Denying my heritage

It's St. Patricks Day, if you hadn't noticed already.


Normally this is a holiday I embrace with gusto, though there are a few other European countries that my ancestors originate from, I have always been most proud of my Irish heritage. Today I'm not even wearing green. I'm over it.


Instead of going out and having too many green alcoholic beverages with my fellow honorary Irishfolk, I am hitting up the craft outlet store with my homegirl W (of Ghetto-licious fame) and we're staying in to get crafty (and maybe drink a little bit of the Green Dragon).

In the past month since my boyfriend (let's just start calling him Bear) has been gone I have been in almost-hibernation mode and doing my best to busy myself with projects to take my mind off of how much I miss him. We Skype frequently, but since our time zones are 9 hours different we usually only get to see each other when it is late at night here and early morning there, which doesn't kill much of my ample free hours. I've been learning Turkish with Rosetta Stone, but my brain can only add so much at one time and I try to get another lesson in every few days. My place is now almost spotless, all my little household projects are complete and I'm getting a bit bored. I haven't been in the mood to go out out lately, so I've been wrangling different friends for dinner parties at least once a week and mostly staying at home reading.

W is a Crafting Queen and when she realized how Etsy-dependent I have become for papergoods, she immediately gave me a (gentle) hard time for buying something I could make myself. It's not totally true (no way I can make a pop-up bird cage card) but the idea of getting together to craft with her was irresistable. She claims to be able to DIY a pillbox hat out of a cheese container and since I am curious AND in need of a hat for March's Yelp Elite Event (a *Spiked* Tea Party) I figured a night of arts & crafts, a few drinks and good company wasn't too horrible of an idea. I have a stash of supplies from making my own wrapping paper for a few years in row and W has all kinds of glittery goodies, but we're still going to hit up Pacific Fabric and Crafts Outlet to see what kind of damage we can do. They better have some blue feathers, dammit.

Shameless Plug Sunday: One Bath Fizzer Honey Please and Kings & Queens Nefertiti Body Butter

Perusing through Target today trying to find something pretty smelling and fun to add to my bubble bath routine on a typical Domestic Goddess Sunday, preferably in the form of a bath bomb, I came across the One Bath Fizzer in Honey Please scent. It claimed to have calming abilities, smelled divine and for about $6 for 2 baths worth, I figured I may as well try it. Another bonus is that their products are eco-friendly: "ONE takes eco-conscious to the next level, uniting superior natural ingredients and recyclable packaging to offer genuinely earth-friendly products."

Just a few shelves over, I discovered Kings & Queens had a honey scented Body Butter called Nefertiti, offering that she "regularly used honey as a beauty treatment in order to live up to her name 'the beautiful woman has arrived.'" It was a tad on the expensive side (for Target) at $15 but it is mineral oil and paraben free.

The Fizzer was absolutely amazing, the scent of honey filled the entire room and I'll be damned if I wasn't pretty darn calmed. I could feel the soothing effects on my skin even after I got out of the bath and toweled off, and to seal it all in I finished off with the Body Butter. HEAVEN. Sexy, pretty smelling, soft Heaven.

I love the concept of Kings & Queens: each scent is named/themed after an historical ruler and they have some inspired fragrances that suggest you should "get ready like a royal, start the day like a sovereign, make like a monarch. Kings & Queens is a royal new body care range developed around the herbs and spices favored by the aristocracy of a bygone age." It appears they have a full line of products and a myriad of aromas, and I have a feeling I will be hoarding more than one of their products in the future

Psychic Reading Part 5 - The Conclusion

Yep, folks, this is the end of it. It makes me overwhelmingly curious as to what a reading might turn up in my current life...:

She looked directly in my eyes and said “it's okay to be who you are. Actually it's essential.” Again she told me of the scenes that she saw of me, this time she saw a bookshelf in the back of my heart with me taking a book off the shelf that I appear excited about – a book about how the mind works. The next book is about the theater and plays, and she firmly states “I think you should write them.” Instantly she had a “future image” of me calling her from New York where my piece was being shown to say “oh my god, it's happening!” She seemed measurably thrilled with the thought and rushed to tell me that I should focus on painting, writing and psychology before instructing me to take the first step: to write. “It would give you so much ecstasy. You can! Yes, you can!” she expressed forcefully, but with a grin.

She told me I was “such a romantic, true romance – you can live a romantic life,” because it was “pretty fucking clear. A no brainer. Who are you is a courageous act. It's scary but you can do it.” and that I should go to school as I would find it fulfilling and gratifying. At the time, I was baffled – I had known for years exactly what I wanted to do and that was: go to school for horticulture, start my own nursery and garden boutique with the hopes of expanding into landscaping/design. I had written a lot when I was younger, but seemed to grow out of it in my very early twenties and it just didn't seem like something I would ever have a career in. She passed along that the Spirit says I needed to “write the lines” before going quiet again. She seemed sad when she told me that I had walls, but that the Spirit also said I was a patient person. Then the tape stopped. I can't recall any exchange we may have had following that, but I am sure she wrapped it up shortly after that and gave me the tape before I slipped out for the rainy drive home.

