5 things that bring me peace...

I will post more pictures of Barcelona, once I take down the Christmas tree, because we have to squeeze into the chair at the computer desk beside the tree to post from there and this is awkward. There is not enough room in the living room for - tree, computer and me!! and unfortunately all my pictures are on THAT computer not this one. I was a little thinner right after Barcelona from all the walking so I could squeeze in to transfer said pictures then - it's a tad more difficult now.

And why you might ask did I put up a tree at all when we were going away over the holidays - Well we left the eldest at home - he hates travelling and he needed a tree. Also my daughter just assumed that we would be having Christmas here before we went and bought a lot of gifts in Halifax - so yes, we had to run out at the last minute and buy some gifts, which we hadn't planned on and then buy more in Barcelona for our Christmas there with extended family from Edinburgh.......a pretty chaotic time.

You can see by my crazy world that I need to find some peace from time to time and here is when I do it...

1. Knitting brings me peace.  Even when patterns aren't working out and I have to rip back a lot, the rhythm of making the stitches soothes the frazzled nerves and really does "Knit up the ravelled sleeve of care."

2. My morning cup of tea and a flip through the newspaper.  I know that most of the news these days is bad and the papers are a lot thinner than they used to be and yes, I probably should just be reading them on-line, but the ritual of making tea and toast, picking up the paper from the front steps and reading the headlines is grounding. It connects me to all the other times I made and/or drank tea - with my paternal grandmother in Hamilton, ON, with my flatmates many years ago in London, UK. With my mother-in-law in Glasgow and my sister-in-law in Edinburgh. I made tea everyday in Barcelona too.

Knitted Teacups by Debbie New

3. Music - my husband isn't a great fan of music.  He finds it a distraction, like background noise, so I don't play a lot of music, even though I grew up in a home that was filled with music. I do find time, though, to listen to my mp3 player when I really need to escape.

4. Photography - I could spend hours taking pictures, organizing them, cropping them and just plain "fiddling" with them. They are another world and some are the perfection of a moment in this world.

Mud Creek ravine in Spring

5. Walking - I love walking, particularly the ravine created by Mud Creek which leads down to the Brickworks near the Don River in Toronto. There is a kind of surreal peace to be far below the traffic, as one merges with the foundations of the city - the pillions of overpasses and train trestles, the underground rivers that surface as they near the lake, the wild tangle of weeds and wildflowers, the trees - another Eden.

Have a peaceful day!