Day 26, 100 Happy Days: Snow

Max deciding if the yard is sniff-worthy.

I love snow - but only if I don't have to go out into it. I love looking at it, and I love having an excuse to stay cozy and warm at home.

But today I had to get out in it to walk a dog. Now I know that dogs are super fun in the snow. But even the prospect of watching a dog frolic and play in the snow was not enough for me to want to go out. But a pet sitter's gotta do what she's gotta do, so I put on about 8 pounds of clothes and got out there.

Suddenly I was reminded of how much I LOVE to be in the snow! I don't know why I ever forget. New snow is so beautiful. I delight in being the first one to make tracks in the snow. I love how quiet it makes the world seem, and how loud my feet are as they plow through the snow.

I've got to get some nice warm boots and get out there more often.

Day 24, 100 Happy Days: Reflecting on Beauty

"Haven" ©Tabetha Hastings

I had a lovely Christmas Eve morning. It started with writing my morning pages, and then moved on to reading the book I'm currently devouring savoring. (One way or the other I'm eating it up.)

I had just read a particularly beautiful passage, and I paused to reflect on it. I looked out the window to see a the bones of a beautiful old tree standing against the blue sky with a few happy clouds floating by. It was all framed so perfectly by the window. I wanted to paint it.

I wonder if I would have appreciated that scene if I hadn't just read some beautiful, thought provoking words. Certainly I wouldn't have even noticed it had I not paused to reflect on those words.

Art inspires art inspires art.

There is so much beauty in the world if we just take the time to slow down and see it... Savor words, pause to reflect... it can make a person happy.

100 Happy Days Again! Day One: Pet Sitting

I had such a good experience doing my Happiness Project at the beginning of this year, and I've been wanting to do it again. For some reason, it's not the easiest thing for me to start. It's not the looking for - and finding things that make me happy that I find difficult. It's the actual blogging about it - which is a very important part of the process for me. It's what keeps me on track.
So here I am.
December 1st seems the perfect time to start. I tend to get a bit gloomy around the holidays (although so far so good this year), and I figure if I start looking for things that make me happy now, perhaps I can skate through Christmas and New Years feeling better than usual.

Perk of pet-sitting: seeing the sun rise.

Day One: Pet Sitting
I've been pet/house sitting for the last several years. Not only am I paid to stay at people's lovely houses and take care of their wonderful pets, but it also allows me the opportunity to shake things up in my life.
Being self employed and a natural life-long night owl, I tend to run about four hours behind everyone else. While a lot of people get up at 5:00 or 6:00, I get up at 9:00 or 10:00. And I really like it that way! However, I think it's good to change things up every once in awhile.

When I pet sit, I'm pretty much on the animal's schedule. If the dog is up, I'm up. Right now I'm sitting a dog whose mom is an early bird, so the dog gets up with the sun. This means I'm up before the sun (if you can believe that), to get myself up and ready for the wild puppy energy.

The best thing about getting up so early? Yes, getting a jump on the day is nice but I'm loving those sunrises! Gorgeous. So, there I am at 6:30am, bundled up, throwing a ball to a dog, and letting that sunrise make me happy. Oh yeah, and this guy... this guy makes me happy too...

Yup... and this sweet girl....

My Happiness Project Day 42: Change of Focus

I had some big-time first world self-employed artist technical issues today. Okay, not THAT big-time, but that's how it felt. Not to bore anyone with details (which I already did on Facebook, anyway), the latest thing was that I found I had deleted the home page of my website in an I can't sleep so I should get some work done blurry-eyed bit of 6am craziness that I can hardly remember. Brilliant.

An hour ago I was pretty cranky about it. In the old days (like... 43 days ago), I would have muscled through it, recreated the webpage, and moved on to the rest of my work without a break. And my body and my psyche would have (and have in the past) suffered for it. But because I'm committed to this project, I went looking for something to make me happy. Someplace to focus that was not on my work. So I emailed my website host about the missing page, and I went for a walk.

Talk about an instant state change! From cranky to oh - look - spring bulbs popping up and green grass! It was a short but lovely walk, and it did the trick. I came home and felt much better. AND I found that by the time I got back, my website peeps had restored my deleted page! (I didn't expect them to even get the email until tomorrow) Oh happy day!

iPhone Spinning Pictures

For some reason I love motion blurs. Of course you can get a motion blur with a Photoshop filter, but I prefer to get mine the old fashioned way: by spinning the camera. It's much more fun that way!