it's so pretty out there...

A word that I can deeply relate to at this time in my life is inspiration. The world is full of it, and when the time is right you can't not see it.

I couldn't always see it. It's something I learned. Now I find myself walking around in my little blissful world, smiling to myself with my own little secret to happiness!




It's fair to say that I am not pre-disposed to being blissful. It took some hard work on my part. I have had many times of moodiness and negativity, aching at the thought of what others have, look like, do... I couldn't always appreciate what was before me. I went through a time where I felt like I was in the wrong place, relationship, career; the wrong life. I know what it feels like to be uninspired.

Somehow in the past year something changed. I shifted thinking. It could have been moving away from the city that I just could not relate to to a city that I can connect with on a deeper level (someday, I want to talk about what home means to me...someday). It could have also been spending a month in arguably one of the most beautiful, inspiring countries in the world. I can't exactly say. All I can say for sure is that most days are bliss, and it has nothing to do with anything other than letting go of expectations.

We don't have a lot. We have both opted for jobs that fit with our passions and values rather than pay us the big bucks. We rent a one bedroom apartment and share a compact car. Warren wears many of the same t-shirts that he has had since I first me him, and I often shop at value village. We're not thrifty, we're choosy! I often say that's it's better to have a rich life than a rich bank account (I am not yet convinced that you can have both).

We moved to a one bedroom apartment because we want to be together as much as we can! We used to live in a two bedroom townhouse, and we only ever used a quarter of it. The rest just collected dust. We just want to be together! Moving was one of the best decisions we ever made. 


Yes, we live in a city that most people gawk at, but honestly, it's beautiful! There is not a 'smart centre' in sight and everything we need is within walking distance. From our windows we see houses worth millions of dollars next to high density housing. The park across the street is filled with families, the sound of children playing, groups of frisbee throwers and amazing diversity, culturally and socio-economically. Compare our neighbourhood full of gardeners, lemonade stand entrepreneurs and cyclists to a sleepy suburban neighbourhood where the kids spend sunny days inside an arena, the parents are fighting crowds at Costco, and the SUV's in the driveway outnumber more practical vehicles. Which life is more rich? It's just my opinion, but I would say mine! Do people in big expensive houses look outside their living room window and say, ten times a day, "it's so pretty out there"? (the first month we lived in our apartment that was my mantra...)

I don't intend to put anybody down or judge people for their lifestyles. I just want to convey my passion for pursuing things in life that really lead to happiness. Which brings me back to the idea of inspiration. Life inspires me. And when I let go of what I think life is supposed to be like, and become open to possibilities, I have access to a level of peacefulness I didn't even know existed. I have learned that happiness is not about the world around me, but the world inside me. I can find inspiration in the most simple of things: a beautiful stone on the ground, the shadows in the leaves of a tree, hearing a belly-laugh from a stranger, the sensation of warm, bubbly dishwater. These things make me smile. It's all about perspective.

I take a lot of pictures of things that inspire me. I am no photographer. That's evident. But I like to think that the photos I take show some of the beauty in my world.

I have a new found love of 'nesting'. This has not been typical behaviour for me. I have always liked to surround myself with beautiful things, but always with the feeling of freedom to pack up and leave in an instant. I have always had really itchy feet. Since moving away from home to go to University at the age of 19 I have always felt the need to move around. Not commit to a home. I used to take inventory of all of my stuff and feel comfort in knowing that I could pack it all up and go on the road. Like a snail wears it's home on its back. I read Jack Kerouac and identified with the vagabond lifestyle. I dreamt of taking off for months, and always regretted that I could never really leave everything that I have worked for behind.

I read somewhere that the term 'hobo' comes from the words 'homeward bound' and this rings true for me. Traveling, trying out new cities, exploring other lives, all lead to where I am now. I find myself urning for roots; for a home base. A place to display my books, to nurture a garden, to represent us. This doesn't mean that my travel bug is gone, but it means that travel will always lead back to the same spot. Travel has inspired me to get to know my own home.


I am inspired by my home. Inspired to make the little place we have into a refuge. I love filling rooms with things that improve our quality of life. I love making things cosy. We have turned a slab of concrete and metal bars into an outdoor heaven for us and the cats to retreat to. The tiny, windowless, fan-less bathroom has elements of nature to make it warm. I am always inspired my our beautiful wooden chopping block, and the way veggies look sliced and diced atop it. Our mix and match napkins look so homey on the handmaid kitchen table that Warren ate cornflakes at as a child.

