#The long holiday season is here again. Let us engage our children productively this holiday.

[elimuhubconsultants]

5 posts!

[miseriathome]

A queer reading of Christmas by Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick

What’s “queer”? Here’s one train of thought about it. The depressing thing about the Christmas season--isn’t it?--is that it’s the time when all the institutions are speaking with one voice. The Church says what the Church says. But the State says the same thing: maybe not (in some ways it hardly matters) in the language of theology, but in the language the state talks: legal holidays, long school hiatus, special postage stamps, and all. And the language of commerce more than chimes in, as consumer purchasing is organized ever more narrowly around the final weeks of the calendar year, the Dow Jones aquiver over Americans’ “holiday mood.” The media, in turn, fall in triumphally behind the Christmas phalanx: ad-swollen magazines have oozing turkeys on the cover, while for the news industry every question turns into the Christmas question--Will hostages be free for Christmas? What did that flash flood or mass murder (umpty-ump people killed and maimed) do to those families’ Christmas? And meanwhile, the pairing “families/Christmas” becomes increasingly tautological, as families more and more constitute themselves according to the schedule, and in the endlessly iterated image, of the holiday itself constituted in the image of “the” family.

The thing hasn’t, finally, so much to do with propaganda for Christianity as with propaganda for Christmas itself. They all--religion, state, capital, ideology, domesticity, the discourses of power and legitimacy--line up with each other so neatly once a year, an the monolith so created is a thing one can come to view with unhappy eyes. What if instead there were a practice of valuing the ways in which meanings and institutions can be at loose ends with each other? What if the richest junctures weren’t the ones where everything means the same thing? Think of that entity “the family,” an impacted social space in which all of the following are meant to line up perfectly with each other:

a surname a sexual dyad a legal unit based on state-regulated marriage a circuit of blood relationships a system of companionship and succor a building a proscenium between “private” and “public” an economic unit of earning and taxation the prime site of economic consumption the prime site of cultural consumption a mechanism to produce, care for, and acculturate children a mechanism for accumulating material goods over several generations a daily routine a unit in a community of worship a site of patriotic formation

and of course the list could go on. Looking at my own life, I see that--probably like most people--I have valued and pursued these various elements of family identity to quite differing degrees (e.g., no use at all for worship, much need of companionship). But what’s been consistent in this particular life is an interest in not letting very many of these dimensions line up directly with each other at one time. I see it’s been a ruling intuition for me that the most productive strategy (intellectually, emotionally) might be, whenever possible, to disarticulate them one from another, to disengage them--the bonds of blood, of law, of habitation, of privacy, of companionship and succor--from the lockstep of their unanimity in the system called “family.”

Or think of all the elements that are condensed in the notion of sexual identity, something that the common sense of our time presents as a unitary category. Yet, exerting any pressure at all on “sexual identity,” you see that its elements include

your biological (e.g., chromosomal) sex, male or female; your self-perceived gender assignment, male or female (supposed to be the same as your biological sex); the preponderance of your traits of personality and appearance, masculine or feminine (supposed to correspond to your sex and gender); the biological sex of your preferred partner; the gender assignment of your preferred partner (supposed to be the same as her/his biological sex); the masculinity or femininity of your preferred partner (supposed to be the opposite⁶ of your own); your self-perception as gay or straight (supposed to correspond to whether your preferred partner is your sex or the opposite); your preferred partner’s self-perception as gay or straight (supposed to be the same as yours); your procreative choice (supposed to be yes if straight, no if gay); your preferred sexual act(s) (supposed to be insertive if you are male or masculine, receptive if you are female or feminine); your most eroticized sexual organs (supposed to correspond to the procreative capabilities of your sex, and to your insertive/receptive assignment); your sexual fantasies (supposed to be highly congruent with your sexual practice, but stronger in intensity); your main locus of emotional bonds (supposed to reside in your preferred sexual partner); your enjoyment of power in sexual relations (supposed to be low if you are female or feminine, high if male or masculine); the people from whom you learn about your own gender and sex (supposed to correspond to yourself in both respects); your community of cultural and political identification (supposed to correspond to your own identity);

⁶. The binary calculus I’m describing here depends on the notion that the male and female sexes are each other’s “opposites,” but I do not want to register a specific demurral against that bit of easy common sense. Under no matter what cultural construction, women and men are more like each other than chalk is like cheese, than ratiocination is like raisins, than up is like down, or than 1 is like 0. The biological, psychological, and cognitive attributes of men overlap with those of women by vastly more than they differ from them.

and--again--many more. Even this list is remarkable for the silent presumptions it has to make about a given person’s sexuality, presumptions that are true only to varying degrees, and for many people not true at all: that everyone “has a sexuality,” for instance, and that it is implicated with each person’s sense of overall identity in similar ways; that each person’s most characteristic erotic expression will be oriented towards another person and not autoerotic; that if it is alloerotic, it will be oriented toward a single partner or kind of partner at a time; that its orientation will not change over time. Normatively, as the parenthetical prescriptions in the list above suggest, it should be possible to deduce anybody’s entire set of specs from the initial datum of biological sex alone--if one adds only the normative assumption that “the biological sex of your preferred partner” will be the opposite of one’s own. With or without that heterosexist assumption, though, what’s striking is the number and difference of the dimensions that “sexual identity” is supposed to organize into a seamless and univocal whole.

