feeling & running & gratitude.

this is my daughter beauty & her amazing teacher abigail. abigail, as you can see, is one of the most radiant beings. she is fierce and full and light all in the same breath. she has a gumby like patience that could stretch for days. abigail is a deep knowing of love. it lives inside her glow, it's always on like a slow cooker simmering from her soul. it's woven inside her blood, her skin, her stories. abigail has become one of my teachers too.

when it's time for me to leave beauty at school, there is always a moment on the way to the car that i say thank you, thank you, thank you for this safe, magical and love filled place. i think the gratitude, i speak the gratitude but do i feel the gratitude? i feel the magic. i feel the joy even if it's just a minute. do i feel the gratitude? so i have been feeling into feeling the gratitude.

in my personal research, i am finding that feeling the gratitude is a little harder then just saying it and moving on with life. truly stopping to feel into the gratitude is a whole other thing. it's a moment, just like the other moment and totally different than the mental moment. why is it more challenging to feel than to think? feeling is what we did so naturally as babes. thinking wasn't as natural as feeling right? it's like opposite day to my body. does it feel this way to you? 

i find in my self practice and in my healing practice with others that running from seems like the easier approach. the remedies of honesty & curiosity are not even taken into consideration. we develop anxieties, panic, body issues, stress from running to feel. as though are feelings are the law and will be here forever.  as we all know, our feelings change ALL the time. why are we doing this? if we lean into our feelings, our darkness, our fears, they disperse. if we share our feelings with those who are triggering them or involved in some way then you both can be set free. we are no longer holding onto the feelings, we are creating space for truth which creates connection which is what we are all so hungry for! to connect deeply, to be understood, to be gotten! yes? are you hungry for this? when a friend understands my heart, i am nourished for days.  why are we not being honest with ourselves and each other? 

so....back to gratitude in the studio ;).  i am working my way to feeling gratitude and when i do there is a very simple moment that is deeply intimate. i believe this moment is called grace. i am finding my way there in the moments. in the moments surrounded by crazy noise, stress, fear, anxiety, motherhood and more. of course, it's easier when things are good.  feeling into gratitude is the way to the ground. it's how i root into what is important right now. it's a way to lower the volume on all that is not serving me. how do you ground in and lower the volume? are you a runner of feelings? what are you hungry for in feeling? please share in the comments below! i would love to hear you xxxx

quietly daring.

dearest beauties, 

i could write about our hunger for beauty for pages, for years, for decades... and i probably will. this post is a continuation of this beauty feast. i am finding in my research that the under belly of this need for beauty is giving permission to receive the beauty. to buy the flowers, to take the time, to create the altar whether it be peaches on a wood board or sea shells on the book shelf or the book shelf itself can be an altar. we all do this. we nest in this way. we create home in this way. if you look around you will see you have probably created many altars around you. it's something we do, we need this beauty to reflect us, to recall a memory, to rewrite a story, to create an idea, to make room for our dreams. if you are not doing this yet, you might hunger to do it. you feel it when you go to a friends home or family. it feels cozy and you don't know exactly why. 

"we must take the time to discover what is beautiful to each of us, beautiful enough that we are willing to protect and cherish it, change our lives; beautiful in the indigenous sense that it is beauty that organizes and gives meaning and purpose to the world." --ruth gender writes in "notes on the need for beauty"

in the creating of altars, taking the stickers off the fruit, placing things in the way that feels good in you... this all gives meaning and purpose to your world, if just, for that moment, that day, that week. there are altars that change up often and others that remain true to the need for longer. this is not about hiring a designer to get the right hue of fabric to match the shades. i love that too. that feels supported and calming to a part of me. that is alignment and connection in another way. 

what i am sharing about is intimacy. it's about being quietly daring during the madness that is the schedule, the needs, the noise. it's taking some time to create a cluster of beauty on the dusty shelf above the sink where you might put your ring when you do the dishes. maybe there is soap there and a dirty sponge. better yet the stainless steel scrubber with the scrambled egg stuck in it for days. what we see and what we want to see can be vastly different worlds. that shelf above the sink is your mirror. lets start with putting something there you love. let it reflect who are you. what you want. write words on a piece of paper and put it there with pink tape. ball jar it up with a few herbs. maybe there is always a flower there from the garden. it's not your kids art shelf... that can be in another area of the house. don't get me wrong, i love my kids art AND this is your area. your easil. your cake plate. whatever it is, it's yours so start feeding yourself what you love to see and how you want to be xxxx

here is a quick moment of the shelf about my kitchen sink... 

churn the butter.

