photography lately

august wanes and the season changes

what a month it's been! planes, trains, ships and cars. edinburgh, london, dover, hamburg and copenhagen. the culmination of a very big and very healing (for my wounded soul) project that resulted in a world record. a couple of days away with all of my co-workers. we sent the child off to the states for her year of high school. a bit of time in the garden here and there. as the garden produces its abundance, all of the other more metaphorical seeds that were sown over the past year have also come to fruition. i feel sated by the bounty of it all.

we've had the best weather of the whole summer in the past couple of days but right now, it's raining with biblical intensity. husband is helping the child with her algebra in the other room, via facetime. there are two teenage cats racing back and forth, playing a bit too rough. we had a roast chicken for dinner. i served it with a squash gratin (i'm using squash in everything, since the plants are going like gangbusters in the garden) and a broad bean mash (also from the garden). a simple salad of plum tomatoes and cucumbers from the greenhouse rounded it out. it's so satisfying that most of the meal came from our own garden.

i made it to yoga entirely too little during august. i saw friends too little. but on the whole, it's been a very exciting and happy month. it feels like i'm entering a new season of happiness, just as autumn, which is always my favorite season, comes around. a balance has come, an equilibrium. it's borne of spending my weeks doing work that makes me happy and being home on the weekends in this place in the countryside that makes me happy. it's the best of both worlds. long, deep conversations with husband make us both appreciate the time we do have together. meals eaten together, a glass of something cold in the garden in the late afternoon, musings about garden designs. life is full and good as august comes to a close.

alone time

being alone? how much do i love thee? let me count the ways...

~ eating spinach for dinner (i start by sauteeing an onion in butter, add spinach and a little dash of cream).
~ i can talk to the cats.
~ using cat voice (not that having other people around holds me back from that).
~ humming to myself and talking to molly in the greenhouse as i plant a few more things in pots, water and pull a few weeds.
~ listening to podcasts instead of watching television or netflix. check out the latest mini season from the heart. binge on millennial, new to the radiotopia family.

~ taking dozens of pictures of kittens.
~ mowing the lawn (while listening to the aforementioned podcasts).
~ folding the last of the laundry (the last of the laundry is such a welcome thing).
~ the privilege of a first read of a friend's novel.
~ talking to my dad in my head as i pick asparagus.

~ picking a lilac bouquet, bringing it in and enjoying the fragrance.
~ going to yoga for two hours every evening during my work week.
~ silence.
~ letting go of negativity and negative experiences...watching and physically feeling them float away in my mind's eye.
~ feeling in touch with myself, physically, emotionally, creatively and psychologically.

~ buttered radishes with a sprinkling of flaky sea salt as a snack.
~ appreciating my time together with others so much more.
~ being consciously happy.

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what do you do when you're alone?

a new happiness wardrobe or is it the happiness of a new wardrobe?

i did not buy all these dresses, but i wanted to. i do have some restraint. but at the same time, i am working in the more dressed-up world of shipping again and i needed some new work clothes. my old shipping wardrobe had been hanging in the closet for ages and was pretty out-of-date and just didn't feel like me anymore. i'm a different person now than i was then. and this person needed some new clothes.

i've been drawn to navy blue for awhile now, i think it's since i picked navy blue glasses about a year go. slowly, i've added blue items to my wardrobe. today, i went in to my current favorite store (COS, which is H&M's answer to banana republic) to have them remove the anti-theft device they forgot to remove from a necklace i bought the last time and there were new styles in the store. and frankly, i couldn't resist them. black isn't far from navy blue, but everyone needs a good little black dress and the cut of this dress? swoon! and to push myself out of the blue rut, i grabbed the mustard dress (those pockets are dark blue in reality, tho' they look black in this instagram photo, so there's still a bit of navy) and made myself try it. it didn't look like much on the hanger, but i fell in love with it. i didn't fall in love with the one in the middle, so it stayed in the store, but i did like the burgundy, pink and navy combo.

i think best of all, i realize in looking at these photos, snapped in a dressing room mirror, that i look happy again. and feel worthy of pretty new clothes. it's been far too long since that happened. i think it might have something to do with all those ships.

taking pictures of ships

did i mention that my molecules are humming in alignment these days? i think it's probably mostly because i get to take pictures of ships. for a living. is there anything more a girl from the prairie could ask?

more soon. it's been busy and i'm spending the evening eating sushi with sabin and watching a webinar with lea thau (of the fabulous podcast strangers) about storytelling.

50 things about right now (mostly awesome)

i totally copycatted was inspired by molly's 50 things about right now post.

1.  in a word, kittens. two of them, tho' we thought she had 6 in there, her belly was so big.
2.  sunshine breaking through.
3.  working at home.
4.  sitting for too long in one spot when i work at home.
5.  building excitement over our coming holiday in london.