And if it doesn’t?

That’s one of the things that “queer” can refer to: the open mesh of possibilities, gaps, overlaps, dissonances and resonances, lapses and excesses of meaning when the constituent elements of anyone’s gender, of anyone’s sexuality aren’t made (or can’t be made) to signify monolithically. The experimental linguistic, epistemological, representational, political adventures attaching to the very many of us who may at times be moved to describe ourselves as (among many other possibilities) pushy femmes, radical faeries, fantasists, drags, clones, leatherfolk, ladies in tuxedos, feminist women or feminist men, masturbators, bulldaggers, divas, Snap! queens, butch bottoms, storytellers, transsexuals, aunties, wannabes, lesbian-identified men or lesbians who sleep with men, or... people able to relish, learn from, or identify with such.

Again, “queer” can mean something different: a lot of the way I have used it so far in this dossier is to denote, almost simply, same-sex sexual object choice, lesbian or gay, whether or not it is organized around multiple criss-crossings of definitional lines. And given the historical and contemporary force of the prohibitions against every same-sex sexual expression, for anyone to disavow those meanings, or to displace them from the term’s definitional center, would be to dematerialize any possibility of queerness itself.

At the same time, a lot of the most exciting recent work around “queer” spins the term outward along dimensions that can’t be subsumed under gender and sexuality at all: the ways that race, ethnicity, postcolonial nationality criss-cross with these and other identity-constituting, identity-fracturing discourses, for example. Intellectuals and artists of color whose sexual self-definition includes “queer”--I think of an Isaac Julien, a Gloria Anzaldúa, a Richard Fung--are using the leverage of “queer” to do a new kind of justice to the fractal intricacies of language, skin, migration, state. Thereby, the gravity (I mean the gravitas, the meaning, but also the center of gravity) of the term “queer” itself deepens and shifts.

Another telling representational effect. A word so fraught as “queer” is--fraught with so many social and personal histories of exclusion, violence, defiance, excitement--never can only denote; nor even can it only connote; a part of its experimental force as a speech act is the way in which it dramatizes locutionary position itself. Anyone’s use of “queer” about themselves means differently from their use of it about someone else. This is true (as it might also be true of “lesbian” or “gay”) because of the violently different connotative evaluations that seem to cluster around the category. But “gay” and “lesbian” still present themselves (however delusively) as objective, empirical categories governed by empirical rules of evidence (however contested). “Queer” seems to hinge much more radically and explicitly on a person’s undertaking particular, performative acts of experimental self-perception and filiation. A hypothesis worth making explicit: that there are more important senses in which “queer” can signify only when attached to the first person. One possible corollary: that what it takes--all it takes--to make the description “queer” a true one is the impulsion to use it in the first person.

Christmas Effects from “Queer and Now” as published in Tendencies (1994) by Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick

Transcribed by me, including removal of one footnote and clumsy inclusion of another

[jefferyryanlong]

Fresh Listen - Kath Bloom, Finally (Chapter Music, 2005)

(Some pieces of recorded music operate more like organisms than records. They live, they breathe, they reproduce. Fresh Listen is a periodic review of recently and not so recently released albums that crawl among us like radioactive spiders, gifting us with superpowers from their stingers.)

Aside from two songs, the 2005 reissue of Kath Bloom’s Finally is a collection of music Bloom put to wax in the 1990′s, that popular music universe of Nirvana’s Nevermind and In Utero, Pearl Jam’s Ten and Vs., Smashing Pumpkins’s Siamese Dream, the end of 10,000 Maniacs and the beginning of solo Natalie Merchant, that era bridging grunge’s forbears and their less winsome successors (Silverchair, Bush), and the radio dominance of the female singer/songwriter (Sarah McLachlan, Paula Cole, Shawn Colvin, Lisa Loeb, Joan Osborne), and the true oddities of the 90′s pop music scene: Crash Test Dummies’s “Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm,” Chumbawamba’s “Tubthumping,” Freak Nasty’s “Da Dip.” None of which sympathetically resonates with the work of Kath Bloom (unless you count a few plucked notes of an acoustic guitar in “Sunny Came Home” or “Stay (Because I Missed You).” Like Alan Lomax’s field recordings of sharecroppers and criminals, or Bob Dylan’s Basement Tapes, Kath Bloom’s songs sound captured out of time--not through Shure microphones and multi-channel boards onto DAT recorders, but in the middle  of porch jam sessions and bedroom introspection. Bloom and her accompanying musicians are beautiful amateurs with a whole lot of soul. The magic Bloom generates with her limited set of tools--her singing especially--reveal a profound spirit, an almost ugly thing with its nakedness made clearer by Bloom’s willful forsaking of virtuosity and technical ambition. The success of each song is dependent on, not mitigated by, Bloom’s overall musical weirdness and peculiar sense of time.

