Meg Evans

…make an alligator.

That’s what a creative neighbor family did when we had a lot of snow this past weekend, making a snow sculpture of an alligator in their driveway. That gave me a smile when I drove past and saw it, so I took a photo to share for Nurturing Thursday:
 

And in the “be careful what you wish for” category: Last week I was grumbling to myself about needing a new mailbox because the old one was rusty and was hard to open and close in the cold weather. On Monday, the snowplow ran into the mailbox and totally mangled it. My husband bought a new one after he got home from work.
 

Though it was no fun for my husband putting the new mailbox on the post in the cold and dark, it definitely looks much better now. So, all’s well that ends well!

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 in October, I posted a photo of the willow hedge that runs along my backyard fence, and I got a comment asking for another photo in the winter showing the bare branches. So here it is—the snow looks quiet and peaceful, but the wind was whipping it up just before I took this picture, and I hurried right back inside to get out of the cold!
 

The hedge looks especially pretty at this time of year, with all the little white catkins unfolding. It doesn’t matter how cold and snowy the weather gets—the willows always put on a show anyway! Our own lives are not so very different. Even though there are times when we may not feel that we’re in the most comfortable and nurturing environment, we are still capable of creating beautiful things; and all kinds of worthwhile lessons go on unfolding when it’s the right season for them.

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.

Diva Dog didn’t have the best morning today. She has a small irritated area on her belly, so she has been wearing a cone to stop her from picking at it while it heals. Of course, she hates the cone, so she has been making her best efforts to look pitiful and convince us to take it off. She probably could win an award for best actress or blues singer with some of the poor-little-me noises she makes.
 

All of us have bad days when we feel like singing the blues; but overdoing the self-pity just makes us look silly to others while feeling worse about things ourselves, and that’s not a good way to go through life. Though a dog may not be capable of understanding that a bad day soon will be over, people would do better to keep in mind that “this too shall pass.”

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.

While the groundhog was seeing its shadow on Monday morning, I looked out my back window and found snow flurries falling at the same time the sun was shining. As a child I would have thought that looked magical, rather than grumbling about not wanting six more weeks of winter. So I took a picture to remind myself that how we feel about things is all a matter of how we look at them.
 

The flurries can’t be seen very well through the screen, but I think the photo shows at least a little of the soft magical look. Although it’s clear and cold here today, the sunshine coming through the windows feels warm. Every moment of our days is like a high-resolution snapshot packed full of little details, and we’re always free to choose which ones get our attention!

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 could hear the clatter of freezing rain when I woke up this morning. My daughter’s puppy (a.k.a. Diva Dog) wasn’t at all happy about being put outside to do her business, but stood next to the sliding glass door looking at us with big sad eyes as if to say, “You really expect me to go out in this?” The sky was so dark that when I sat down at my desk, I turned on the flameless candle that I keep to brighten my workspace on such mornings. I bought it to remind myself that I always have plenty of time (as discussed in this post) because time is a constant and there is only now.
 

The rain didn’t last long, and the sun came out for a while, looking brighter and higher than in the past months—as if sending a message that winter’s end is not far away. This year I haven’t felt stuck indoors and gloomy because of the cold weather, although not many days have been above the average January temperatures. I believe that’s the result of making efforts to cultivate a more positive outlook and to appreciate the moment. Even on a dark morning with freezing rain, there is always something to appreciate, starting with the simple fact of being indoors with cozy warm central heating!

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.

Because my daughter has been here longer than expected since she graduated from college last May, we’ve all been stepping on her dog’s toys for months. So we decided it was about time to start training the dog to pick up those toys. In addition to playing with the usual chew toys, the dog gleefully nabs stuffed animals from my daughter’s room whenever the opportunity arises. We put the toys in a laundry basket, with a blanket at the bottom to raise them up high enough for a small dog to reach easily.
 

I don’t know if the dog will actually learn how to put away the toys and start doing it consistently before my daughter moves to an apartment. But even if we do more of the picking up than the dog does, it’s worthwhile because the house is much more comfortable without dog toys scattered all over the place. There’s a useful lesson in that, I’d say. Just a little effort to get things better organized can go a long way toward a more pleasant environment, no matter whose toys are in need of picking up!

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.

When I wrote my previous entry on Tuesday about cultivating creative energy, just before posting it I found myself thinking: Should I save it for Thursday? It fits the self-nurturing theme, and what if I can’t think of anything better for my Nurturing Thursday post?

Then I realized a “what if I can’t” attitude like that was very far from nurturing! Blogs are meant to be full of fresh new entries; and a blog author needs to trust that a good flow of creative inspiration will be forthcoming, instead of hoarding ideas like a greedy dragon jealously perched on a treasure chest.
 

Hoarding, whatever its object, never comes from a place of healthy self-nurturing. It always grows out of fear and doubt. The underlying script is, “If I let this go, I might not be able to get anything new to replace it, and then I’ll just have to do without.” The more hoarding that people do, the more their subconscious narrative of never getting anything new becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

The converse also is true—when we regularly let things go and trust that our lives always will be full of abundance, lots of good new things are likely to show up! Just as soon as I decided to go ahead and post Tuesday’s entry, the idea for this post came to mind. If I had hoarded that entry instead, I’d never have thought of this one!

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.

When I set up the follow box in my sidebar, I decided not to display the number of followers because I didn’t want to feel that I was competing with other bloggers for popularity. I do glance at that statistic occasionally, though, while doing administrative tasks on the blog. A few days ago, I noticed that I was down one follower since the last time I looked, and my first reaction was to feel put out—not necessarily with a nice warm coat like my daughter’s puppy got for Christmas, either!
 

I found myself worrying that people didn’t like my blog, that I might carelessly have offended a reader without knowing it, et cetera. Of course, when I stopped to think about it, I realized that I was being very silly! Lots of people go through their blog subscriptions at the start of the new year and remove blogs they haven’t visited recently, without making any judgments as to merit. In fact, I had done that myself just the day before!

In our competitive modern society, it can be hard to remember that most of what happens is not about us. The decisions people make about how to spend their time generally are not driven by harsh value judgments; it’s simply a matter of managing a huge number of choices and a limited amount of time. So when people decide not to stay subscribed to a blog or otherwise not to stay in contact, they probably haven’t even thought much about it, but are just trying to simplify a busy life. It’s not personal.

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.

On Christmas morning it’s easy to find our presents. All we have to do is look under the tree and pick out the ones with the tags that say they’re for us. Life would be so much simpler if every day could be Christmas, wouldn’t it?
 

But going through the rest of the year, it’s not so easy. Sometimes we really have to hunt for those presents. When we let ourselves get too busy to appreciate the moment, they can seem very far away. Life starts to feel like we’ve been slogging through wet grass looking for Easter eggs on a cold, rainy April day, but all we found was a bit of squashed chocolate that somebody stepped on.

Of course, heaps of wonderful presents are all around us every day—sunshine and trees, family and friends, a good meal, a comfortable home. Getting too busy to notice them is like forgetting it’s Christmas and walking right past the tree without paying attention!

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.