image via pinterest Yesterday, April 22nd was Earth day. Who knew, not I for sure, yesterday was the first time I ever recognized the day. Earth hour, I know about but not Earth day. All the same I decided to embrace it and find out more on how to mark the day. One thing I did was read a survey and educate myself on ecotriva from this website below
http://www.earthday.ca/resources/ecotrivia A few tips, I learned and would like to work on include: 1. Unplug electrical appliance when not in use, from laptops to kettles to toasters. This will not only be earth friendly but save me money. That I can definitely get on board with ( smile) 2. Keep my showers short and quick, especially as I already take too long and use up too much water on days I wash my hair.
3.Keeping car idling to a minimum. A minimum, as this cannot be help sometimes due to our cold Canadian weather. However a great tip/eye opener I learnt was the fact the car is idling when in a drive through, going forward, I will park the car and walk into the restaurant. 4. Stop being lazy and go out of my way if need be to recycle. This will require some effort especially in places where recycling facilities are not readily available but I am now more willing look or ask for a recycling bin. 5. Use less disposables. From fashion, to packaging to cleaning materials, our society tends to lean towards disposables, disposables that end up in landfills. I plan to learn, investigate and use other alternatives. For example, purchasing more classical fashion of good quality fabric that would not need to be tossed out after a few wears, using cloth napkins and less paper towels, using actual plates and less Styrofoam, taking my re-usable bag to the grocery store etc. Ideas for the future - Plant a garden. A garden instead of a backlawn, one that is a rock garden that consist of food crops in rotation to keep the soil healthy and mixed in with some flowers of course. - Would love to own a home with energy saving features and possibly a solar panel.
Valentine's day just went by, a day to share love or express love in different ways that the media, the world encourages, influences and in some cases dictates that we do. As much as there are so many people out there taking part in the festivities, there was so many others hating on the holiday. All the blog posts and vlogs on valentine 's day outfit,events for couples and singles in the city got me thinking. What is all this about? in one word HAPPINESS! We are all looking for love for many reasons, the underlining cause is HAPPINESS. We do it all to be happy and that I think that is admirable. Like most times, when I feel inspired, I went looking for happiness quotes. Here are a few that I found that resonated with me. Happiness: a calm awareness of the present moment, of sensation, consciousness, thoughts, and perception.
Everyone has a different idea of happiness. Follow your own path, not someone else's.
A loving family and friends....... that's happiness.
Be happy you're alive!
Happiness is a natural outcome of being able to be oneself
Make happiness your goal, and do whatever it takes to achieve it. All photos cutesy of Pinterest
It all started with this picture of Grace Jones, that I saw a long time ago, then recently, I catch myself in the bathroom mirror doing a sideway version of this. Ever since then I haven't been able to stop myself from doing this each time. Years ago, my sister would tease me telling me that I look like Grace Jones, am ashamed to say I didn't think Grace Jones was beautiful; infact I thought she looked like a man. My perception of beauty has matured since then and if my sister were to tease me now.I would definitely pull that face again.
This picture got me going with a whole train of thought and I went searching on internet, spent hours looking at images of strong , fierce women that i grew up watching. All these women, love, love them for all they have inspired in me.
Been currently obsessed with these two tracks. Been listening to their music for as long as I can remember. These get me grooving and dancing, my current get ready music. Enrique.....
Recently I have been confronted with what it means to wear my hair in its natural state. It has been 3 months since I took my braids out and have been wearing my hair in twist out, updos and buns. Personally I have really enjoyed it and had a lot of positive reactions to it. So much positive reactions that the one negative ( nose turned up) reaction/ comment stopped me in my tracks and caused me to think. 3 years ago standing in front of the bathroom mirror, I cut off my relaxed ends, did the big chop. The only negative reaction I had at the time, with my twa was from two family members who soon stopped the teasing when they saw and came to understand why I was natural. With friends, my brother and younger sister, the latter two being my greatest supporters cheering me on, I navigated through my natural journey. On hair forum and blogs, I read about negativity that other naturals encounter and thought I could relate ( remember the two family members)but really I now know that I didn't really know the half of it. My large cheer quad boosted up my confidence in the new natural me that I was and am able to be natural and love it. I have been thinking, I have take for granted the great support I have. I have been thinking about what my natural hair means to me. I do not have the amazing curls like much type 3 or 4a naturals, my kinks and coils need some manipulation to clump together in a curl ( usually after being in twists). But I have come to love it as it represent me in every sense, in ways that even I do not even know but am coming to learn about. Will I ever go back to getting a relaxer, most people that know me, already know that answer, NO. I came across this picture on Le coil and it spoke to me, it captures how I feel about my hair, my natural hair, so natural, so me, so in tune with me. My natural hair is me.