The first and probably most famous track, “Come Here,” manifests the intense yearning of someone who has just discovered the depths of their desire, after so much unconscious repressing. This overwhelming, portrayed in the moment by Bloom, has crossed the threshold of the abstract and crossed over onto the physical plane. Myself, I’ve always heard “Come Here” as every person whose love I didn’t deserve singing to me. I listen to the song feeling wholeheartedly unworthy, the purest feelings directed at me remaining out of reach because my resistance, my selfishness, my stupidity, my refusal to acknowledge the sentiment and hold it close.

“Forget About Him,” a brassy country tune, exhibits Bloom’s sense of humor while confronting the tragedy of a break up. For Bloom, life goes on after love departs, and though she repeatedly takes the temperature on her state of mind as she pines, she is well aware that there are enough external distractions in the course of a day--the dog, the rooster, the boy nearby--to occupy her attention as she reluctantly heals.

Bloom questions the notion of value in “A Homeless Dream,” a sketch of a song that imagines money as an abstract means of salvation. This inquiry continues in “What Is Really Beautiful,” which attacks the cultural value of permanence. This need for sticking around, Bloom sings, is why we live in fear, the unconscious drive to obtain what cannot be grasped: a sense of forever. What is really beautiful--what has the most significance--is the changing, the aging, the passing away. The strength to say goodbye is worth more than any blockchain of cryptocurrency.

“I’m gonna pay, until I know that it’s okay / then I can go on with my life” from “Can’t Rise to Your Feet” is the most succinct description of the existence we all have the pleasure of muddling through, that sense of a struggle past one constructed obstacle to the next, enjoying, when we can, the resting moments when being ourselves is not predicated on fighting to gain or maintain some society-acclaimed status or additional material wealth. This ongoing war within ourselves and against our neighbors, all of us fooled into fighting for the same things, is the root of so much depression, the inability to engage after the the world and its excruciating expectations have wrung one out.

One day in the future, “Fall Again” will be welcomed unequivocally into the great American songbook. Its overcast melody, and the gritty longing Bloom evokes through her lyrics, is not far removed from the ballads fo Billie Holiday or Sarah Vaughn. “Fall Again” is simply another facet of Bloom’s talent. Despite her arresting strangeness, she can just as easily put across a love song applicable to any genre.

“In Your School” is a children’s song, willfully silly, that evolves into an older folk expression (life / death / the seasons) as it goes along. In “Sand in My Shoe,” another loose number in which the percussion follows the non-committally strummed guitar, Bloom, always the pilgrim, wanders only to arrive at some final truth: the desire-free cease of all wandering. One of the few extended instrumental breaks bursts through in “We Crossed Over,” while “Who You Are,” a more carefully produced track, could have, with its easy hand drums and steel guitar, been a minor hit in the singer/songwriter-centric 70′s. 

If a neo-country band had the stones to to remake “I Wanna Love,” with its pop ambitions among its heartburned wisdom (”I know you gotta have the pain in order to have the growth”), Bloom might achieve the musical popularity in which, during her career, she seemed completely uninterested. At this juncture, though, its seems our listening masses are too concerned with the next shiny and loud noise from the Industry. The quieter, more truthful songs reside in those dark rooms of the imagination, those rooms the general listenership avoids, now that listeners can be played with and strung along for as long as it takes.

Finally “Finally,” in which Bloom strips away even the minimal accompaniment that has meandered with her thus far, singing along to her own imperfectly strummed guitar. If Bloom only wrote one song to validate her carer as an important musician, let it be this one--there is no line that is inappropriate in “Finally,” no evocation that is not overflowing with earned emotion. It is the perfect love song from a real poet, not a schmaltzy, showbiz type. Though there are several peaks of genuine feeling that arise in Bloom’s performance, when she sings “the light, the light” it seems that she herself is surprised by the deeps of her depth, possessed by demons she didn’t necessarily realize she was summoning.

Finally is the the kind of album that would make fans of technically correct music, rendered soulless by its production, gnash their teeth in irritation. As fully baked as Bloom’s art is, its execution is raw. Invigorating. Her timing errors and missed cues, after regular listens, become endearing, self-correcting, almost indelible to the understanding of each plaintive and life-affirming song.

