Making Senses
Five things I am doing for my senses this summer:
*Taste*
I have made cakes, I've made pie, I've made tarts and "darling" cupcakes, but I still stand by the classic chocolate chip cookie for dessert. It's perfect. It needs nothing, it wants nothing but it gives so much. Every morning The Chief wakes up asking, "Can we make cookies Mom?" and that's the other incredible thing about chocolate chip cookies, they make for a fantastic lazy person's breakfast.
p.s. I only make choco chip cooks with brown sugar. It's a dangerously nutty splurge, a risk white sugar can't handle.
One of my favorite songs on the Lower Lights album is a throw-back number called Count Your Many Blessings. It's sung by two girls who have the most retro harmony I've heard since 1946. I was so intrigued by this arrangement that I started doing some homework and discovered the voices to be of Vivian Smith and Becky Jean Williams--the lead vocalists for The Mollies. Last week Vivian sent me their two albums in the mail, and we've spent many summer hours listening and falling for this style. It's soft, sweet music but also very lively with instruments and melodies--it was a cool surprise for both Chup and me to discover how much we dig these albums. I would recommend it for the songbirds in my life, people who appreciate well-crafted music. Very good on the ears--specially as a backdrop to summer.
*Touch*
Because I am at the salon so much with Ashlee I've made friends with half the place. One of my favorite stylists at Platinum is Destiny. She gave me this advice to soak my hair in pure coconut oil once a month for twenty minutes. Because I am the type of person who figures, "if 20 minutes is good, how about 20 hours?" I bought a jar of pure coconut oil from Basa Body and have been soaking my hair in the miracle oil once a month for 24 hours. It does make for super oily hair one day, but for weeks after that I have the softest hair in the history of my desert-dwelling life.
I would say it's the softest thing at our house right now, but Ever Jane's baby skin can't be beat. Fresh out of the tub? Forget about it.
*Smell*
Utah has always had strict firework laws. There were very specific and hard rules regulating when and how we could light off the sparkling wonders. This year the law changed and we can now celebrate with sparks and glory from June to July and the firework stands are open for business. Because we live close to a firework-approved park, we look out our windows at nights to see lights dancing in the sky. And sometimes we contribute with our own stash. But the smell of a freshly lit firework is the best part for me. It's the scent of celebration, active fumes and just a hint of danger.
*See*
My wonderful friend Laura from Dear Lizzy sent me a box recently. It was a box full of thought-provoking quotes on old brown cardstock, typed up in an equally old courier font. Every day I pull a quote out of the box and meditate a bit on the truth. The arriving conclusion from that card becomes sort of a fortune for the day and it shows up at the right time in the twenty four hours that follow. The other day I pulled one that read, "The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes. Marcel Proust" So I've been trying to see different angles, different views--not figuratively only, but really seeing with different eyes.
And I love the new views. Who knew the mountains had snowy tops in mid-July?
Now I know.
And now you know.
