Blue Mountain Baskets

Basketmaking & Growing Willow in the Blue Mountains, Ontario, Canada

Category: Exploring Mindfulness

Mindful Morning among the Birds

View from my porch that morning (and Maple sharing it with me on the grass).

I am a member of the Blue Mountains’ Writers’ Group, and our task of this week was to create a story using only one words for each letter of the alphabet.  I was impressed by those who could do it in alphabetical order! The morning of our meeting day, I sat on my porch and took in the sights and sounds in a senses meditation. There was an orchestra of birds as the sun rose! After taking in the feel, sounds, sights and smells of the morning, I wrote down all of the sounds and sights.  I also learned  few new names of colours in the task.

You could hear the landscape’s layers. Birds at every hill and tree cluster as far as the eye can see and even farther as the ear can hear.

  • Trill of the squirrels
  • Rattle of woodpeckers
  • Thunder thuds of grouse
  • Honks of geese in distance
  • Chirps and whistle and tweets
  • Chatter of squirrels
  • Caws
  • Coos of dove
  • Echos of cranes
  • Flaps of a crow overhead
  • A fat wild turkey appears a murmur of low gobbles in the bush.
  • A flock of geese signaling
Finished Task for BM Writers’ Group
Yonder dawn’s xanthic amber sunlight peeks from under grey veil; hence, there is no celestial zaffre. Birds kibitz whistling, rattling, quipping. Morning jabber echoes over landscape.

Amber
Birds
Celestial
Dawn’s
Echo
From
Grey
Hence
Is
Jabbers
Kibitz
Landscape
Morning
No
Over
Peeks
Quips
Rattles
Sunlight
There
Under
Veil
Whistles
Xanthic
Yonder
Zaffre

 

Taking a Mindful Moment Rushing Out at Dawn

On of my volunteer duties is to send out the Nature Photo of the Week for our local Blue Mountain Watershed Trust.  We feature different local photographers each week who take fantastic photos of wildlife, land & waterscapes. This photo was just taken on my phone but the moment was memorable:

Sunday, April 22, 2018

White-tailed deer at Sunrise in Duncan, Grey Highlands (Euphrasia)

A mindful moment: This morning I shifted from dreading a 2-hour drive at the crack of dawn to being grateful to be at these quiet crossroads at sunrise to be greeted by these three playful deer. We shared a long peaceful moment staring at each other before we all dashed off into our day.

Andrea Matrosovs
Your Nature Photo Coordinator
Communications Committee

Your nature image of the week, compliments of the Blue Mountain Watershed Trust.

Breathing in the Sunset

I am frustrated and tired from a construction job in our garage building project. Feeling overwhelmed I have learned to walk away and find a happy activity to reset my neurons and mood before tackling the task again. The evening is approaching. I pick up my iPad to write my weekly blog post (sharing on this blog has become such a feel-good activity), but the evolving dusk across the horizon out my window lures my attention.

There.

Just for a minute or two.  A mindful moment.

Our window faces east but we enjoy a phenomena when the sun sets behind us in the west: in our east view the escarpment ridge reflects the firey orange sunlight while the sky lights up in a brilliant pink.

I stop everything.

I breathe.

I watch the shifting colours as pink fades to purple fades to blue. I have witnessed this colourful gift of nature many times out back of our home yet each time I breathe in awe. The horizon is expansive popping in glowing orange on the highest ridges with the last of the sunlight’s reflection.  The sky above is even more vast as it unfolds in its palette just ahead of nightfall.


Maple & I watch the last of the sunset reflecting off the escarpment- the best has passed & photos never capture the true rich colours.


Now the landscape is dull brown grey in the last light. The sky is now a cool darkening blue.  I just heard the first of the nightly coyote howls. If I had raced on in my garage or gone on to another to-do item, I would have missed nature’s escapade.

Living mindfully has taught me to take in the moments. I am fortified and refreshed.

I am ready to go back out to the garage and work late into the night to finish my construction woodwork (ahead of the drywall crew showing up at 8 am tomorrow).