Meg Evans

Almost twenty years ago, I was walking through a flea market with some friends when I noticed a display screen with animated art of a moving waterfall. It had no Internet connection and showed only the one image on a big, heavy screen, in the blocky graphics of the time. Still, I thought it would be great to have something like that to hang on my wall; and I decided to buy one after a few years when the technology got better.

Time went by, and I moved to a new house without having found anything similar. I had a spot picked out for it on a wall of my dining room, which is on the north side of the house and always seemed too dark and quiet. Even with a small holiday tree in the corner, it was hard to brighten up that room in December. So I was very happily surprised when my husband’s Christmas gift for me this year was a flat-screen art display connected to an online gallery, which he put on the wall right where I wanted it.
 

For this photo, I set it to display brightly colored abstract art. It can easily be changed to other images, either static or animated, with a phone app. This is a new product by Electric Objects that was rushed into production for the Christmas season and doesn’t yet have a large searchable gallery. Users can upload images, though, so it’s just a matter of finding good ones.

I look at it as a symbol, on this New Year’s Eve, of moving forward in a world where the images and stories we keep in mind become our reality. They may take a while to show up in our everyday lives, they probably won’t look exactly the same as what we first imagined, and they’ll change even more as time goes on—but however it happens, they do find their way into real life. So, it’s up to us to choose our thoughts wisely.

Nurturing Thursday was started by Becca Givens and seeks to “give this planet a much needed shot of fun, support and positive energy.” Visit her site to find more Nurturing Thursday posts and a list of frequent contributors.

I mentioned in a post on Saturday that one of my Christmas decorations is a clock that chimes holiday songs on the hour. The clock has a bright, cheerful winter scene on the face. Last year I got it in a Yankee Swap (also called White Elephant) regifting party, where my husband and I got together with friends after Christmas and everybody brought their unwanted presents.
 

I suppose the person who didn’t want the holiday clock thought that the chiming songs would be annoying. My daughter complained that when she was watching TV, the clock was too much of an interruption. I like it, though, because it breaks up the holiday rush with a cheerful pause every hour, reminding me to take a moment and appreciate my blessings. We can all benefit from such reminders. Have a very merry Christmas, everyone!

Nurturing Thursday was started by Becca Givens and seeks to “give this planet a much needed shot of fun, support and positive energy.” Visit her site to find more Nurturing Thursday posts and a list of frequent contributors.

One of my first Nurturing Thursday entries, which I posted almost two years ago, was about the benefits of having a fruit bowl on my kitchen table. I wrote that I always kept it filled with my favorite varieties of fruit as a symbol of abundance, a reminder that the kitchen table is not a junk shelf, and a prompt for healthy eating.

This year I’m still using the fruit bowl, but I have realized that it’s much healthier to eat a wide variety of foods instead of always buying the same ones, so I’ve made a point of switching things up. At present, the fruit bowl contains Asian pears and large mandarin oranges.
 

Making small changes to our routines is healthier not only with food, but also with life in general. It’s all too easy to get stuck in a rut, always doing the same old stuff out of inertia or because it seems more comfortable. And then, before we know it, our creative energies have gotten malnourished. Although it’s perfectly natural to have favorites—both in what we eat and what we do—it’s also important to make sure we get plenty of variety!

Nurturing Thursday was started by Becca Givens and seeks to “give this planet a much needed shot of fun, support and positive energy.” Visit her site to find more Nurturing Thursday posts and a list of frequent contributors.

This week it has been fairly warm for December here, but there have been a lot of dark, damp, foggy days to go along with the warm temperatures. Like many people, I sometimes have a hard time staying cheerful and energetic in the depths of winter when it seems the sky is always dark. Christmas lights, candles, and other bright decorations help, as long as I consciously notice them rather than just going about my usual routine.
 

There are so many beautiful things available to us in modern times to brighten our days—what’s needed is the mindful appreciation to enjoy them as part of our daily lives!

Nurturing Thursday was started by Becca Givens and seeks to “give this planet a much needed shot of fun, support and positive energy.” Visit her site to find more Nurturing Thursday posts and a list of frequent contributors.

Last year my houseplants got infested with gnats. I tried repotting the plants, but there were so many gnats flying around the house that they soon colonized the new potting soil. My husband tried setting out cups of apple cider vinegar to trap the gnats, which didn’t do anything other than make the house smell like vinegar. What finally got rid of the gnats was covering the potting soil with a few inches of sand. The plants are thriving now, the annoying gnats are totally gone, and as a bonus I don’t need to water as often because the sand cover keeps the moisture in the soil longer.
 

Often that’s the way of things—a problem starts with something tiny and grows to seem hugely annoying, which leads to making the situation worse by putting time and effort into bothersome fixes that don’t work, but all we really need to do is to spread just a little sand over our worries!