i am a woman who sits in front of the mirror to truly see what & where & who i am -looking me straight in the eye - i am hungry to learn more - chantings of the heart my belly churns inside an internal fire that has no expiration date - i am alive - i am grateful - i am on fire. i am feeling me - all of me - redefining me as each molecule takes a new shape - watching my hair as it falls on my breasts - observing all the touch - the feel - begging the internal rush to take a nap so i can enjoy the breath - my body - falling deeper in love with the woman i am today - excited for tomorrow - grateful for yesterday - all the sticky pain - the shenpa - the hook biting - all the attachment i am working on - to peel off like a hard boiled egg - chip away at a whole to create a purity i long for - this longing is innocent - all the girls inside me - all the women and the ancestors - they all want to meet up inside my gaze in the mirror - they all just want to be here - words on this white - how vital this medicine - to take this precious time - to go inside - churn the butter - splash some salt - check the temperature - open the oven - fork the bread - to show up ravenous & sated - to ground inside this practice of being - call it what you will - name it if it helps - beat the drum - fluff the pillow - whisper to the empty car - whatever helps you love - whatever helps to get you there - opening up the cracks - welcoming the light - giving this mess permission to fly - to burn - to bleed thru the white linen life we think we want - sit in front of the mirror - get curious - ask questions- feel inside and breathe xxxx

***when listening to audio: close your eyes, let the poem wash over you, nourish you, land where it wants to, let the poem move you*** just a thought beauties xxxx

squash blossoms.

in the summer months, we see these fragile beauties and we wonder... what the heck to do with those? when you are the market, the beauty may call to you...so you reach into your pocket for your last 5 or 6 dollars. you bring them home and watch them everyday wondering what to do .... the beauty feeds you so you sustain. then, one day you look in the back of the fridge and you see them: all wilted and brown. yes, we all know this feeling. life got ahead of the beauty and then hid it in the back so even with the time you didn't have to look up what to do.. the beauty was lost. OY... ok, ok.. so this is a very quick and yummy recipe to make when you get home with those blossoms.

GATHER 

SQUASH BLOSSOMS

2-3 EGGS

FLOUR OF YOUR CHOICE

OLIVE OIL 

1. mix up a few eggs with a dash of salt in a big wide bowl.

2. drop the blossoms in the eggs and let them swim around a bit.

3. then put out a wide plate of flour... you can use pamela's pancake mix (gluten-free) or any flour you have..

4. make sure your pan is HOT.. i love an iron-clad with a good amount of oil...any oil. i use olive oil with this.  

5. you also will need a plate near you or a town paper bag to place the hot fried blossom on...

6. you can coat each blossom on the flour plate and then into the hot pan.

7. let them cook a few minutes on each side.. then take them out to cool ...

sure, you can fill the middle with goat cheese or something yummy as well. that's it! easy and everyone eats them 'round here. let me know how you go xxxx

summer crumble.

hi beauties!

this is the first blog post on my new site! i am so grateful that you are here with me. this has been a long labor of eight years in creating a sacred space to share this movement, to talk about turning on our fire, to call forth awakening our hunger to discover how we nourish and how we were nourished inside our food story. this movement started here, on the blog, with my hunger to create a way to nourish my needs & their needs, my wants & their wants, my dreams & their dreams and more.... with my hands on the keyboard like throwing the dough, flattening it out, adding flour, rolling it up, i started writing it over and over again. i am grateful for those of you who have been with me since the beginning. many of you are friends or have become friends, who feed and nourish me with your stories, your showing up to gatherings, your reflecting back to me what it is that i am up to with this important and delicious work. i am so excited for our community to grow, to truly help each other grow, to inspire each other to buy the flowers, to stop the comparing and drop down deep for the connections we are so hungry for and to support each other in healing with beauty, with story, with permission and freedom. this is the conversation i will continue to offer up here and more of course. 

speaking of flour...lets make the easiest crumble ever. here is one of my summer favorites. this can be used with any fruit that create a juicy base.. berries, ripe pears and more. 

PEACH CRUMBLE

WHITE & YELLOW PEACHES

1/2 CUP CANE SUGAR

 3/4 CUP OF CUP4CUP OR ANY FLOUR

1 STICK MELTED UNSALTED BUTTER

1/4 TSP CINNAMON

1/4 TSP SALT

here are peeled peaches, cut in cubes, steeping in their own gorgeousness with a a little sugar to sweeten up the insanely sweet love fest happening here ....put the oven on 375 bake... 

put all of the ingredients together in one: melted butter, flour, sugar, cinnamon, salt....looks like a planet i want to visit. 

mix it all up with a wood spoon or a spatula you love, you want your tools to feel good in your hand and in your heart, everything tells a story ....

grab a sweet hand or two to help with this part or get in their yourself, i love to crumble the crumble! another tip: it gets real juicy in the fire, so make sure to put your crumble on a baking sheet so you don't set the fire alarm off... i learned from experience! it goes in for about 40 minutes or so depending on your oven.

voila! browned and CRISP. solo or with vanilla ice cream of course. you already knew that... i can be so silly around sweets. enjoy beauties xxxx 

lets keep the conversation going. let me know how you go. more soon beauties xxxx oh and for more crumble or quick desert recipes you can archive the blog right here on the site xxxxjules

coming into the light xxxx.

hiding is a way of staying alive.
hiding is a way of holding ourselves until
we are ready to come into the light.

...................

hiding done properly is the internal faithful promise 
for a proper future emergence,
as embryos, as children or even as emerging
adults in retreat from the names that have caught us
and imprisoned us, often in ways where we have
been too easily seen and too easily named.

