Sacred
Religion is like a multi-colored lantern. Each of us looks through a different piece of glass, but the light is always there.”
–Mohammed Naquib, a 20th-century Egyptian politician and author.
Here is a link to a video I made inspired by the above quote.
Hear
Sunday Morning — we’re all connected…
Number — We had a nest with 3 baby bunnies in our yard last week.
Smell
Your fave thing — hanging out at home with my family.
Smile — Greg and my brother after The First Race post brain surgery.
These are not in order, and I’m skipping some days. Yea for flexibility!
Mid-day…my favorite Kelly Rae clock.
White…bluebird eggs from earlier in the summer
Not white, but still with the nest theme…an empty nest gift basket I made for a friend.
Something Old…a church pew, now in our entryway, from St. Peter’s Cathedral where Greg’s father went to church and school
A strange juxtaposition, but another Something Old picture, the old Missouri State Penitentiary…Greg used to play baseball “inside the walls” when he was a kid. Now he is in charge of all the mental health services for Missouri’s Department of Corrections.
For explanation of these posts, click here.
Red
Play (my nephew playing the banjo last weekend)
Far Away (love all the trees in our back yard)
Home (looking out onto our back patio)
Stillness (one of the parks we go to)
Books (read most of this over the weekend)
Floral (in our back yard)
I’m already feeling behind. I barely know what day it is, much less what photo prompt I’m “supposed” to be on. There are so many fun projects on the Internet. They sound good when I read about them, and I approach them like 
most of the things I do: with a bit too much seriousness. As you can see to the left, I printed out the prompt list and have put check marks by the ones I’ve done, and have notes about ideas for prompts coming up. But for whatever reason, I lose interest and have definite trouble with follow through. “Why did I think this would be fun?” (Oh, I just remembered the One Little Word project…haven’t touched that since January or February!)
Like many things, I turn what are supposed to be fun projects into a chore. This is clearly an “issue” for me; however, I don’t feel like analyzing at the moment. It’s Friday night and my brain is shot. I’m just going to post the pictures I have, and not worry about it.
Diagonal
Okay, I’m feeling really self-conscious now. I usually only post pictures I like of me. Oh well, I can always delete them tomorrow!
You can read about the August Break series here.
Maybe this one doesn’t go with the “close up” theme, but it’s cute.
The prompt today is Love. You’d think this would be an easy one, but I had a hard time narrowing it down and deciding what to post. I decided I’d share a little bit about the clay hearts you see on my blog header and on my Facebook page. My sister-in-law, Sister Caroline, a nun with the School Sisters of Notre Dame, gave them to me. She uses them in her devotional time and gave me a set many, many years ago. I just googled “Purple clay hearts” and found them online!
Here’s what it says about them:
By combining heart, the shape we use for the hearthstones, and earth, the material used to make the hearthstones, the word hearth is created. These simple, hand-made terra cotta clay hearts come in 56 different attitude-words. Each rich, purple velvet bag contains 25 randomly selected hearts. Their popularity has spread by word of mouth all over the world and used as a daily focus for people who have found the Hearthstone experience an easy, fun and even profound way to experience guidance, affirmation and encouragement for their daily walk.
When I had a psychotherapy practice, the little hearts were nestled in a basket on a coffee table. Some people ignored them; others were fascinated by them. When I left my last job and had to end therapy with people (which was SO hard), I gave a lot of the hearts away to my clients. I wanted a little bit of me to go with them. When I told my sister-in-law I missed them, and she got me another set!
One person commented on my blog that they looked like yummy cookies!
I just found out about Susannah Conway’s August Break. She describes it on her blog: Each day, for the whole of August, you take a photo and share it on your blog. You can add words if you want — or not. You can use any camera. You can share a series of photos, or miss a day out, or just post on weekends. There are no real rules, basically. This is all about being present and enjoying taking photos just for the hell of it. She provides prompts for each day.
A big thanks to Jill at A Thousand Shades of Gray for clueing me in about this project.
Day 1: Breakfast
I don’t eat an exciting breakfast, usually instant oatmeal at work, so I thought I’d share a picture of my favorite mug instead. It’s a Kelly Rae Roberts mug. When you are done drinking your favorite coffee or tea there is a surprise heart at the bottom to remind us we are loved. On the outside is a heart with Kindness changes everything written 5 times at the bottom.
Day 2: Circles (I had no shortage of circle picture ideas…)
Day 3: Yellow
Love all the gold finches in our backyard!
The Self-Compassion Project 