Shameless Plug Sunday: Secret Stash Sea Salts

Well before my boyfriend returned to Turkey a few weeks ago I had started scheming about a Seattle-themed care package to send to his parents. I have not had the opportunity to meet them yet, but his Mother has been so kind and supportive about our relationship that I wanted to show my gratitude and share a little bit of my city (and the city where their son has been spending so much time) with them.


Without hesitation, I wrote "Secret Stash Sea Salts" on the list of items I intended to gather and send.B actually introduced me to their product after he had picked up a jar of Nicoise Olive salt at the nearby Queen Anne Farmer's Market and used it on breakfast eggs, as they had suggested, and later as an accent to a chicken fettuccine dish that he would make. A few weeks later, I was visiting Dave Sheely Design's booth at Urban Craft Uprising and ended up coming across the Secret Stash booth, where they were offering tastes of their artisan salts and selling 1 oz. samplers. I tasted and enjoyed all of the flavors they had, but immediately fell in love with the Lavender Rosemary blend and ended up buying a sampler to take home and try. A little goes a long way (especially for someone who mostly cooks for one or two) - it's been about 6 months and I still have a smidge left.


They have an array of mouth-watering options: Truffle, Smoked Chipotle, Bloody Mary, Chorizo, Almond Cardamom, Coconut Garam Marsala, and occasionally some additional flavors are available in limited release.


Not only are their salts amazing, their business is local and consists of 2 people: Chef Joseph Conrad and Janna Wemmer (read more about them here). Janna has been supremely helpful and friendly in all of my interactions with her and when I finally placed my order online (they should be back at the Queen Anne Farmer's Market when it opens for the season, but they do have reasonable shipping charges in the meantime) after deciding which samplers to send to Turkey, she got them in the mail to me very promptly. Furthermore, she has been happy to give application tips and recipes (also featured on the website: www.secretsalts.com), solicits input about new flavors (check out the blog: http://wwwsecretstash.blogspot.com/)and wants to know how you like to use their salts.


They're in my Top Ten "Businesses Totally Worth Supporting" but I can only eat so much salt by myself, people. Help a sister out.

Sick pigeon on the worst day ever.

My boyfriend left for a visit to Turkey a few weeks ago, and all this week I have been fighting a cold and spending most of my time resting and doping myself up with cough syrup.

I've been staying around my home a lot since he been gone, but a friend of mine was home visiting from Atlanta and organized a party at a Yelp-popular bar in Greenwood, and he let me know that he intended to bring a piece of art he had made for me months and months before but had never been able to deliver to me, so of course I had to go out last night. I took it pretty easy, sticking with cheap beer and drinking it slowly, but I still ended the night fairly early. I'm 100% glad I went out because I had a great time, saw a lot of my friends that I hadn't been able to visit in a while AND I got to bring home Robot Cat (Original art by Scott Kick):Unfortunately, today I definitely felt worse. I woke up rather early and stayed in bed while I called my boyfriend, then Jamba Juice to see when they opened so I could run over to get a Cold Buster while I picked up some groceries to get me through the weekend. It was so beautiful out while I ran my errands and I was kicking myself for being sick on one of our priceless sunny Seattle days. After I took care of that it was home and back to bed to read and nap, a little Skype session and then reheating some leftovers for dinner.

I was getting ready to get back to relaxing when one of my best friends called to check on me and let me know that our friends were going out to celebrate his birthday tonight...Ouch. I wasn't able to go out on his birthday earlier this week either because I was already feeling sick and had made plans for a long overdue visit with another of my best friends, so I'm already feeling like a schmoe. I will make it up to him, of course, but the clincher is that while I was on the phone with him, another one of my friends called with an extra ticket to tonight's Snoop Dogg concert.

SNOOP DOGG. Yes. I may not really look it, but I am a big r&b/hip hop/rap fan. Don't hate.

And I have promised my lovely boyfriend that I will not go out tonight. And I know if I do go out tonight, I will most likely end up with bronchitis or pneumonia or some such potentially fatal illness/fuckery. So I am staying at home, and missing the opportunity hang out with my bestie for his birthday or see SNOOP f*cking DOGG. I might just cry a little.

Psychic Reading Part 4

She begins to describe a huge room where she sees me showing someone where to sit, communicating that it feels opulent and I should be that for myself. After yet another pause and out-of-nowhere subject change she says that I some point I had stopped growing but now my foot was on the gas pedal and I was flying and free towards my greatest dream - the ability “to do what I want to fucking do” and she asked me “what if? If you had the money, time, health?” before going silent again. She returned to the description of that opulent room and relayed that she saw me picking up canvasses and thrusting them onto nails that were sticking out of the wall, puncturing the exquisite paintings. She understood this to mean that my artist inside had been wounded in the same way, but she could clearly see one of my one pieces of art and breathlessly told me that it was “profoundly beautiful, that's your work. You can make it.”