[certaindonutstudentlove-blog]

2017 Merry Christmas Greeting wishes massages for family & friends

merry christmas wishes

It’s that time of year again when friends and family think about the Christmases of the past and plan for the coming holiday with their loved ones in mind. As we reflect on this wonderful holiday, we must keep in mind that Christmas is not just any holiday but may be the most important one of the year for some people. It is a time for remembering, a time to share the goodness of your heart with others, and for expressing with words and gifts what someone means to you. It is a chance to make wishes come true and to give something from your heart

merry christmas wishes Here is a selection of 200+ Merry Christmas wishes and messages you can use for your family and friends

In this huge collection of wishes for Christmas you will find

✓  merry Christmas wishes

✓  funny Christmas wishes

✓ merry Christmas wishes for friends

✓  Christmas wishes for family

✓ Christmas wishes text messages

✓ Happy Christmas wishes cards messages

✓ short Christmas wishes ✓ christmas love wishes messages

We truly hope you enjoy this collection of merry Christmas wishes and, in the spirit of the season, pass these on and share!

Some religious christian Christmas wishes messages for someone special with popular and famous greetings along with unusual Christmas greetings are also posted. when we wish someone with Christmas greetings messages Looking for the perfect wish is no different than looking for the perfect gift! On our website, we classify wishes per issue in order to facilitate your search. We hope you enjoy browsing! merry christmas wishes

merry Christmas wishes

May the melody and spirit of the holidays fill your home with love and peace. I wish you all the best and happy           New Year too !

May success be with you and everything you do, Merry Christmas and a happy New Year too!

On Christmas, there’s a reason to be happy and a reason to smile, and there’s a reason why I’m sending                  Christmas wishes your way. You’re it.

Wish you a Merry Christmas and may this festival bring abundant joy and happiness in your life !

From miles away, no matter how far we are, the warmth of Christmas will bring us closer together. May you                have a wonderful holiday!

Special Christmas greetings to a person who is just so very special. We wish you and your family a Merry                  Christmas and A Happy New Year.

Sending the warmest Christmas wishes to you and your family. May God shower his choicest blessings on you          and your family this Christmas !

Let us celebrate Christmas with lots of fun, surprises and magic. May you have a wonderful Christmas

There are some people who want to throw their arms round you simply because it is Christmas; there are other          people who want to strangle you simply because it is Christmas. Which one are you?

I wish you and your family a joyful, serene and white Christmas. Happy Holidays !

Special Christmas greetings to a person who is just so very special. We wish you and your family a Merry Christmas and A Happy New Year.

Beneath the hustle and bustle of the festive season there is the true beauty of connecting with loved ones. May this beauty and joy lift you up during Christmas and the New Year!

Wishing you the best during this joyful season. I hope your holidays are filled with festivities and plenty of merry enjoyment.

Christmas is sign of stars, angels and love divine come down from heaven, may love of Christmas remain with you. Merry Yuletide

I hope your holiday is filled with plenty of warmth, love, cheer, and happiness. Merry Christmas to you and yours

With Christmas come faith, hope, and love. I wish all these things for you and your family during the holiday season

funny Christmas wishes

This year you was not good… You was FANTASTIC ! May your celebration be joyous and your holidays bright!

A lovely thing about Christmas is that it’s compulsory, like a thunderstorm and we all go through it together. Lets        buckle up and enjoy the ride

I hope Santa is good to you this year because you only deserve the best. Merry Christmas from our family to              yours

May your Christmas sparkle with moments of love, laughter and goodwill, And may the year ahead be full of              contentment and joy

Christmas is not a time nor celebration, but a state of mind. To cherish peace and kindness, to be plenteous in          mercy, is to have the real spirit of Christma

Christmas is mostly for children. But we adults can enjoy it too until the credit card bills arrive

I am dreaming of white Christmas, with every Christmas card I write, May your days be merry and bright, and            May all your Christmases be white. Merry Christmas

Blessed is the season which engages the whole world in a conspiracy of love !

Man will live for ever Because of Christmas (Because of Christmas Day drinking) Merry Christmas to you

I am so excited to wear my new dress today just to see that my Godparents were out of their house

I think Santa must ride a plane instead of sleigh so that he can reach me faster. I oftentimes fell asleep waiting for him

Since I brought the presents, I’ve asked Santa to bring you love and happiness!

How do cats greet each other at Christmas? A furry Merry Christmas and happy Mew Year!

Christmas is like job: you do all the work but fat guy in suit gets all the credit. Enjoy and be merry!

Santa wont be coming this year…He died laughing when you said youd been a good girl. Have a Merry                      Christmas May you have the spirit of Christmas which is Peace, the gladness of Christmas which is Hope, and the Heart of        Christmas which is Love.

merry Christmas wishes for friends

What better way to spend the holidays than dancing with the snowflakes! May you have a wonderful Christmas          in the snow! Christmas shopping… they said it would be fun! They said I wouldn’t get trampled on! But hey what’s Christmas        without all the crazies! Merry Christmas!

