Dare you to use only your hands.

Yesterday I learned to make noodles. I learned a new way to cook that has come full circle. I was raised in a kitchen where the microwave was a new incredible time saving device. Everyone was jazzed up and excited about being about to cook a whole chicken in a quarter of the time it took to cook the chicken in a conventional oven.

My mom had a massive microwave! You could cook a huge turkey in it! She bought special plastic cooking devices that assisted in the cooking with this new faster invisible fire.

We live in a new faster invisible fire world. Everything is rushed about. Or that is what I thought, until yesterday. I have a friend who was born in China. We teach swimming together and when she discovered my love for noodle soup she asked if I wanted to learn how to make the noodle by hand.

I was thrilled! 

The ingredients could not have been simpler. Wheat flour, salt and water. The process takes time. There is a kneading process that requires resting for 30 minutes between each kneading. The noodle dough has to be kneaded 4 times.

When Carissa was showing me how to add the water, small amounts into the flour and salt, she told me to move my hand in a circular mixing swirl. The direction of the hand must be the same. The way she mixed the dough, the careful way she pour small amounts of water, her strong hands mixing the flour into dough was exquisite.

There is a beauty in slowing down and using the hands instead of a machine. The kneading of the noodle dough is similar to kneading clay. Removing bubbles and increasing elasticity is a process both incorporate.

There is a lovely serenity in knowing something is going to take four hours long, and to accept it as is. There is a calmness to the knowing. We were working on some brochure art, so we continued working together and designing in between the kneading times.

When one slices the noodle, it can be stretched out. First, one uses the finger tips to pull it along and stretch it. Then the noodle can be held at either end and softly whisked back and forth so the noodle elongates. It is magical and fun and there is an art to it.

The art is patience. The art is in the serenity of making something. Of giving my total attention to the task at hand.

It would be a blast to travel around the world to all my friends and make the noodle by hand for you. Flour, salt and water…and a little oil at the end.

And hands, we need our beautiful hands.

The image I created with a photograph of my hands. Thank you Carissa for taking the time to show me this beautiful technique. I made noodles for dinner and you have forever changed my style of cooking.

Slow. On purpose. Taking the time to savor the making of the noodle.

Dream dream dream!

This quote from a poem by Peter Forster.
Image created by Judith Parsons Art 2017

" And
Once
Begun
Finish
Every
Dream
You ever
Started!" By Peter Forster

Amen.
I believe in your dreams sweet luvs!!

Soaring beside you!

Valentine

Anita, this blog is for you.

Why does someone choose a love halfway around the world?

Because  relationships are not easy. At first, I wanted to be able to have you fully, when ever we could be together. I didn't want the distractions of life to get in between us. I thought I could compartmentalize love. This relationship has been about discovering true love from God's perspective. We started out our relationship with the spirit. 

The growling sleepy bear learned to accept me. The strange mysterious happenings left me in awe. You opened the door to another realm of magic and mystery that most would think could not have happened. We laugh, we raise our eye-brows and expect miracles. They happen for us.

When we are apart we focus upon our own goals. God knows, while I am working on my art, I tend to fall off the face of the earth. You understand that, you leave me be, you let me do whatever I need to do, knowing I will come back to you.

Our love has grown like that crazy wild blackberry beside your river. Where you begin and I end there is no telling. The fruit of love is fabulously luscious and sweet!

We give one another our best love. Our love is selfish and incredible! Time does not exist-it is tunnel vision love!  I am learning how to love honestly, without giving so much of myself away that I drown in you. You amaze me, the way you pour yourself into me! I adore and love you more and more as you continually blow me away with your compassion and caring.

I am thrilled to love you! Thank you for your incredible wild Irish woman love! Thank you for having a steel back bone! Thank you for being my personal photographer! God knows you astound me with your “eyes”.

Happy Valentine’s Day Anita. Growing younger and stronger beside you!

Mermaid Margaret

Woman shape taken from Google, image trace created.
Watery Wings created by Judith Parsons Art. 2017

My daughter Margaret's words:

"When I teach kids how to float, 

I tell them that the 

most buoyant part of their bodies 

is right over their hearts. 

I ask them to point to it, 

and with little seashell fingernails, 

they tap tap tap their breastbones. 

I tell them to raise their chins 

towards the sky and 

open their arms like a flying bird, 

so that their buoyant chests are open.