Nurturing Thursday was started by Becca Givens and seeks to “give this planet a much needed shot of fun, support and positive energy.” Visit her site to find more Nurturing Thursday posts and a list of frequent contributors.

I had a quiet Wednesday at home because I took vacation before Thanksgiving, while my husband had to go to work. My daughter was back from Cleveland, but she took the dog to the groomer’s and had lunch with a friend. Then, instead of peaceful thoughts, my mind started filling up with “shoulds” — today I have plenty of free time, so I should work on a story project, write my Nurturing Thursday post in advance, do some Christmas shopping online, clean the bathroom mirrors…

But the early afternoon sun coming in my back windows felt so nice and comfortable, I just closed my eyes for a moment and listened to the silence. The mental clutter drifted away like dandelion fluff on the wind. I went out to the backyard, took a deep breath of fresh air that felt pleasantly mild for late November, and noticed that a few pink snapdragons were still blooming.
 

I took a photo and uploaded it to my blog for a draft post; but rather than trying to hurry, I deliberately left the post half-finished and allowed myself to enjoy having an afternoon and evening with nothing much to do. After my family ran the Turkey Trot this morning, I lazed around the house for a while before sitting down to write the rest of this entry. I’m feeling much refreshed now, and wishing a happy and stress-free Thanksgiving to all my readers!

Nurturing Thursday was started by Becca Givens and seeks to “give this planet a much needed shot of fun, support and positive energy.” Visit her site to find more Nurturing Thursday posts and a list of frequent contributors.

Back during the summer, I got rid of a dog bed that Diva Dog totally refused to sleep in (as I mentioned here). My daughter bought another bed in a style more to the dog’s liking and put it next to a wall where the dog often napped. It has the words “Gone Fetching” in the middle, though you can’t see them in this photo with the dog snoozing there.
 

Bed, dog, and daughter left for Cleveland this morning, although they’ll be back for a Thanksgiving visit before my daughter starts her new job at the end of the month. It seemed very quiet around the house today. I took the garden fountain off the porch and put it away for the winter because this weekend is forecast to be much colder. In life as in nature, everything changes…

Nurturing Thursday was started by Becca Givens and seeks to “give this planet a much needed shot of fun, support and positive energy.” Visit her site to find more Nurturing Thursday posts and a list of frequent contributors.

My husband occasionally buys rubber band balls to put in the desk drawer. When they’re new, the drawer looks neatly organized, with enough rubber bands to last for many years. But they don’t really last that long because as time goes on, the bands start coming off the ball and getting all over the drawer, and the rubber gets hard and brittle.
 

Last night I didn’t know what I was going to post for Nurturing Thursday. I started to feel anxious—what if I couldn’t think of anything good? It seemed so much easier last week when I had the post written and scheduled in advance, leaving no uncertainty.

Then I realized that such worries made no sense because a personal blog post is supposed to be a snapshot of where the author is in the present, which means there never can be much certainty. If I wrote everything far in advance like some commercial sites, I would just get bored, and the posts would feel as useless and irrelevant to my actual circumstances as old worn-out rubber band balls!

Nurturing Thursday was started by Becca Givens and seeks to “give this planet a much needed shot of fun, support and positive energy.” Visit her site to find more Nurturing Thursday posts and a list of frequent contributors.

After saving her money for a while, my daughter is making plans to move out. She decided to take a new job and go back to Cleveland for graduate school after looking into her options for nurse practitioner programs and employer-provided tuition assistance. On Monday, she went shopping and bought furniture for her apartment. Rumor has it that her boyfriend, who also took a new job in Cleveland, has been looking at engagement rings. My husband says that seeing his little girl all grown up is making him feel old!
 

I am proud of how well she is doing; and although I’ll miss having her nearby, at least her new home is close enough to visit in a day trip. As for feeling old, not so much. At whatever age, there are always more adventures to fly toward and discover!

Nurturing Thursday was started by Becca Givens and seeks to “give this planet a much needed shot of fun, support and positive energy.” Visit her site to find more Nurturing Thursday posts and a list of frequent contributors.

The frigid winter two years ago was hard on my roses. Three bushes, weakened by the extreme cold, caught the rosette (also called witch’s broom) virus last summer and died this year. I ordered bare-root replacements and planted them with fresh topsoil and mulch last weekend. Here’s a photo of one:
 

Next spring I’ll have three tiny new bushes in the same flowerbed with larger existing ones, which will look peculiar at first; but I expect it won’t be long before they grow big enough that I can’t tell the difference! That’s often how things go. Even if something happens that is bad luck and a nuisance, there’s no reason to get stressed about it because in a year or so, it will all be forgotten.

Nurturing Thursday was started by Becca Givens and seeks to “give this planet a much needed shot of fun, support and positive energy.” Visit her site to find more Nurturing Thursday posts and a list of frequent contributors.