Santa is in the hospital and the toy production has stopped… he almost died laughing when I told him you were        good this year.

On this day I want to wish you more success so that you will continue to be a blessing not just to me but also to others. Merry Christmas!

May this Christmas Sparkles with love, happiness and celebration, to pave the way for a happy new year Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

Heartfelt holiday wishes for a wonderful Christmas and a Prosperous New Year.

It is the month of Cakes & Candles, Snow & Songs, Carols & Joys Laughter & Love,Its December… Wishing you a Blessed Month of Christmas!!

May all the sweet magic of Christmas conspire to gladden your heart and fill every desire

A star has come to earth! Spread the Christmas love and cheer! Merry Christmas!

I wish that love, prosperity and well-being be with you and your dear ones not only on Christmas season, but all        year long!

Read this article:- 

merry christmas hd wallpapers

merry christmas wishes collection 

Christmas wishes for family

‡ Cookies and sweets in every corner of the house! That’s how it smells Christmas with family!

‡ May God’s blessing shine upon your family members and you on this Christmas time!

‡ I am thrilled to call you as one of my family members and I would love to spend the Christmas holidays with you.

‡ Wishing all my family members peace and love this holiday season. May you feel the joy in your home that you bring to me.

‡ May God’s blessing shine down upon you and your family this holiday season. Sending love from our family to yours.

‡ May God’s blessing shine down upon you and your family this holiday season. Sending love from our family to yours

‡  May Santa bring lots of goodness and happiness to our family on this Christmas! Merry Christmas!

‡  Having a family like you makes me feel blessed. May you all be blessed with health and wealth. Merry Christmas!

‡  Family’s love and moment of togetherness is the greatest blessing. On this Christmas I would like to thanks Jesus for gifting me this blessing. Merry Christmas!

‡ Lovely snowflakes, Christmas lights and smiley faces everywhere – it all creates a special atmosphere of                   forthcoming celebration, but there’s still something missing… I guess it’s my dear family. There’s no holiday               without you. Merry Christmas!

‡ There are only two really sacred things in the world: Christmas and family. And I will honour and cherish them           both till the end. Wish you a Merry Christmas!

Christmas wishes text messages

‡ We had rough times, but God showed us the way. Time flies when we are happy, like we are today. May this day be full of love and be blessed. May we be good and pass every life’s test! Merry Christmas!

‡ Christmas lights and trees, The light and sweet breeze. Make Christmas feel jollier, As the 25th of December draws nearer, My heart jolts faster and faster, May you have a Merry Christmas, And a wonderful new year!

‡ May this Christmas end the present year on a cheerful note and make way for a fresh and bright new year. Here’s wishing you a   Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

‡ Joy resounds in the hearts of those who believe in the miracle of Christmas! Wishing you all the peace, joy, and love of the season! Season’s Greetings!

‡ The Spirit Of Christmas Is All About Fun, Love Joy Reminding Us That Christianity Is Deeply Rooted To Christ           Share Your Love With The Less Fortunate During This Christmas Eve

‡ am dreaming of white Christmas, with every christmas card i write, May your days be merry and bright, and May       all your christmases be white. Happy Christmas.

‡ The baby of Bethlehem was born today; May His peace, love and serenity descend upon you; And remain with you forever and ever; Here’s wishing you a blessed and a holy Christmas!

Happy Christmas wishes cards messages

‡ For business Christmas cards, write Christmas messages that are cheerful yet appropriate.

‡ Write a few religious sayings or Christmas bible verses for those recipients who celebrate their faith during the           holiday season.

‡ Thinking warmly of each of you and wishing your family an extra measure of comfort, joy and hope this Christmas.

‡ May this Christmas end the present year on a cheerful note and make way for a fresh and bright New Year. Here’s wishing you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

‡ With all Good Wishes for Christmas and the New Year.

‡ Peace, good will and happiness for you at Christmas and always.

‡ On this happy holiday season, may the spirit of Christmas spread the happiness, love and peace. Celebrate the         Christmas and new year with fun and party. merry Christmas

‡ Let us remember that the Christmas heart is a giving heart, a wide open heart that thinks of others first.” George       Matthew Adams

‡ Christmas is the Blessed season which engages the whole world in a conspiracy of love!

short Christmas wishes

‡  Wishing you a magical and blissful holiday! Have a merry Christmas and prosperous New Year!

‡  Have a jolly and blessed Christmas and a Happy New Year!

‡  Sending you lots of love and heartfelt wishes to have a wonderful Christmas and holiday cheer. Happy New Year!

‡  There are many gifts under the Christmas tree, but the best one is you!

‡  May we be thankful for everything big or small and may the light of Christ shine in our hearts. Merry Christmas.”

‡  I wish my best friend a day full of all the jingles and twinkles of Christmas!

