Life in Focus

In Focus Friday

The essence of all beautiful art, all great art, is gratitude.

                                                        -Friedrich Nietzsche

 

Today begins the first official In Focus Friday! This idea offers us the opportunity to take a deep breath, look around, reflect, and feel gratitude. Very often as our lives get busy and schedules become demanding, the simple joy and beauty of everyday life can become blurry. Life In Focus is about learning to notice and see what's right in front of us. It's about appreciating the little details and moments that  make up our existence, but that can go unnoticed if we don't stop to really see them.

Life In Focus is a lifestyle that celebrates the day with awareness, gratitude, and joy.

In doing so, we begin to develop the power to see the miraculous in the common.  We can then look for and find beauty and happiness in our everyday lives. When there is struggle and stress, Life In Focus can help us put it in perspective. When there is peace and calm, Life In Focus can help us celebrate.

Life In Focus is an attitude that can be a powerful philosophy for a happy life.

I believe that armed with a camera, we see differently. With this tool in hand, we have the ability to notice, focus on, and capture what we might normally take for granted. This in mind, I created In Focus Friday as a sort of project and experiment all rolled into one. On In Focus Fridays, I'll post a single image that captures my life in focus from the previous week and observe over time, a gallery full of grateful details.

Want to play along?

It's easy and fun!  No fancy equipment is necessary.  All you need is a way to capture an image. Camera phones and point and shoots are perfectly ok!  The idea is that you document what you appreciate and makes you happy...right now.  Knowing you have this image to capture for yourself will cause you to look for it in your daily routine and that's good stuff! To join the group, all you have to do is open up a free Flickr account.  Under the "groups" tab, you will then search for and add the In Focus Friday group to your profile and voila...you're in!  You can upload an image every Friday or whenever you feel like it.  It's up to you!  Feel free to email me with questions and I hope to see you there! 

Have a joyful weekend and don't forget to see and capture your life in focus.

handmade halloween

Halloween is such a fun holiday around here and we do our best to enjoy it to the fullest.  So, of course, there should be some handmade goodness to help us celebrate.  Here's just a few of the details around our house right now that are decorating our days and making this time of year extra special.

 

Happy Halloween Banner :: I love banners...and this one was so much fun to make with papers, stamps, paint, glitter, ribbons, and a few cute little spiders.

Halloween Snuggle Quilt :: It's a lap size quilt just perfect for snuggling with while watching a spooky movie.  A great reason to stock up on all that fun Halloween fabric out there!

Trick or Treat Halloween Album :: Everyone should have one of these...It's such a fun and doable tradition and makes a treasured keepsake!  Just take a photo of your kids dressed up for Halloween each year and stick it in the book.  Over time, you will see your cute little princesses and pea pods turn into creepy vampires and monsters!!  This book only comes out during October which makes it extra special.

Halloween Photo Wreath :: With a few photos and some embellishments, this wreath was so easy to make!  It hangs on the inside of our front door and makes me smile every time I walk past it.

Hope you enjoy a spooky and fun Halloween week!

It was time.

Life has been a whirlwind lately. It gets like that sometimes, don't you think?  Where you find yourself juggling with more balls up in the air than you care to catch. When your mind is as busy as your body and you find yourself unable to see, enjoy, and appreciate what's right in front of you. I felt this way....out of breath and out of focus and in desperate need of time.  So, I hopped off the freight train and took it, which was wonderful and positive and very necessary. Life has been a whirlwind lately.

It was time

to go for a walk with my puppy and crunch the fall leaves beneath our feet.

for an impromptu lunch date with people I adore.

to crack open a good book.

to sit and think and listen.

to remember my focus and my priorities in this life.

for extra long snuggles at tuck in time.

to laugh with a friend.

to hold hands with my sweetheart.

for creativity and play.

to find balance again.

to absorb the inspiration all around me.

for celebrating the day.

It was time.

a house for the fairies

Have you ever had the pleasure of building a house for the fairies?  

Since my kids were little, we've spent many hours in the woods or park or even back yard hunting for materials and creating homes for these fantastical little creatures.  Mostly constructed of sticks, bark, rocks, and moss, these houses only lasted for a short time before a breeze knocked them down....but the process of hunting and building went on and on as more houses were imagined and created in their place. 

Over the weekend, my daughter and I had the opportunity to spend some time creating together (which  is going to become a more regular date for us).  This time, we built a house for the fairies that would last a while.

 

Still created of mostly natural materials, it's held together with a glue gun this time. Once constructed, it was so much fun to decorate!

 

This is the top of the house with a cozy moss floor, some sea glass, a few pebbles and pine cones, and even a marble gazing ball. The perfect place for a sweet tired fairy to take a nap, don't you think?

 

Take a peek inside the house where you'll find another fairy "hanging out" next to her desk.

 

The back of the house has the 2nd floor pumpkin garden, and of course, a swing made of bark.

What you can't see in our house is that it also has a little battery pack of lights strung throughout the inside and on top...the glow is so pretty at night. We are already imagining more houses to make and a special garden to put them in.

Enjoy an afternoon with your imagination, creating something special.  It will be time well spent.

a day at the fair

Autumn is definitely my favorite season.  The crisp cool air, colorful sights, delicious smells, and fun traditions make it such an exciting time of year. One of our favorite ways to kick of the season is with our annual trip to the Renaissance Fair, which never disappoints.

There's nothing quite like a beautiful autumn day at the fair, don't you think?