My home is no longer just a place for my things. It is the safest, cosiest, happiest place in the world!

Someday soon we want to buy a house in our neighbourhood. It will be nice to be able to paint and renovate and nest on another level. But for now, I love our little home with all it's cosyness!

As much as I love home, I am equally in love with travel! I haven't been everywhere. We don't get to travel half as much as we want to. Sometimes I feel sad about this. It's hard for me not to be jealous when I hear of my friend's travels. Most of my friends are globe-trotters.

Travel is something l value. I am not really referring to 'vacations' like Montego Bay or Varadero, although those are both great places! I am referring to the kind of travel that forces you to forget everything you thought you knew, and learn how to live in a new way.

Within the twenty-four hours of travel I am always reminded of this: travel has this way of simultaneously beating you down and lifting you up. If done right it's hard (where to eat? how to use the money? where to sleep? how to drive on the "wrong" side of the road or use the transit? how to communicate?) but also amazingly rewarding.

I don't always get to go to the places I want when I want to. But I try to consider what it is about travel that I love, and how I can incorporate that into my life as it is. What I love about travel inspires me to have a richer life right at home. Road trips into the nowhereness of the rural highways outside of the city... choosing different foods at the farmers market to try... having a soy latte with a book in a coffee shop... these things remind me of travel. There are so many adventures to be had in this life of ours, and we don't have to travel to southeast Asia to experience them if we don't have access to travel all the time.

There are thousands of things that inspire me, and I have only just scratched the surface! 


Life is good!

Love Always,
Joan Blondina

on a dreary june day...

{lavender simple syrup}

...nothing is more wonderful than making up a batch of lavender lemon-aid and lemon-basil ice cream.

The lavender came from my mom's garden (ours is a little too puny) and the basil from ours.

I have some friends coming by tonight to help me enjoy!

Love Always
Joan Blondina

with the pursuit of inspiration I am able to grow...

What makes me qualified to write a blog? What makes Tyra Banks qualified to host a talk show? I love Tyra, but if she can do anything she wants to do, than so can I.

But really, it's after a few months of internal debate that I decided to blog. For me, blog reading started because blogging is a big part of the knitting world, and since I have no one in my life who shares a love for the 'art of purl' I get my inspiration from mysterious yet familiar strangers from afar. Knitting was the gateway drug that then led to to sewing blogs and DIY blogs and vegetarian blogs and interior design blogs... it's a big world out there folks! There's a lot of inspiration to be found. You can find examples of some of the bloggers who have given me inspiration on my sidebar. They are amazing. I am not delusional to think that I am as gifted or artsy or talented with the camera as they are (I don't have an SLR or Photoshop... frankly my laptop can't handle any photo editing period). I am certianly not as elloquant as many, yet I still really want to be a part of this sharing of ideas and thoughts. I can't express how women like Aura Joon and Sarah Britton have made me feel more comfortable about who I am, knowing that there are other's out there with similar values as mine. Why can't all these amazing women get together for an amazing women party at my home?? Well we can't. We can, however, meet up in blogland. So, here is my contribution. Thank you to those who have inspired me to be a part of this!

Not too long ago I was at my parents home helping them empty out the basement when I found a box of things from between the years of 1997 to 2002. Everything that I kept from before university was in a box (let's not be delusional... there were several boxes of hoarded half broken crafts and trinkets). Included amongst the treasures were past journals and notebooks. I have always written in a journal. Even now I write. As I read some poems and passages out loud to my mom we were both amazed at what I was writing, even as young as 14 years old. I just loved to write. While I still occasionally write privately in a journal, I don't pour myself out on paper like I used to. Granted, these were very private notebooks, and the internet didn't even exist for most of it, but I was somehow able to express some very insightful thoughts about significant developmental milestones. My mom asked me why I don't write anymore, and why I never pursued writing as a career. I told her that no job could ever be as glamorous or financially rewarding as social work (wink wink) but agreed writing is something that I enjoy.