‡ Warmest thoughts and best wishes for a wonderful Holiday and a Happy New Year.

‡ Before Now you are just ok,yesterday you were better,today you are perfect, This is the the effect of a blissful season…christmas.merry it in style

christmas love wishes messages

♥ I wish you the best of happiness and health amidst lovely Christmas carols, sweet delights and cookies and loads of presents… Merry Christmas and a New Year to you my dear.

♥ Wish you a sweet and lovely Christmas. May this Christmas bring loads of happiness and love in your life

♥ You were there by my side during the last Christmas and I’m glad to have it this year as well. Wishing you a Merry Christmas.

♥ Wishing you a Merry Christmas my soul mate. I love you!

♥ I am wishing you the blessings on this Christmas holiday and for the upcoming year.

♥ Even though we are living miles away, we have always been together throughout the past year. I love you!

° 。 ° ˛˚* _Π_____*。*˚˚˛ •˛• ˚˚ ˛ •˛• ˚˚ ˛ •˛• ˚˚ ˛ ˚ ˛ •˛•˚ */______/~＼。˚ Merry Christmas !!˚ •˛• ˚˚ •˛• ˚ ˛ •˛• ˚ ｜ 田田 ｜門｜ ˚ ˚ ˛ •˛• ˚˛•˚ ˛ •˛• ˚˛• ✿•*¨`*•. (¯`v´¯) • (¯`v´¯) .•*¨`*•✿ YAY!!!˚ ˛ •˛• ˚ . . . ✿•*¨`*•.¸(¯`v´¯)¸.•´*¨`*•✿˚ ˛ •˛• ˚˚ ˛ •˛• ˚

♥ May the winds of love and joy visit your homes this Christmas and live with you and your family for today and forever. Wishing you and your family a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

♥ Why do I need Christmas presents when I already have you? Merry Christmas to the most beautiful angel on earth. I love you

so hopefully guys u are enjoing this all wishes collection so humble request for all of you please share this wishes collection to your friends & family

[goddessgardener]

Dig a Little, Dream a Lot

By Cynthia Brian

“Be at War with your Vices, at Peace with your Neighbours, & let every New-Year find you a better Man.” Benjamin Franklin

Resolutions, goals, a fresh start. Does January bring out your best efforts in wishful thinking as you embark on a new year or do you have the stamina and mindfulness to actually fulfill your gardening dreams? The famous English gardener and writer, Vita Sackville-West, wrote: “The most noteworthy thing about gardeners is that they are always optimistic, always enterprising, and never satisfied. They always look forward to doing something better than they have ever done before.”  Although Vita died in 1962, her gardens at Sissinghurst survive as a national treasure, thriving with seasonal beauty and tender care from volunteers. I was fortunate enough to travel the grounds last year and marvel, even in the rain, at the expanse of her horticultural involvement. Vita’s quote definitely describes my personal gardening mantra as my motto has always been “Failure is fertilizer. Throw the mistake on the compost pile to grow a new garden.”  In other words, mistakes, or malfattis as we say in Italian are always an experiment in something new…and maybe even a better creation. I don’t rest on my bay laurels but keep on striving.

One of my favorite global excursions is to visit gardens everywhere I travel. Exploring gardens, great and small, is a wonderful way to expand one’s horticultural intelligence while gathering ideas for one’s own plot. At the top of my resolution list for 2017 I’ve designated garden hopping as a must-do. In the past few weeks, I’ve had numerous emails from readers of this column with questions, comments, and aspirations as well as ambitious dreams for gardening in 2017.  Here are ideas you may wish to employ this year as you dig a little and dream a lot!

⎫ Get your children and grandchildren engaged in gardening activities. Virtues, skills, and life itself are learned in the garden. ⎫ Be brave. Experiment more. Worry less. There are no brown thumbs. ⎫ Plant more seeds to watch the wonder of sprouting. ⎫ Grow more vegetables and herbs in your pots or potager for a healthier plant to plate palate. Consume, share, preserve to eliminate waste. ⎫ Photograph your garden often and keep records of what blooms when, what works where, and what you want to edit. ⎫ Install a water-saving irrigation system. ⎫ Donate extra produce to a food bank. ⎫ When time is limited, hire help. ⎫ Compost, compost, compost. (see composting recipe below) ⎫ Visit botanical gardens wherever you travel. ⎫ Encourage pollinators to take up residence by planting and offering habitat that attract them. Birds, bees, bats, hummingbirds, and butterflies are precious protectors. ⎫ Eliminate insecticides and pesticides. Research companion planting. ⎫ Mulch more to reduce weeds, keep the soil warm or cool depending on the weather, and stop soil erosion. ⎫ Take a class to expand your knowledge. ⎫ Be more realistic. ⎫ Find interesting outdoor accents to use in the landscape like vintage windows, doors, or Victorian gazing balls. ⎫ Add one or more water elements. ⎫ Start saving special seeds. ⎫ Propagate from cuttings. ⎫ Plant a garden or pots in a patio for the first time. ⎫ Add a new rosebush. ⎫ Plant a cutting garden for creating beautiful bouquets year round. ⎫ Sow a path of fragrance with lavender, jasmine, honeysuckle, or other sweet-smelling shrubs. ⎫ Become more aware of the natural world by paying attention to the sounds, smells, and sights. ⎫ Make your garden drought tolerant with succulents. ⎫ Resolve to utilize organic gardening methods. ⎫ Begin keeping a journal of your outdoor endeavors. ⎫ Use tropical plants indoors as air purifiers as well as décor focal points. ⎫ Enjoy your garden more, slave less. Spend at least 15 minutes every day admiring your beautiful handiwork in conjunction with nature.

