blank canvas

Our daily walk through the woods became single file. The snowshoes lead the way; they break trail, leaving footsteps for everyone else to follow. Step with caution, walk with intention, be mindful of those around you.

This is my first winter in New England. I find myself approaching it with a giddiness and certain childlike innocence that borders on naive. Of course I remember the snows of my past life: I’ve driven in snow, I’ve dug out from blizzards, I’ve had my hair freeze to straw. But this? Love and family and motherhood circling around as the snowflakes sparkle? This is something new and very much welcome in my life. I remember now the magic: the quietness that comes with snowfall and the bright sunny days that feel too warm after a good storm. What I had forgotten was how the winter world creates a blank canvas on which we stand. What we do with this new world is completely up to us. The freedom of vast whiteness is exhilarating. Just as a painter stares at what will become new art, we take a breath of crisp air and look out upon the world.

Winter is most certainly a time of hibernation, but this year I’m also seeing it as a fresh start. A blank canvas on which to walk. How do I want to carry through the day? How do I want to express my thoughts? What words am I choosing? How do I want to remember this moment? When winter slows down, it leaves space for us to gather our thoughts. This season of new beginnings is a great time to take a look around your world and see what makes it spin. Join me this month in taking steps in a more positive direction. Let the snowshoes lead the way.

~~~~~

ps: tomorrow morning i’ll be jumping in the atlantic ocean off the coast of maine!
wish me luck!

countdown to crazy

only a handful of days until new years! this means i’m beginning the freak out that comes with the anticipation of something so exhilerating and completely chilly. beyond chilly. downright fucking freezing.

i’m doing the dip. jumping into the ocean off the coast of maine!

i’d love your support. every $1 helps (proceeds the special olympics of maine) hop on over to my fundraiser page and leave a donation if you can!

xo, meredith

slowing down to see

If you are like me, the months of winter spin past in a sort of whirlwind chaos. It is goodness of course: the lights, the sparkle, the baking, the family. It seems the short days and long nights are packed full with celebration and time spent together. I find myself trying to cram it all in. Cram it into what? A memory for the shoebox full of photos? What about right now as it’s happening? Being present is a present.

This is my wake up call. To feel the swirling of energy that comes with the season of holidays. To feel it tugging at my pant leg and instead of hurrying past onto my next task, I’ll bend down as if to embrace a child in need. This year let me take the sometimes frantic feeling of the holiday, and let me slow down to figure out my place in the center of all this celebration and tradition.

Yes, I am a baker of tasty goods. I am a wrapper of presents. I am also chauffer, teacher, cheerleader, and partner. These are some of the pieces that make the whole of me. Let me not forgot that who I am is at the core of all these labels. This year as I enjoy the lights that sparkle around my family, I will look more closely to find myself and catch a breath of peace as I remember my heart. Even if it’s a simple reflection in a tree ornament, it will be enough to act as reminder of the magic.

lobsters on the coast of maine

how long have i dreamt of maine? with a babe in arms and a mind full of insomnia i’d cruise around new england via internet in the dark of night… searching for something i knew existed out there somewhere. it took me nearly seven years to find it. but here i am.

my first winter in new england (oh how my ancestors would be proud) the combination of snow on sand and salt spray from biting ocean winds… i am full of stories. and not just my own. i carry my mothers stories with me for strength. gathering sea water in lobster pots, her tiny frame sloshing freezing cold water back to the cottage where lobsters waited their fate.

what better way to celebrate my first winter in new england than to do a lobster dip?! yes, i’m going to jump into the freezing cold atlantic ocean off the coast of maine this new years day.

“that’s batshit crazy!” she said, and we both laughed, knowing it made perfect sense. i’ll be joined by a dear friend and fellow shutter sister, because last year at this time i made a wish and it came true. and now here i am.

i’m doing this for me, for my own personal reasons. and the special olympics of maine gets to reap some benefit. support me if you can, even just $1 helps. you can donate on my personal fundraiser page.

thank you!!
xo
meredith

making and creating

The wheel spins. A child’s eyes grow wide with anticipation, a lilting voice unable to hide the excitement. Steady hands show him how it’s done. How to make something from nothing. Art from air. Beauty from clay. Patterns traced with fingertips across my heart, this is the making and creating of a life shared.

finding our way

friends make our world.
near and far.

we skype, we play, we act as if nothing has changed
when in fact every.single.thing. has changed

we find our way with friends. old and new.

sometimes worlds collide
and faraway friends become real to life
with laughter and art and toothless grins
shared over lunch and dinner.
so is the case with us now.

today we are spending the day with friends.

we’ll make christmas cookies together.
we’ll share a meal.
and we’ll come away with hearts full.

the view from here

coming up over the crest, through the woods, this sight never ceases to take my breath.  this {what this stands for} might be everything i love about new england. {and this one too if i’m being completely honest}

there was snow in the air and just a dusting on the ground yesterday when i pointed my lens towards my surroundings. this week i’ve been begging the universe for a change, something to soften my view. something to get me ready for the holidays. something to match the new love and new traditions of new england. i was looking for it in the snow, but it came in the form of family and laughter shared over bowls of soup.

