an amazing company where I am able to work from anywhere I want: my home, coffee shops, RV parks, wherever. I’ve worked there for over a year and never once worked outside of my home. Until yesterday. I worked from a coffee shop for a few hours yesterday, and I loved it. I was among people and the clatter of coffee shop sounds, I was not dressed in pajamas or workout clothes, and I didn’t have to make my own coffee. I’m looking forward to doing this more.

Build plant, animal, and home care into my daily routine
We bought these awesome flower boxes back in Septemeber, and within a few weeks, all of our beautiful pansies had withered and died. None of us were in the habit of watering plants. My work schedule is flexible — I don’t have to work any specific hours, and I can make up my own schedule — so I’m slotting in one hour per day that is dedicated to tending plants, animals, and other home care. By building it into my day, I will help build a habit.

Work on one home project per weekend
I had a lot of momentum when we first bought our house. I was a painting machine. I burned myself out, though, doing too much too fast and never taking a break. As a result, I stopped working on the house. We’ve got a million projects we’d like to do, though, and we have big ideas for our home. I don’t want to kill myself and never have time to relax, so I’m not going to work all weekend every weekend on house projects. I am, however, going to make sure I dedicate some time each weekend to making progress on our projects.

Hike twice per month
We live in the Appalachians. The hiking around here is ridiculously beautiful, and ridiculously accessible. It’s shameful how little hiking we did last year. This year I’m changing that.

Read through Massachusetts on my reading project
I am reading 3 books from each state in the United States for my Andrea Reads America project. 2015 was a year for writing, and 2016 will be a year for reading. I’m reading the states in alphabetical order and am currently reading Indiana. Completing Indiana through Massachussetts (8 states) would give me about 6 weeks to research, read, and write up each state’s three books. I’d also love to give my Andrea Reads America blog a makeover, but I don’t want to go too crazy here.

So there it is. I’ve transferred my scribbled resolutions from my private Moleskine to my public blog. That means I have to do them now, right? I’ve got a calendar for recording my hikes and coffee-shop work-days, I’ve got a time tracker to make sure I build in plant and home project time, and I’m reading Indiana. I’m ready for 2016.