Since getting in shape or losing weight is the number one New Year’s resolution that is rarely kept, remember that gardening provides an excellent workout with the digging, tilling, weeding, raking, mowing, moving, planting, and climbing. Plus gardening is great fun.  My hope for you is that you will adopt one or more of these tips as your gardening promise for the year. Be enterprising. Do things better than you ever did before. Be optimistic. Be the STAR you are.

As we take a moment to reflect on the past and look forward to the future, share your gardening dreams for 2017. Email me, Cynthia@GoddessGardener.com.

Cynthia Brian’s Garden Guidelines for January ⎫ Compost Recipe: Keep a bucket with a lid on it in the garage or other storage area to fill with your kitchen scraps, shredded newspaper, coffee grinds, tea bags, fish bones (no meat products), and egg shells. Dump daily in an outdoor bin or pile. Add leaves and other brown materials, grass and plant clippings, and garden waste. Keep moist. Turn often with a spade or pitchfork. When the material looks and feels like a damp chocolate cake mix with an aroma of the earth, spread in your beds. ⎫ With the flu and colds that seem to be ubiquitous, make sure to keep lots of citrus on hand, especially oranges and lemons which have a high concentration of vitamin C, citric acid, calcium, iron, fiber, and B complex vitamins. Squeeze lemon juice on salads, vegetables, meat, and, of course, in your water to keep you hydrated. Even cut flowers benefit from drops of lemon juice in the vase, helping the water to travel from the stems to the flowers. Scatter the peels on any acid loving plants in your garden including roses, azaleas, rhododendrons, and fuchsias as a natural fertilizer. ⎫ It’s time to do your heavy pruning on your roses. Cut out any dead wood. Prune roses to about knee height. Although many people assume that roses are fussy, they really are quite tolerant providing months of luscious blooms. ⎫ Buy and plant bare-root roses, berries, vines, and fruit trees now following the instructions on the packaging. ⎫ Spray an application of dormant spray on peaches and other fruit trees to kill overwintering insects. ⎫ Peruse catalogues for ideas for spring and summer flowers. ⎫ Make fragrant potpourri from cut flowers.

Happy Gardening and Happy Growing! Happy, Healthy, Auspicious New Year!

Dig a little, dream a lot!

Read ore: https://www.lamorindaweekly.com/archive/issue1023/Digging-Deep-Dig-a-Little-Dream-A-Lot-in-2017.html

©2017 Cynthia Brian The Goddess Gardener StarStyle® Productions, llc Cynthia@GoddessGardener.com www.GoddessGardener.com 925-377-STAR Tune into Cynthia’s Radio show at www.StarStyleRadio.net I am available as a speaker, designer, and consultant.  

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TWITTER: It's cold, raining, snowing, and holiday season is coming to a close. What's happening in your garden? http://ow.ly/csEN307y3ES

Cynthia Brian’s Gardening Guide for January https://www.lamorindaweekly.com/archive/issue1022/January-Gardening-Guide-Season-Greenings-for-the-New-Year.html

Season’s Greenings By Cynthia Brian

“Winter is in my head, but eternal spring is in my heart!” Victor Hugo

The festivities of holidays are almost over, winter has arrived, and our hills are once again the lush emerald that we, and the cattle adore.  Congratulate yourself on a year well-spent growing your own food and tending to your plants. Now it is time to put your gardens to bed and give yourself a bit of respite. With the colder weather, we are fortunate that lemons, grapefruit, and tangelos are ripe to help us stay healthy.

There is still time to plant bulbs through the end of January for a late spring show. All bulbs need well-drained soil, full sun, or partial shade. Avoid planting in soggy soils where the bulbs will rot. Instead of lining bulbs up in a row, scatter them in clusters for a more natural look. Since deer, squirrels, raccoons, and rabbits enjoy eating many bulb flowers, experiment with planting narcissus cultivars, snowflakes, and snow drops (galanthus) as these repel the critters with their toxicity.