the view from here just keeps getting better and better.

Shoveling Snow
by Kirsten Dierking

If day after day I was caught inside
this muffle and hush

I would notice how birches
move with a lovely hum of spirits,

how falling snow is a privacy
warm as the space for sleeping,

how radiant snow is a dream
like leaving behind the body

and rising into that luminous place
where sometimes you meet

the people you’ve lost. How
silver branches scrawl their names

in tangled script against the white.
How the curves and cheekbones

of all my loved ones appear
in the polished marble of drifts.

“Shoveling Snow” by Kirsten Dierking
from Northern Oracle. © Spout Press, 2007.

30 days

during the month of november, i did a small gratitude project.
30 days of gratitude.

it seems like such a small task, to find gratitude each day… but as i’ve noticed with daily projects, the focus really draws your attention to all the little things in life we often take for granted. i am a firm believer in setting intentions, in saying wishes outloud, in beginning sentences with “I Will…”

with the new year fast approaching, and december quickly slipping into fast paced festivity, i would highly recommend a quiet month in which you could turn your words (or camera) on being thankful. the 13 images above are simply some of my favorite images captured. what i found to be truly helpful was putting pen to paper and writing down the words of gratitude.

life is all about the little things, isn’t it?
let’s make the most of it.

 

this november i was

* grateful for puddles that turn to ice overnight leaving magic portals for us to stomp on the way to meet the school bus.

*grateful for the mystery of morning fog.

*grateful for my morning walk and the snow that still lingers, the seasons and my own childlike innocence while looking towards my first new england winter.

*grateful for two rivers and a james. my life {and heart} is full.

*grateful for beautifully sunny days and exploring together.

*thank you covered bridges and mellow sundays and my sweet river.

*thankful for photography and good music that streams like sunshine from where i work.

*grateful that the migraine is gone.  light and dark keeps it all in balance.

*thankful for early mornings and our cozy nest.

*grateful for how his art reflects our life.

*happy to be exactly where i am supposed to be.

*grateful for piggyback rides and the man who gives them.

*thankful for boys who climb trees.

*thankful this day is almost done.

*grateful to work from home.

*grateful for the now familiar drive to portland, the friendship i find there, and the love that waits for my return back home.

*grateful for his hat of happiness.

*grateful for found treasures that inspire and remind me that sometimes photography lays dormant but it never leaves me completely.

*grateful for sunny days family laughter and birthday cake.

*grateful for his light {especially on a day that begins with a sick child, vomit, diarrhea, and cat pee}

*grateful for listening and being heard, chilly days, hot cocoa and marshmallows.

*grateful for seasons {and the fresh snowfall we anticipate tonight}

*grateful for snowshoes and sledding and family and laughter and friendship.

*thankful for a river who goes with the flow {and the new tradition of pineapple for thanksgiving}

*thankful for this quiet day with the man i love {dreaming up art}

*thankful for the history i carry with me {the view of what was and what now is}

*grateful for family trees {now matter how they grow} life is never black and white

*grateful he’s back home.

*grateful for the threads of art that are woven into our days.

*grateful for the everyday togetherness that comes with real life.

she sprouted wings

the first time i met her it was summer on the coast of oregon :: laughter abounds
friendships bloom even with their farawayness (i love that)
her art draws me in :: mixed media

when danielle asked if i’d be interested in a collaboration with her, i jumped at the chance. i had seen her I Heart Prints series unfold and i was surprised at how easily the words came when i sat with her images. i love using word prompts as a jumping place for my own creativity but i had never before used a visual prompt (specifically, a piece of art a friend of mine has made) as a writing prompt for me. i love how it feels so organic, so full of story (both hers and mine)

the best part of danielle’s I Heart Prints series is not that she is creating new art each and every month (awesome!) but that she is offering them to you (you, me, us!) on her website as a downloadable print (that’s free!)

if you’d like to have a print of your very own (her art, my words) go check it out: she sprouted wings is available for the month of december.

don’t let the turkeys get you down

my mom had a coffee mug collection, i had my favorites as did she. but the one that stuck with me the most was that phrase printed across a horribly illustrated picture. “don’t let the turkeys get you down.”

i thought of this with frequency over thanksgiving… and not because of turkeys (we chose to eat pineapple).

my mom oozed positivity. surprisingly so, for the hand she had been dealt in life. during the angst of my teenage years, this positivity bothered the hell out of me. (this should be common for any teenager in suburbia.) i dwell on this now. (this should be common for a mother on the verge of middle age.)

it’s strange to have a ghostlike presence in your life. a mother that is more than halfway gone, a mother untouchable, unreachable, unexpressive. i find her in the birds overhead. her voice flutters into my days with phrases i find myself repeating to my own son. i’m writing her story, the one she now won’t be able to tell herself.

so when negativity seeps in, when people toss their words like grenades (oh family dysfunction and holidays go so well together don’t they?) i hold my shield tightly, i think about how she raised me. i think about her spirit (it’s here in Maine with me i can feel it) and i continue forward with mothering and loving and living and grace.

on this day, it meant grabbing my camera and trudging through the mud.
focusing on the positive.
always, always… knowing she’d be proud.