Write here!: 02/01/2008

Thursday, February 28, 2008

Happy February 29th!

A whole extra day ... wishing you a good one! x

February 29th is an extra day, once every four years, to align the calendar with the seasons.

The day is often seen as a lucky omen: February 29th (1504) was especially fortuitous for Columbus.

People born on this day are known as 'leaplings' and include: Pope Paul III, Dinah Shore, Joss Ackland, Tony Robbins and Ja Rule.

Traditionally, February 29th is a day associated with romance. This is a day when women propose marriage. Leap years are so called because February 29th was a day when women could 'leap' the law that prevented them from proposing marriage.

What will you do with your extra 24 hours? How about making a leap towards a greener life? (Try the Nag too, if going greener interests you.) Whatever you do, I wish you a positive, uplifting extra day.

Yasmin Boland has this to say about today:

"We are now entering a period where profound healing is possible, and yes that includes physical healing, if that’s what you need. But it also covers emotional and spiritual healing too.
Look at where you’ve been hurt or upset recently, Ask yourself if you in any way, shape or form somehow managed to bring it on yourself, eg: by not being honest with yourself about the fact that you were clearly cruising for an emotional bruising but determined to kid yourself that it wasn’t so. If you can, forgive yourself for any perceived failure to Do Your Best.
And so now. Where does that leave you? What next? This cycle is all about transitioning to the next level, once the healing is done. PS Forgiveness, including self-forgiveness, is extremely healing."

:o)

Wednesday, February 27, 2008

Huge "Thank You" and Warm Fuzzies to Karen!

I've been buried in research about flowers since the post I wrote about Floriology, or the language and meaning of flowers ... surfacing late last night to discover this fab award from Karen:

Karen, thank you so much, it really made my day!

And your comment really touched me, what a lovely thing to say: "I'm going to pass it on to Moondreamer for her impressively long (and interesting) posts." You really made me smile, because I sometimes worry my posts are just too blooming long! (see below)

Now to pass it on ... passing awards on is just as lovely as getting them, but I always find it hard to choose from all the fab blogs on here. (A big Mwah to all of you!)

I pass this one on to:

Sarah Dunnakey, at The Write Words, for her interesting, poetic and humourous blogging.

Aliqot, for her wonderful, thoughtful and often visually stunning alithoughts, and her lovely, much-appreciated, 'grumpy' rationalism!

Casdok, for her Mother of Shrek blog: consistently amazing posts and fantastic insight into autism. (Comments on her blog often make for deep and meaningful conversation too.)

Pacha, to say "Welcome back, honey!" I missed her warm and entertaining blogging.

Lisa, because she deserves an award and a huge hug for her wonderful honesty and her amazing, inspiring sense of humour under rotten circumstances. (Sending good thoughts, Lisa!)

:o)

If you haven't already, check out the very funny first post on Karen's new blog, That's Life!

Monday, February 25, 2008

A Blooming Long Post!

This truly is a long post, I should probably have made it into more than one! It was an organic process - I daren't start pruning and dividing now, as I'm sure it will mess all my spacing up!

Flowers are a part of almost every aspect of human life. Traditionally, they are present at all the most significant times and anniversaries in our lives: birth, coming-of-age, courting, marriage and death. We associate flowers with moving home or changing job, with romance and friendship, with successes and with disappointments, tragedy and triumph.

But they are also a part of the daily stuff too.

With daffodils mad footnotes for the spring

And asters purple asteriks for autumn

~ Conrad Aiken

Like humans, flowers come in all shapes and sizes, and they each have an important job to do here on earth, even if it's only to make people smile!

Earth laughs in flowers

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

From the largest flower on earth ...

The Titan Arum at Kew Gardens

... to the smallest.

Ok, so the smallest flower is really Wolffia microscopica, the Duckweed flower

(several of which would fit on a pinhead)

Flowers thrive in the most amazing places.

From desert ...

... to tundra.

They even grow on the moon ...

(Well, ok, but they are called Moon Flowers!)

We grow them in fields ...

... in meadows ...

... and in gardens.

We arrange them in bunches ...

... in chains ...

and in vases ...

We have flower festivals to celebrate them in their thousands ...

A carpet of flowers at Christchurch's Flower Festival

... and carnivals ...

Battle of the Flowers in Jersey

And we love them as single blooms ...

We decorate our homes with them in other ways too.

Pictures of flowers on the walls ...

Van Gogh's famous Sunflowers

I love Dali but hadn't seen this before: Woman With Head of Flowers

Monet's scrumptious garden

I perhaps owe having become a painter to flowers

~Claude Monet

We decorate tableware with flowers ...

This plate has been decorated using pressed flowers

These cuties were designed by Warhol

Japanese flower plates

And soft furnishings ...

Flowers are a traditional symbol in quilting

We decorate ourselves with flowers ...

We can eat flowers ...

Nasturtium flowers are gorgeous in salads

(and you can use the leaves and seeds too!)

Elderflower heads make a spectacular dessert fried in batter

Lavendar is often used to flavour sugar and makes unusual fragrant scones or biscuits

Crystallized violets make pretty (and very yummy) decorations

We wear flowers.

As floral dresses ...

... dresses that make us look like flowers ...

... and dresses made from flowers ...

We have flowers on hats ...

... on bags ...

... and groovy shoes.

And ...

(Wow!)

Let us dance in the sun, wearing flowers in our hair

~ Susan Polis Shutz

We make artistic arrangements of flowers ...

Japanese warriors used flower-arranging as a way to relieve stress

We give them as gifts.

In big bouquets ...

... or VERY big bouquets ...

... or tiny, hand-picked posies.

(The best kind of all!)

***

A different point of view:

Why do people give each other flowers? To celebrate various important occasions, they're killing living creatures? Why restrict it to plants? "Sweetheart, let's make up. Have this deceased squirrel."

~ The Washington Post

***

We use flower names as names for girls ...