Happy List: #164
Hi! Happy May Day!
Thank you to everyone who reached out to wish Handy Husband a happy birthday. He was thoroughly embarrassed and secretly delighted!
Someone asked me about his favorite cookies – they are these Red Velvet White Chocolate Chip Cookies. It is a recipe that uses a cake mix and they are always a hit.
This week on the blog I shared the wood backboard we made for our son’s over-the-door basketball hoop. It has been seeing a lot of action while we’ve been hunkered down at home.
Here’s the Happy List!
PLINK, PLANK, PLUNK
If you watch one thing today, it MUST BE this video by the Chicago Sinfonietta playing Plink, Plank, Plunk!
It is pure joy and delight.
I fully admit to watching it more than once.
TWO THINGS
Two things about this photo caught my eye. First, the pale pink door is pretty. I can almost picture our front door a pale pink.
Second, I love the railing over the flat roof. Our garage has a flat roof and it looks like an after thought. I think a railing would help integrate it with the rest of the house. I just have to convince Handy Husband. On the project priority list, this would fall to approximately #3,027, but a girl can dream.
For more front door ideas, read this Southern Living article.
(image: Hector Manuel Sanchez; Styling: Buffy Hargett Miller via Southern Living)
HUMAN KINDNESS IS OVERFLOWING
Wow. Did you read this letter from a farmer in Kansas? He sent one N95 mask to Governor Cuomo to give to a healthcare worker. His wife has one lung and diabetes and yet they still thought of someone over themselves. Seeing the best of humanity is truly the silver lining of this pandemic.
(image: via Governor Cuomo’s Facebook)
FAVORITE GARDEN INSPIRATION
If you love gardening or at least appreciating other people’s gardens, then do yourself a favor and follow Jenny Barnes on Instagram.
TURN DOWN STRESS
I listened to this Outside podcast titled “The Switch in Your Brain That Turns Down Stress.”
The premise of the idea is that by exposing yourself to small bouts of being uncomfortable, you can train your brain to not freak the heck out when something becomes stressful.
Our family does, by accident, several of the things the interviewee suggests. For instance, we keep our house pretty cool in the winter. It is 63.9F right now in my living room in the late afternoon. Your body acclimates to these temperatures.
OUTDOOR UMBRELLA
I just ordered a black and white striped umbrella
(two, actually) because I am determined that if I act like it is summer then the weather will improve. The 7.5-ft. size I ordered was under $40 and got great reviews.
BASKET WEAVE IN WOOD
Look closely. This is a basket weave design on a WOOD console table.
If you want to be blown away, go to the Don Howell Joinery website to see all the custom tables, chairs, etc. that they make. Just have a hanky on hand to wipe all the drool off your face.
POETRY TO PONDER
WILD GEESE
You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting –
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.
That’s it from me! As always, thanks for reading the Happy List.
I’d love to connect with you on Facebook, Instagram or Pinterest. Thanks for all of your encouraging comments. I appreciate every single one of them.
Take care and have a wonderful weekend.