7.  flowers in bloom all over the place.

8. did i mention the two perfect, tiny kittens?

9. awesome projects at work.

10. great people to work with on awesome projects at work.

11.  a trip on the (rather distant) horizon to seattle and then new york.

12. yes, me, in new york.

13. for the first time ever.

14. cold white wine in the garden.

15. and the odd gin & tonic.

16. the coolest business cards ever. and i have some.
17. long, light summer nights.
18. being invited to a party this weekend.
19. horses with fly fringe attached to their halters.
20. the antics of our pigs.
21. the child hanging out with her good friends.
22. the awesomeness being submitted to the turtle competition we're running on eurobricks.
23. these are the ultra-creative people i get to work with. all. the. time.

24. pinterest.

25. looking forward to molly's kittens.

26. yes, that's more kittens.

27. awesome neighbors.

28. summer visits from friends.

29. rewatching friends from the beginning on netflix.

30. shark burgers for dinner.

31. salmon burgers for dinner.

32. burger burgers for dinner.

33. berries to pick.

34. the strawberries are done.

35. the child buying a nikon D7100 with her confirmation money.

36. arranging lunch dates with friends in london.

37. and tours of oxford with other friends.

38. packing up the "dining" room so it can become sabin's room.

39. reluctantly. because packing all those books away again feels wrong.

40. our independent, awesome feral hen keeping her babies safe up a tree every night.

41. overusing the word awesome.
42. but it's because everything is pretty much awesome.
43. looking at the calendar to find the best time for a weekend in rome.
44. and maybe one in berlin.
45. did i mention we're going to london?

46. getting to write at work too.

47. mowing the lawn.

48. strawberry shrubs.

49. staying up late.

50. sitting in the golden hour light with husband in the garden, sipping a cocktail and talking about our days, the future, living abroad, the angle of the roof, and what to do with all these cats.

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seriously awesome reflection photos by kiripi katembo siku

they are stunning and so full of subtext and depth.

a big thank you to molly for sharing them with me.

summer light: the view from sunday night

saturday evening drink & draw. a blissful sunny sunday in the garden. the zen activity that is mowing the lawn. lots of discussions of our upcoming party. it doesn't get much better than this. plus the light was spectacular. feeling all recharged and ready to see what the week ahead brings.

picture perfect morning

it was such a beautiful morning, i drove a long and meandering way to work, since i didn't have any early meetings. there was fog, but it burned off quickly and it was a bright, light fog while it lasted. absolutely gorgeous. it just gave me so much energy that has carried me through the rest of my day to have taken a little extra time to stop and breathe in the fresh morning air, say hello to some lambs and capture the beauty with my camera.

now the afternoon is cloudy and rainy, but it doesn't matter a bit, because i got to enjoy the sunshine while it lasted.

happy weekend, one and all!

on an even keel

i have had the best possible start to my new job. it's a great company. i'm surrounded by creative, motivated people and i have a great boss. there are moments of actual playing nearly every day. and i am surrounded by sources of inspiration. i have been given time and support to read and learn and absorb the information i need to be able to do my job. it is absolutely as you would hope your job would be in every way.

it makes me tired in a different way than i've been tired in a long time. and it also makes me awake and engaged in a way i hadn't been in a long time. the kind of projects i've worked on in recent years have been quite solitary. i find it both energizing and tiring to be around a lot of new people. trying to feel centered in the midst of these often conflicting feelings is an exercise in balance. and i'm not always equally good at it. today, i'm on a kind of high. awake and feeling like it will be hours before i sleep, just like my old patterns (i've been a night owl for some time). other days, i come home and want to go to sleep early because my brain is full and my instinct is to go to sleep and dream to process it all. the brain is wonderful that way. and this evening, it apparently thinks it's best that i stay up and write about it (my usual mode of processing). i've learned that i need to go with it, whichever mode my instincts choose, somehow they know best.

if we listen to ourselves, we do know, at our core, how to stay on an even keel. it's just a matter of tuning in.

the perfect end to a wonderful week

early in the week, i saw these stacks of awesomeness in my boss' boss's (i did one of each because i couldn't make it look right - any grammar police, please advise which is correct!) office. i nearly fainted dead away. they're all there. every. last. one. of. them.

and today, i had a meeting with that boss, which stretched from an hour to an hour and a half and during the course of it, he said i could select a single minifigure from any box of my choosing every friday. this is the one i chose. i was hoping for the equestrian.

but i got the gymnast, which was my second choice anyway and which is totally awesome! how lucky am i?  it was the perfect ending to a truly wonderful week. i think i actually feel sorry for anyone who doesn't work for lego. it must be the best place in the world to work.

