Can you find something in your life to be happy about today? How about for 100 days in a row? It sounds like a pretty tall order, but 100HappyDays.com is challenging people to attain an attitude of gratitude by simply snapping a picture every day.
It started in 2013 as a personal mission for founder Dmitry Golubnichy to bring happiness back into his life. As is so often the case, Dmitry suffered from lack of contentment in a modern life so full of everything. He made a visit back to his hometown, where he tried to express his dissatisfaction to his friends and family, but found that he was met with happy people who were mostly content with their lives. He left promising himself that if all of those around him could find happiness in the everyday, then so could he.
Dmitry made himself accountable by posting his intentions and a daily photo on social media sites with the hashtag #100happydays. Much to his surprise, his friends started asking to join in, and then strangers wanted to join in, so he launched a website and had a staggering 3,000 participants sign up on the very first night.
To date, the challenge has been taken by 1.5 million people from 220 countries! Sounds like lots of folks want to be happier.
A snapshot of my happy … I am grateful for my children, a campfire, ice cream, flip-flops, sweatpants, and cozy quilts.
Intrigued? Visit 100happydays.com to register for the challenge and pick a platform for sharing photos. You can share your pictures on Facebook, Twitter, and/or Instagram with the hashtag #100happydays, or if you’re a little more private, you can simply share on their website or link to your own private space. At the end of the challenge, you can receive a set of all 100 prints to remind you about the everyday beauty of your life.
Why is one of the main ingredients in my toothpaste also one of the three things that were so precious in ancient times that they were gifted by the Three Wise Men to the baby Jesus at his birth?
Myrrh … even the word sounds soothing. Kind of like purr(h) …
Myrrh is the aromatic resin of several small, thorny trees in the genus Commiphora. And soothing it is. It was once used as a treatment for toothaches, and now appears in toothpaste for its anti-microbial, anti-viral, astringent, and antiseptic qualities.
Photo by Alsterdrache via Wikimedia Commons
But why a precious gift? Even though myrrh was mentioned in the Old Testament as a rare perfume with intoxicating qualities, its role as one of the three gifts isn’t as clear as that of gold, a precious metal and valuable commodity, and frankincense, another resin that was often burned as an offering in worship. Myrrh was also a component of holy incense and was used as a anointing oil, and all three of the gifts were standard offerings to honor a king or deity in the ancient world.
But frankincense and myrrh’s powerful herbal healing properties could also have had a role in their choice as precious gifts. Frankincense and myrrh both have proven antiseptic, analgesic, and anti-inflammatory properties, and were once considered remedies for everything from toothaches to chronic coughs to indigestion to hemorrhoids to leprosy. Myrrh was commonly carried into the battlefield to treat wounds by the ancient Greeks. Hippocrates, the father of modern medicine, mentioned myrrh more frequently than any other plant substance in his writings.
Today, both frankincense and myrrh are commonly used in traditional Chinese medicine, Ayurvedic medicine, and aromatherapy. Myrrh is used as a natural remedy for treating a variety of ailments, including skin conditions, congestion, asthma, indigestion, ulcers, and joint pain. It’s also known to protect against liver damage and has been shown to inhibit the growth of cancer cells and to lower cholesterol. Many natural toothpastes contain myrrh to soothe irritated gums, mouth, and throat; to fight plaque; and to promote healing.
Purr(h).
If you’re already yearning for an ocean vacation, complete with snorkeling, I have just the vicarious voyage for you … The Google Oceans mapping tool is one more way in which Google packs up the imagination and sends it sailing around … Continue reading Continue reading
Back in October, I mentioned the Kirkus Prize and its $50,000 award to each writer in a variety of genres. I also vowed to devour the chosen book in their fiction category. And devour it I did.
Lily King won the prize in the fiction category for a brilliant little novel by the name of Euphoria. It also won fistfuls of other prizes and accolades, and I am happy to report that it certainly lived up to its reputation.
Lily King pays homage to Margaret Mead through a re-imagined tale of a true-to-life meeting of the revolutionary anthropologist and her second and third husbands, Reo Fortune and Gregory Bateson. Using this as a point of departure, the story depicts a tragic love triangle between three rival anthropologists working along the Sepik River in Papau, New Guinea, in the early 1930s. When the novel opens, our protagonist, Nell, has just published a brilliant and controversial book about natives of the Solomon Islands that has made her very famous. She and her jealous and competitive husband, Fen, are about to set sail for Australia after a stint of disappointing field work in New Guinea when they happen upon a colleague and competitor, the desperately lonely Andrew.
King’s descriptions of the three characters’ collaborative yet colliding journeys in the hot and muggy air of the jungle, the stolen glances of hidden love, and the background throbbing of tribal drums was beautifully done. I will most definitely read the Kirkus Prize fiction winner for 2015.
The adorable, always humorous MBA Jane is my way of honoring our Sisterhood Merit Badge program, now with 6,399 dues-paying members who have earned an amazing number of merit badges so far—9,095 total! Take it away, MBA Jane!!! MJ
Wondering who I am? I’m Merit Badge Awardee Jane (MBA Jane for short). In my former life …
For this week’s Make it Easy/In the Garden Beginner Level Merit Badge, I went shopping.
Outside.
In my yard.
And maybe in my neighbor’s yard.
And by yard, I mean trash.
Ahem. Hey, now, before you get all judge-y on me, farmgirls, (no, I am not advocating a Freegan Badge) remember this little nugget of truth: A penny saved is a penny salvaged. Or is it: A bird in the bush is worth two in the garden?
Well, no matter. Whatever your personal mantra and creed is, your own yard (and your friendly neighbor’s) is an excellent place to find all sorts of treasures to recycle/upcycle/DIY. Golly, I could probably have my own reality television show at this point. And an action figure.
Wait. I AM an action figure.
Well, anyway. Back to the show. My goal was this: Make a garden trellis out of material I could salvage/find/discover.
Don’t get all overwhelmed on me, chiclets—this was going to be easy-peasy. (In fact, a pea or bean teepee was next on my list, to boot.) I had so many ideas, my head was swimming with them. You can make a trellis out of nearly anything …
“The Grey Trellis,” by J. Alden Weir, 1891
And now that you have a fabulous, unique, one-of-a-kind garden trellis, what to do with it? Well, you came to the right place, doll. Here are a few creepers (and by that, I do not mean a shady-looking character … I mean some climbing plants) and crawlers that adore trellises almost as much as you do:
Photo by Stephen McKay via Wikimedia Commons
And did you know these fun facts about growing veggies on a trellis, as opposed to on the garden floor? The fruit and veg will be cleaner, better-shaped, take up less space, will be less discolored (no resting on the ground), easier to water, and easier to harvest.
And this most important reason of all:
It’s totes adorbs!
Try a trellis today. Don’t go shopping for supplies, just use your imagination. Then get planting. You’ll have the cutest, most functional garden on the block (of course, your neighbors might want their stuff back … let ‘em share in the bounty instead). Happy DIY-ing, peeps.
Buy props used in MaryJane’s books and magazine!
5% of profits will benefit www.firstbook.org, a non-profit that provides new books to children from low-income families throughout the U.S. and Canada.
Here’s how:
MaryJane will post a photo and a description of a prop and its cost along with a few details as to its condition here: https://shop.maryjanesfarm.org/MaryJanesCurations. It’s a playful way to be the new owner of a little bit of farm herstory.