I ask them to inhale, 

like filling up a big birthday balloon, 

and feel their breath take them 

to the top of the water, 

light as a feather, 

relaxed, gentle, slow.

And they float, 

and they smile,

every time, 

again, and again, and again. 

Deep inhale, lift. 

Your heart is the most buoyant part of your body."

Well done My Mermaid Queen!!! (pulling you into my arms for a glorious heart to heart embrace.)

Dream Big Always

Photograph from google images.
Manipulated and played with in photoshop.
Composition by Judith Parsons Art 2017

The wind awakened me with her pleas from the past. She was looking for a woman that she once knew, the gardener with green thumbs. The wind was howling at Mr. Time asking him to move along. We all have tired of all this frozen cold hate and it is time to plant seeds.

You remember planting seeds. Perhaps you planted grass seeds in a paper cup you decorated with a face? So when the seeds sprouted your face had an awesome flat top of hair.

For most of my life I was excited about planting seeds. There is a lovely time of “Choosing THE seeds”. Always tomato and basil, then other exotic seeds. 

The wind continues to howl, asking, why aren’t my hands in the soil? Where are the seed catalogues? Where did I place my green thumbs?

The sun awakens and rolls over to calm her howls, he pulls her impatient self into his arms. He soothes her cries, he warms her soul. He coos, “Everything is happening perfectly.”

The howl ceases. She sighs deeply into the warmth of his embrace. She closes her eyes and dreams of fresh tomatoes ripe off the vine and aromatic basil in her hands.

It is time to plant seeds of beautiful things to come. 

Dream big always.

A dream

Photograph by Ross Richards
Follow his tumblr account: Nikkor35world

Synchronicity

Beauty

Connecting energy in the highest realm.

The photograph you see inspires me. I expect to see myself walk around the corner and to pop into that photograph. The woman is evolving and transforming before your eyes. I can see me, the stronger version draped in attire that dates back to the Roman times.

I can see the woman we all are, in her strength. Her children are running about the field catching butterflies. She has a basket upon her hip and she is picking the future fruit that will be harvested in the fall.

This photograph reminds me of a dream, it was much like this. The small white blossoms covering the field forever. Yet, they weren’t blossoms, they were butterflies. A woman of white butterflies awakens, and after she stood up all the butterflies that resembled blossoms took flight into a glorious spiral of magic.

The muse, is you. You grace me with this type of beauty and I am astounded and stunned into silence. I could stare into this photograph for days! Thank you Ross for your magical photograph!!

Ross Richards has a tumbler account, he has captured glorious photographs from his part of the world, Valencia Spain. Please follow his work!

His tumblr name is Nikkor35world

I will not ramble on incessantly, I will leave you with the spring breeze caressing your face. With the perfumed air filling your lungs. Breathe in his magic! Enjoy!

(Whispering softly in your ear) We are all more connected than we know.

oh...and "Everything is happening perfectly." From Susan Jeffers: Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway.

Life has seeds.

Photos of cactus by Carissa (thank you)
Composition by Judith Parsons

Last night I tried cactus. 

Yep. I didn’t know it was a food either. I have a fabulous friend who is introducing me to all sorts of new food adventures! On the outside, it looks like a typical Cactus blossom. Nothing to write home about, however, when it is cut open the color is glorious!

I was skeptical as Carissa peeled away the thick outer skin. She cut it up into little cubes handing me one. I put it in my mouth and started chewing upon it, first sense was the sweetness! It was fabulously tasty. Next were the little seeds, that get stuck in your teeth. Not so pleasant an experience.

Carissa says they don’t bother her. She also tends to eat watermelon seeds and some fish bones. This surprised me. And I am a little worried about her inside getting punctured by bones. I told her to make sure she chews her fish bones well.

Back to the cactus, this is exactly how a vibrant red color ought to taste, succulently sweet. With the surprise of the seeds inside. Sort of like raspberries, how they have little seeds in them sometimes, or even better, a grape with seeds. That is exactly what it is like. A tiny grape seed.

Life is like that, we have to learn to deal with the seeds. Some people swollen them, not letting them bother them. Then some people spit them out. Of course, there are all types of ways to spit a seed out. Does one just lean over the trash can and expel them directly from their mouth?

Or does one take a paper napkin and carefully remove them from the tip of the tongue, so as not to gross out others in the vicinity?

However you decide to expel the seeds, or not. 

Food for thought.