yoga loft

i visited a new yoga studio yesterday and loved it.  loved it for so many reasons but just to name a few...

the coral-colored building nestled on a side street just minutes from my house - who knew summerville had yoga!  early-spring fresh air wafting in and out of all the open doors and windows.  birch hardwood floors.  late afternoon sun peaking through the bamboo shades.  an instructor adept in comfortably adjusting my poses and sweet whisperings that i am "extremely flexible" - a tactic to encourage me into a deeper pose, i'm sure. it worked.  lavender scented eye pillows.  a practice filled with humor - a challenge when you've been squatting in and out of "warrior" poses for 15 minutes.

i could go on and on but, the thing i loved the absolute most...

the eighty-four year old woman on the mat next to me.  let the number fool you not - she was the most experienced and limber student in the class of 10.  she shared that her practice has extended throughout most of her life.  which i realized on my ride home was long before yoga was the trendy thing to do.  two words: awe inspired.

take the reins

think about what makes you happiest - the one
thing guaranteed to get your heart racing and a big
grin spreading across your face. got it? good.
now do that thing.  yes, today.  taking control of your
life is about knowing what you want and going after
it without hesitation.  you don't need permission.
you just need to know you deserve to be happy.

-self magazine; march, 2011

love, love, and more LOVE

happy valentine's day.

i'm not sure about all you others out there in the world but here in charleston it could not be a more beautiful day to celebrate the day marked for love.

i know there are many naysayers in the universe who call this holiday a cliche, only born to fill the pockets of every greeting card and candy industry tycoon stretching the globe.  but i say...

tish.tosh!

i am glad that, in a world that becomes more cynical with each passing day, we still have these capsules of time that dissolve an otherwise mundane day into something a little more beautiful.  special.  fun.  we all need a little more "fun" in our lives. 

and you can't play the "i'm single and depressed" card with me because i've been that single and depressed girl on valentine's day - wishing i had a man and wallowing in my own self pity.  to avoid feeling un-sexy on the sexiest of holidays, my friends and i would protest.  "anti-valentine's, valentine's day". we made anti-valentine's cd mixes.  put on our best pushups.  went out.  toasted drink after drink to being single and fabulous.  and in an attempt to not celebrate, we ended up celebrating anyway.  those scattered, single, valentine's will go down as some of the greatest nights of my life.

so to all you wet blankets out there (yes, i said it) i say: get out of your own head, go buy a box of lindt truffles, sit on the couch with your love tonight, and indulge.  and if you don't have a love.... your friend... your dog... heck, by yourself (sometimes that's my favorite way to enjoy a good box of chocolate).   or go out with your drinking buddies.  drink one too many and get silly.  pop a bottle of champagne for the hell of it and let the bubbles do their job.  throw darts at a picture of cupid with another angry friend. 

something.  anything!

use this day to remind everyone you care about - friend, girlfriend, mom, dad, sister, brother, cousin, cousin's friend martha, or whomever - that you care about them.

and enjoy it for what it is, for tomorrow it will be gone.  c'est la vie!

----

"if you really want to be happy, nobody can stop you"
- sister mary tricky

a whirlwind of days

so many many things to blog about since my last post, only a week and a half ago. last friday, the family packed up and headed for a midnight trip - literally - back to my hometown of lancaster. 

saturday morning came early with a mere 4-1/2 hours of sleep under our belts.  but we made the short trek out to buford, south carolina to cheer my  nephew on at his basketball game.  that's him, way down there... number 15.  we got to spend some good quality time with my sister, brother in law, dad, and my nephew brooks, who was also celebrating his first birthday.  mom stayed home to get the house prepped for the birthday party that afternoon.  riley's team won and it was so awesome to be a part of that. 

john and i also had a pretty good "lol" moment.  as we were walking out of the rec. center, john was complaining that he smelled baby "puke".  i reminded him that the birthday boy had spit up during the game and maybe it was on his shirt.  as we got closer to the car, i began to smell it.  and soon enough we were overpowered.  near gagging, trying to convince john to ditch his shirt and making what i'm sure was a spectacle, we hear this guy from across the parking lot yell, "it's the turkey farm down the road."  now if only blogspot could verbalize the accent.  this guy, who john and i had chuckled at all morning for having his whole family (including the wife) decked out in camo, was the most country feller i've ever heard speak.  it sounded a little more like, "eeets da turrrrkey form down tha rooooad".  we laughed not only at his accent but that he probably hopped in his mud flapped, oversized tires, ford truck and said "stupid city people.  never smelled turkey shit before!"

after a little shopping around town with my sister and some golf for the guys, the entire family came over to celebrate with a birthday party for 2 very special boys - sully (2) and brooks (1).  here are some highlights....

sully's homemade birthday cake... (elmo was courtesy of this gal)

brooks had an adorable dr. seuss cake, made by a local lady in lancaster

sporting his new "2" shirt, specially made by this gal

and checking out his balloons

sully decided that he wanted his cake for dinner.  and on birthdays, we get what we want -



this is what i like to call "drunk on cake"...

sully and mommy

brooks was not a happy camper.  i'm sure he's praying to the toy gods that he never sees this hat again.

so while he was getting squared away, we sang "happy birthday" to sully

and then brooks was ready for his cake.  testing the waters -

getting more into it -

definitely got the hang of it -

the boys had a "few" presents to open.  more like a mound!

and then it was time to crash from all the fun!

with sunday being sully's actual birthday, we decided to take him to the columbia zoo on the way back to charleston - he has been obsessed with "phants" (elephants) lately.  it was a gorgeous, 70 degree, january sunday - that's south carolina for you.  i'm sad to say i don't really have any pictures to post from our excursion because sully was somewhat of a pickle.  it took us two hours of walking around to discover the secret - fish and m&m's.  so next time we go to the zoo, we know to start with that!  ;)

after a quick visit to the hospital to see john's granny, we headed back home as the sun was setting.  sully crashed and i made a quick dash to redbox so john and i could watch "the town" which we've been dying to see.  didn't disappoint!  during the movie, i managed to whip out a batch of birthday cookies for sully to take to daycare on monday and we were all snoring by 10:30.

tuesday brought another trip to lancaster, as my dad checked into the hospital for a triple bypass.  you expect hospital waiting rooms to be exhausting, in the boring kind of way - we had our moments of worry, don't get me wrong - but with 12 members of my family all crammed together it was mostly laughs and good memories.  dad came through his surgery beautifully, ignoring the big scar down the middle of his chest.  i'm sure i will blog about this experience at a later date, but for now he is well and recovering in the hospital until early next week.

by the time i got back to charleston on wednesday, just in time for sully's two-year checkup, i felt like i had been pummeled by one of the zoo lions.  but it took nothing more than a running hug from sully, after 36 hours of worry and wait, to cure me.