She told me that I need to acknowledge my fascination with the media and acting, which she saw somewhere in my history (true – I was briefly intrigued by journalism and had been in plays as a child, in addition to my Madre's long past in the theater). She felt I needed to go to the heart and “get pleasure out of your biz” because that was a huge step towards self-loyalty. Then apparently with a vision of my innards, she stated “you like lavish, you like pretty, girl – your heart is opulent” and described the amazing textiles on the floor (for years I have enjoyed having a large number of rugs – I can never get enough). She said she could see my concern about being a “sane” artist and had a “great fear you will lose your shit.” She laughed as if it were a silly idea, but it's true - I have typically avoided artist types and refused for years to even consider a musician or a poet as a potential romantic partner, because I have always observed that many creative people are slightly “off” and in some cases clearly nuts.

She was silent for a long while.

Psychic Reading Part 3

And we continue...:

She moved back to the “lists,” this time in specific relation to boys, asking me who I was comparing them to that based this checklist off of before slipping in “show up to the relationship. You can be so dismissive. There's a nonchalance.” At the same time she expressed that she saw my moments of “could this just fucking be it!?” but said I should focus on my own happiness and do what is creative. She flitted over to me finding someone that would be the right combination of safe and dangerous before dropping the bomb of “you're supposed to be a mother.” When I listened to the tape, Side A stopped here and I gasped because I thought some of the more pertinent details hadn't been recorded, but I flipped the tape over and to my relief she had noticed when it ran out and remedied it very quickly. I think I had joked to her that I hadn't really thought of myself as having kids because I was afraid what Karma would bring back around to me from my childhood, but she insisted I was not a bad kid before telling me I could have children before stressing that I am “capable” of having children, which is something I had grown to doubt yet had never really expressed to anyone. She asked me my exact age and said I had time to decide; she calculated I was around 32 when I would do so (which seems to suggest she was sure the decision would be positive) and that she saw a vision of me with a really cute kid who looked to be about 3.

With a short pause and no segue, she asked me if I had any siblings and when I answered in the negative she implied there was something I didn't know but would find out with almost a cat that got the canary tone of voice. My father has been deceased since I was a small child and I am an only, so my father would have had to impregnated someone else before his death, which is possible but highly unlikely. Jumping to yet another subject, she told me to “start having fun. Lots of fun” and told me that I should play with my interest in psychology at work before lighting up another cigarette and going silent. I was confused, but quiet.

Psychic Reading Part 2

I'll get right to it today.:

One of the first things Spirit says is that you need to work on self loyalty...Don't abandon yourself for anyone else and stick with what makes YOU feel fucking good.” She lit a cigarette. Years later, I am struck by the accuracy. I have gotten much better at it, but it used to always be that something significant in my life is neglected when Iwas in a serious relationship. In some relationships I had almost totally given up my own friends and hobbies to be able to be involved with theirs instead. Obviously I am a piss poor listener and it wasn't until the past few years that I became so much better at maintaining a high level of independence regardless of what may be happening in my love life (even sometimes going to extremes in the opposite direction). She moved onto encouraging me to allow myself to dream and assured me with her silly laugh that “it's okay to dream big,” but tells me she sees me walking around with a shopping list for everything in my life and that though I live my life with intention, sometimes I just need to let go of the checklists for some of the things in my life. The Virgo part of me says “fat chance, lady,” but another part of me knows precisely what she is talking about. No one and nothing can be perfect, and I should not expect it to be so. Once again, something I've really come around from in the past year so maybe I needed to learn some things before I finally got the message. The Spirit urges her to tell me that they will say yes to whatever my dream is as long as I am dedicated. Presumably searching through my life again she tells me that I am delightful and “really fucking smart. You can play along with dumb. You're smart enough to play dumb.” which sets me to giggling as she adds “you're intellectually capable.” At this point, I could hang out with this woman all night if she keeps the compliments coming, though there is a certain truth to her words. I tested high in the 98^th percentile, yet never did my homework and later ended up as a cheerleader instead of a nerd by learning how to play the part. Boys didn't seem to like the smart girls as much and I got teased for enough in school – when you want to be popular, you act like the popular kids.

She moved on and let me know that I needed to do my best to “check in” with myself and make sure that I am truly doing okay, because I walk around thinking “I have this charmed life” yet it is okay to have other feelings. She suggested that it was the emotional part that needs the care, and that I should pay attention to it so I can let others know when things aren't okay and be direct. She urged me to like myself without the external feedback, which was hitting one of the nails on the head at the time, but confirmed that I have great support from people with very pure hearts.

Skipping to a another subject she said she saw me with a certain ambivalence and that there is a time where I will be sure then telling me with another grin “I don't know what to do with you.” Disjointedly she said that I will “match that person's energy and you won't harm them that way. It's honest” and she could see the time where I was questioning whether or not I want to be here, before telling me that art was good for me and she saw me working in several different mediums. To a certain extent, I am still confused about what she may have meant, but I believe she cleared some of it up later.