-DAVID WHYTE-
 

:::BEAUTIES:::

EIGHT YEARS in the making....here is the first on-line presence of putting my work as a human and a healer out into the world with everything in ONE place. this is just a little wood board love to get the party started... website is coming!

this is a conversation with our inner landscape, the map of our nourishment, how we were fed and how we feed our lives, our families & ourselves today. lets create a new story inside our insatiable hunger as women, men, mamas, daughters, friends and as vulnerable human beings....we yearn to be seen, to be heard, to be fed, to be inspired and we hunger for a place to lighten all that we are carry around...we crave beauty in all its forms even if we don't know it just yet! 

if you have ever wondered what i do, what this kitchen healing is all about or crave more beauty please visit here and get on board with weekly love & there is a chance to win a free one-on-one session when you sign up xxxx 

please help me spread the light, share with your tribes and get on board!

forever grateful for your support, love &nourishment xxxx

part six: sunny.

we talked about all the things we see, we crave, we want for our family.

at some point in the journey, i began to call in the ancestors. there was a lot of driving with tears so i would move to the side of the road and just allow the tears to fall. i wanted to let it out, i was happy to let it go, to move out of the way and allow the heaviness to move on. i would call on j's mother, pat, who i didn't get to meet in human form this time around. i called on my grandmother lena, grandmother pat, grandfather shep, grandmother ina who was lovingly called bressy and all of our bloodlines together. i called to ask for help. i called ask for them to guide us to a home that will hold us, contain us, love us. i asked for a home that will nourish us, nurture our needs, insulate this story. 

then, we found her.

we had let go of hope so we were living off of a brand new kind of sheer raw unknown fuel. we didn't write it 

down on an altar, we didn't fixate on it, we let it go. we gave it to trust. and then after a few days we might have had a little hope left but it was hope in a different font, it wasn't a dark and heavy holding on kind of a hope, it was a new light filled kind of hope. 

she is a big yellow craftsman, built in the early 1900's during a time when all of my ancestors were alive and kicking. when i walked in, i knew, they made this happen. it was the fastest walk-thru in history; we didn't look around too much as we were determined to get to the backyard. wow. there it was: the backyard we were craving for o & b. the home of a bacon avocado tree, a valencia orange tree, a play structure with swings and a slide, a pink house for beauty, a barn for a painting studio, a drive way, a front yard with a communal tree swing and so much more. we named her sunny.

we didn't tell o & b till we signed the lease. we picked them up early from school with a wood board love and drove to sunny. b walked thru the house like we had that first time; fast and determined to see the back. she walked out to the yard and started singing 'for the first time in forever.' she continued to twirl and sing and run all over the yard, jumped on the swing, checked out her wood house, opened the little pink wood windows while still singing her own version of the frozen song. o was quiet with a soft spoken 'wow' here and there. i found him wrapped up in the orange tree picking an orange, peeling it and taking big huge bites with juice going everywhere. 

we watched them take in this new terrain, to land somewhere, to discover this place we were going to call home. i am not sure there are many words for this kind of thing but it felt pure and so, so goodxxxx

xxxx

this is part six in a series called home on the blog

xxxx

a hole in one.

beauties! here is another mini break in the home series for a quick

1-2

which is what i like to call food that takes 1-2 seconds or minutes to make and is simple inside the storm! inside the move, the place that was the hardest to pack up was the kitchen. 

we were swimming in so much of the unknown. what would we need while we were moving around? what are the essentials to go with us wherever we will be? when will we land and where? i decided to bring all the things i use everyday which in turn made me feel deeply nourished just by looking at them. they were also the things i couldn't bare to put in a box and seal it with tape. they are living and breathing parts of me, of us and how i nourish my family. 

:::i realized that they are not just things, they are a part of our story:::

a few wood spoons (roasting spatula & wooden rice paddle), my mom's 2 copper pots, 2 wood boards (big and small), a bread knife, a few kitchen towels, our iron clad pan, miracle tea, a weck jar of pink salt, a ball jar of brown sugar, olive oil, a small spatula, my mini mits, a roasting dish and chamomile lavender tea. the iron clad pan delivered every time. i love that thing. 

breakfast needed to be quicker than normal because we were staying about 20 minutes  away from a school we used to walk to in five. every morning when i wake up, i turn the stove top dial on low to get the pan warm. i have no idea what will happen. what i do know is i will need to warm or cook something soon: one day old oatmeal to eggs to french toast, you name it. 

:::i wake up, i turn on the fire:::

instead of doing eggs with toast, i thought why not put the two step into one and call it a day? i cut a hole out of a piece of bread and threw it on the warm, lightly buttered iron clad pan. i waited as it warmed the bread. 

i put the heat up to medium high.

then i cracked the egg inside the hole. i also added a little cheese as you can see in the photos. in a minute or two, i turned it over and let it cook a bit on the other side. done and done. say good-bye to waiting at the toaster. of course you can cut all kinds of shapes... a hole seems to do the trick depending on how big your bread is! there are so many different ways you can make this yours. 

may this bring some brekkie inspiration into your morning routinexxxx