There is something about writing that helps my thoughts to become organized. As someone who spends a lot of time in my head, it helps to turn thoughts into sentences. There is also something both terrifying and exhilarating about the transparency that comes with writing thoughts down. There is the chance that somebody could read it and (horror) know what I am really thinking. Well, I don't promise to share all of my deepest darkest secrets, but I do want to share a few thoughts. To anyone who is out there. Or to no one. I really don't care. This is partly for me too, you know!

So a little known fact about me is that I am a journal hoarder. I love them. I have some journals that I have found on my travels that I don't even intend to write in. I also have my journals organized thematically. For example, my journal library looks something like this:

- kitchen journal - where I record recipes that I hear a

bout, dream about, or concoct

- gardening journal - what I grow, where, and how it's doing each year

- knitting/crochet journal - when I make up a pattern I write it down - there are not many of these. It also includes ideas for a knitting business which I will probably never get around to!

- travel - oh, this one is a cherished one. It documents, in depth, each day of my travels when I am alway, except for, inevitably, the last few days when I am sick of writing

- a journal for poetic thoughts and insights

- a journal for the juicy details!!

And you know what... unlike my old journals, blogger has spellcheck! Lucky for you. Seriously.

I hope this serves to explain the purpose of wanting to make a blog. I figure I will have a thought, something to say or share to the world, and maybe document it for the whole world to read (or maybe nobody - and that would be fine too).

Love always,

Joan Blondina

how's it growing?

This is my first blog post, and I want to start it off light and easy. See how it feels to be a blogger before I commit. Commitment is hard. What is not hard is just talking. Actually that can be hard too... let's just talk about growing. Growing little things into big ones. What do you say?


I am no gardener, but I do love home grown vegetables and herbs. Being able to grow my own food, that I know is nutritious, organic, and as local as it gets makes me feel pretty empowered. Because I live in an apartment building I don't have a garden, but I do have a balcony, and therefore the best advantage out there for growing! Two summers ago we lived in a townhouse, and not only did we spend hours trying to get the polluted, cigarette butt infested, garbage laden, weed covered dirt from the previous renters out of there and replaced with actual soil, but we spent hours throwing rocks at the poor starving squirrels who feasted on everything we tried to grow! I hated gardening because of it!


Last year things were a lot easier, and this year even more so! We buy plants mid may because in our little nest there is no room for seedlings. This year we got a lot of them at a local market which had tons of variety. Balcony gardening is the fastest way to garden with the best results I think! It took us about 20 minutes to empty the containers of last years herbs and veggies, add fresh soil, plant and water everything. And the best part: no pests or weeding!

thyme, parsley, chili peppers, and mint

Thankfully we do get some bee friends who visit to pollinate. Otherwise there are no critters to compete with. We water every couple of days and enjoy!

cos lettuce, chives, cilantro, rosemary

We ended up switching the tomatoes/basil with the chili/mint/parsley/thyme because the eastern-most corner gets the longest sunshine.


We are really looking forward to trying the heirloom tomatoes. A big problem with food these days is that with the thousands of varieties of veggies like tomatoes, we only get a handful in our grocery stores. This is not right. We can't appreciate the diversity and complexity of food when all we get are some rubbery, waxy, two week old genetically modified version of the real thing. This is why growing is so important!

lettuce leaf basil, heirloom tomatoes (black russian and pineapple)

I can't live without this lovely lady!

Lavender is my favorite! I can't walk down the street and pass a lavender bush without sticking my hand in and smelling it's perfume. Every home should have lavender. In our old townhouse I planted 8 lavender plants, three different varieties, and they all got choked out by the infestation of burrs that I could never get to go away. Needless to say, nothing grew at that house except for my need to move.

welcome buddies! grow big and tall!

By the time I am writing this everything has doubled in size. I have enjoyed all of the herbs in my cooking! What a delight! I can't wait for tomatoes to come! I see some fresh salsa in my future!

basil in its glory

come on out little one!

tomato jungle

"i'll be a chili one day"

We had some extra containers, so I planted some seeds (a little late, I know) and we'll see what happens to them. They are all flowers, so hopefully I can have something to make some home-made arrangements with soon! Here's what they look like right now:

wildflowers

what will you look like?

decorative climbing sweet peas

Isn't nature amazing?

Love Always,

Joan Blondina