and because you can never have too much, i had to share this fabulous MOC (my own creation - which means a lego object created from someone's imagination, not a set). it's pretty darn amazing.

exhausted in a good way

this blurry sunset photo, taken at the end of my day, well after it was way too dark to take a photo, perfectly matches how i feel right now. it's got a warm glow, but it's just not in focus. i had a long and full day of learning exciting new things and while that's wonderful, it's also exhausting. especially because we stood up for most of the day. if i'd known it was going to be standing up all day, i'd definitely have worn different shoes. my feet went from complaining to not speaking to me to cautious rapprochement here after i came home and showered and put them up for awhile. they will undoubtedly have a strong opinion about what shoes i wear tomorrow.

this week has been amazing so far. but it does tire you out in a completely different way than putting around home, writing a little bit here and there, taking some leisurely photos and then perusing pinterest for dinner ideas does. i'm loving every minute of it tho'.

probably one of the biggest challenges (other than remembering people's names), is learning a whole new corporate language. i've never been in a company that made consumer products before (unless you count microsoft and i was arguably in a B2B corner of that behemoth). it seems there's a whole language around the way you speak of pricing and intellectual property and licensing and play experiences and buyers and gift givers and moms and DNA and built-in toilets when you're a toy company. and i had a prolonged exposure to all of that today. it's like trying to decode a language that sounds vaguely familiar, but which also seems like total gobbledygook. and it's pretty exhausting. even while it's also exhilirating.

but i'm trying to remember that you can only have new experiences once before they aren't new anymore and i'm doing my best to enjoy every minute and everything i'm learning and doing. it's such a creative, positive atmosphere that i can't really do anything other than enjoy the ride, wherever it's going to take me. and right now, it's going to take me to bed. my brain says it's time to shut down and let it get on with the processing. i'm sure that tonight i'll be dreaming of lego.

worth the wait

it wasn't easy, but i got through the waiting at long last. i spent the morning ironing and cleaning and tidying and at last selecting my outfit. i shouldn't have gone with the vintage boots because one heel (which i didn't even know was weak) cracked as i walked from the main building over to where i will work. i was able to glue it and hold it together for the day, and now it's just a funny memory.

had to have a selfie, of course. this is, after all, the age of the selfie.

and this is what was waiting for me on my desk when i arrived. a whole stack of apple awesomeness. it really doesn't get any better than that.

and i got to fish through a box of minifigs for the ones i don't have (alas, they weren't all there, but i will get the final two, i'm certain of it).

in denmark, you nearly always get a welcome bouquet of flowers when you start a new job. i had to bring mine home to enjoy them. most jobs, however, don't come with a whole lot of lego. but then, most jobs aren't this awesome.

good news and good links

got some wonderful news today.
let's just say that you can expect a whole lot more LEGO
here on MPC in the new year.

i'm so excited.
and grateful to all of you who helped me with my co-creation question.
and sent good vibes and prayers my way.
they worked.

and after a run to germany for gin and other supplies,
i think i'm almost ready for christmas.

* * *

inside the life of a bookie.

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an interesting blog.

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deep thoughts from john.
worth reading.
worth pondering.

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and for a laugh,
these hilarious answers to test questions.
really worth a look if you need a laugh.

* * *

a pretty accurate little personality test.
and it's short too, so it won't take too much time.

things are coming up raspberries

i know it's supposed to be roses, but i don't have any roses, so you get raspberries. you know i'm rather unconventional. why be like everyone else? but i digress.

remember that meeting i was looking forward to? because i was armed (or dressed, as they would say in danish - klædt på) with the real story behind the behavior of my buddy the troglodyte? well, it had an outcome that i wouldn't have imagined or dared to wish for in my wildest dreams. after two hours of heavy discussion, tho' not heated, oddly enough, he announced at the end of the meeting that he was resigning from the board. he had a prepared, typed speech, so it wasn't a decision he arrived at during the meeting. he cited a bunch of reasons - work, other boards he was involved with, projects, and his health (all likely valid). funnily enough he didn't mention his conflict of interest in the case. but i will be mentioning it in my novel. when i depict him as a cross-dressing geisha with a monkey. you know what they say, be nice to the writer or end up a character in her novel.

sorry. i'm gleeful, but apparently not yet ready to be charitable after all he put me through. i was very glad husband was beside me during the meeting and not across from me, where i could catch his eye. as it was, i'm sure i couldn't conceal my happiness. and i didn't even really try. tho' i did manage to restrain from actually getting up and doing a spontaneous happy dance.

but i'll tell you that if i'd had a bottle of bubbly in the fridge, we'd have cracked it open when we got home. even tho' it's a monday night.