Dharma

"Our personal attempts to live humanely in this world are never wasted. Choosing to cultivate love rather than anger just might be what it takes to save the planet from extinction." -Pema Chödrön

madhouse

This is what my kitchen looked like on Monday morning:

Unfortunately, I didn't have the forethought to take a photo of the kitchen before remodeling began. You can see the blank spots where the refrigerator,stove and oven used to be.

Below is a picture of my kitchen as it looked when I got home from work on Monday night.

No more cabinets or counter tops. While it doesn't appear that much work was accomplished, the picture doesn't show that there used to be more counters and a sink off to the right, which are now piled up in our garage.

Finally, this is the most recent photo of our kitchen. When I left for work this morning, there was a wall still separating our current kitchen from the addition. Upon arriving home this afternoon, I was greeted by this cavernous space:

The cats are enjoying their new play space. I'm still in shock from all of the changes. I've lived in this house for twenty years and, while many things have changed, nothing has ever been altered to such a drastic scale. I am looking forward to a much bigger, easier to navigate kitchen, though.

A peek at the coming season

Despite the fact that it's not even mid-August, many stores have already started advertising various kinds of Autumn merchandise. Two of my favorite stores, Bath & Body Works and Yankee Candle, began selling their Fall products over a week ago and I had to get my hands on some of those deliciously scented items.

Much like the first glimpse of red and orange blazing through the green Maple leaves, the smell of creamy pumpkin candles and apple cider soap give me a much-needed taste of the beautiful season to come.

"It does not do well to dwell on dreams and forget to live."

Life has been uneventful lately and I'm not doing well in regards to making it more interesting. I'm reminiscing about the beautiful Spring we had (during which I took the above photo) and wishing Autumn would hurry up and get here already! Most people feel more depressed as the weather turns cooler and the days grow shorter, but I come alive as all of the trees turn from monochromatic to red, purple, orange, yellow and every shade and hue in between.

In the meantime, I've decided to re-read the Harry Potter series, as it's been approximately eleven years since I first began the series. It's like reuniting with an old best friend after a long, long while and rediscovering all of the reasons why we became close, sharing in our old memories. Reading the series again gives me the ability to see events in a new light and I notice foreshadowing and hints I didn't pick up on before. The only problem with picking up the series again is that I'll miss it all the more when I've finished book seven!

the cross still stands

Years ago, a church near my house caught on fire and it was almost entirely destroyed. I don't know why, but instead of being bulldozed, a fence was erected around the remains but the church itself was left untouched. I crawled under that fence with my camera to take pictures because I've always found that there can be beauty in destruction. I took a lot of great photographs that day, but this one was the best.

I don't know if someone sneaked in to stand the cross back up, or if the pulpit remained upright while the building burned. Either way, it was a moving scene for me to stumble upon.

colorful black & white photo

I just wanted to share a photograph of mine from a long time ago. It's been sitting in my basement since 2004, I think; I took it for a photography class in high school. We used manual cameras and developed the black and white film and prints by hand.

 One of my cousins, roasting a hot dog at our family farm on a cold winter day. After I made the print, I sprayed a special solution on it that made the paper matte so I could hand-paint her clothes...and the hot dog!

I've taken thousands of photos over the years and this still remains one of my favorites.

Serious home remodeling

My house is undergoing some serious changes right now. My parents and I have lived here for almost twenty-one years and plenty of things have been replaced or upgraded over time. However, remodeling began in June and our entire kitchen and deck are being rebuilt! I tend to dislike change and resist it as much as possible, but I had no choice in this matter and it is a bit exciting. 

So far, the work has been concentrated outside of our home. Renovations will begin inside when our deck is complete.

I took this photo about three weeks ago, when work had just begun. Our deck was completely destroyed and a huge hole was dug in its place!

The pit will serve as an addition onto our basement. I took this picture from our kitchen, which is on the ground level of our house.

 The pit was filled in with concrete to make an actual room; the wall between this addition and our basement hasn't been knocked down yet, though.

 With this part of the remodeling complete, work could begin on the addition to our kitchen.

 This will be an extension of the eating area and kitchen. We have a sliding door that opened to our old deck, but this addition will have a French door. The big, square-shaped holes are for the support posts for the deck.

 A view from inside the addition. That wall with the sliding glass door will be coming down eventually. I'm looking forward to having a bigger, fancier kitchen!

I'll post more as work progresses. The entire process isn't scheduled to finish until October, so I imagine there will be many, many more photos for me to share!

Wishing I was in Disney World

Despite our power never going out, our internet had been down for three days due to a storm. Since I didn't feel up to braving the hoards of people swarming Starbucks, I spent my weekend going through all of the photos of my laptop. I have six and a half years worth of pictures on here! I felt quite a lot of nostalgia as I went from folder to folder, but I enjoyed looking through my shots from Walt Disney World the most. The Wilderness Lodge, pictured above, is my favorite WDW resort. It's the hotel my parents and I stayed in the first time I ever visited Disney World and we make sure to visit every time we make the trek to Kissime, Florida. I love nature of all kinds, but the environment embodied at the Wilderness Lodge is my favorite. The scenery calls to mind Yellowstone National Park with its tall evergreens, rivers rushing over rocky falls and even a small replica of Old Faithful. Nowhere else in Florida can you be transported so perfectly to the Rockies.