Speaking of critters, our readers enjoyed the article on keeping unwanted guests from taking refuge in homes. From the response, it is apparent that this season of green has indeed brought the rodents to our doorsteps in increasing numbers. Excellent advice came to me from Jenny Papka of Native Bird Connections. With her permission, I am printing her edited suggestions here: “What you term as "vermin" actually misleads people, since rodents, skunks, wasps and even mosquitoes are necessary in Nature. Yes they are annoying in many cases, but it is important to be respectful of why they can actually be good. Rodents are like chocolate for almost all young wild animals, and often are a life-long food source for many. The advice given about getting rid of ivy, etc is helpful, yet other animals will also be impacted. For example, Barn owls nest in palm trees, especially the dead frond areas just under the green crown. Barn owls are the BEST rodent controllers around and other than applauding their presence we do not have to do anything. Obviously we don't want rodents inside our houses or out buildings, yet annihilation is not ideal for anyone. The advice listed is excellent particularly about what we are responsible for doing around our houses.

In Contra Costa County, skunks are officially considered rabies vectors. This is NOT true in other counties. Obviously caution should always be utilized but seeing a skunk, even in the daytime, does not automatically indicate that it is sick. Skunks are omnivores and will eat many of the bothersome creatures we dislike, snails, slugs, rodents, fruit, and yellow jacket larvae. Skunks look for mates in early spring (Feb usually) otherwise they are solitary and crepuscular. So most of the year they are not obvious. This year is a "rebound year" as well, especially for rodents since last year was so dry. The rain this year promises more grass/food so rodents are producing large families. Information and education really increases tolerance and better, more humane choices. Thank you for a good article.”

Jenny also mentioned that it is illegal (and inhumane) to trap and relocate any wildlife. She also does not suggest acquiring cats as rodent control because cats are responsible for the deaths of millions of birds daily, another contentious subject.

Other ways to eliminate the rodents is to install barn owl boxes to encourage owls to your yard. Areas with heavy Great horned owl presence usually will not support barn owl populations (Great horned eat barn owls) but any owl is good for rodent control. Native Bird Connections has boxes available at Wild Birds Unlimited in Pleasant Hill for a $100 donation. Also of importance is to not use the sticky traps as they can entangle other animals creating suffering and a lingering death. Ninety percent of wildlife in the San Francisco Bay Area has rodenticides in their tissues including coyotes, bobcats, and foxes according to WildCare in Marin. This means that the use of poisons for all applications move through the food chain and should be avoided. My advice is to contact Vector Control at 925-771-6142 or visit www.ContraCostaMosquito.com when you have questions or concerns.

Enjoy the cold nights, the rainy days, and the season’s greening. Thanks for allowing me to be your gardening guide on the side. Get ready for great new year of horticultural joys.

Cynthia Brian’s January New Year Gardening Tips:

⎫ BRING health inside with power plants of ferns, palms, spider plants, and other air-cleansing specimens. Tropical houseplants absorb indoor toxins and add humidity to the air saving you dollars on heating. ⎫ BUY a copy of “Great Garden Quotes”, a coloring book with wit, wisdom, and heart from the editors of GreenPrints, the Weeders Digest. Pat Stone, the editor, was a co-author with me on Chicken Soup for the Gardener’s Soul. You’ll love this new coloring book with inspiring garden axioms. www.GreenPrints.com ⎫ ALLOW the organic matter of chopped leaves and lawn clippings to decompose on the soil during the dormant season. ⎫ ADD a cover crop to keep soil healthy, avoid erosion, and help with fertility. ⎫ PICK Meyer lemons and use for juicing, cooking, and baking. This rich citrus will help fend off colds. ⎫ PROTECT tender plants from frost by covering with burlap or cloth. Do not use plastic as it will maximize the freeze. ⎫ PRUNING for dormant fruit trees and shrubs begins this month. ⎫ TIDY your yard by cutting back your chrysanthemums to six inches above the ground, and removing dead foliage from plants. ⎫ SPRAY your peach trees with a concoction of fixed copper or lime sulfur after all the leaves have fallen from the tree to control peach leaf curl. Repeat this process in late January and February for best results. ⎫ PLANT bareroot stock such as grapes, berries, artichokes, roses, and several fruit trees. ⎫ PRUNE roses, vines, and berry bushes to encourage new growth. ⎫ CUT bouquets of geranium flowers for indoors and snip pieces to plant in other areas. ⎫ DONATE $100 to Native Bird Connections and receive an owl box for your garden. ⎫ REMOVE all ornaments, lights, and tinsel from your Christmas trees before placing on the curb for composting pick-up. ⎫ EXPRESS gratitude for all the green that nature is bestowing on us!

Happy Gardening and Happy Growing! Happy, Healthy, Auspicious New Year! See the photos and READ more: https://www.lamorindaweekly.com/archive/issue1022/January-Gardening-Guide-Season-Greenings-for-the-New-Year.html

©2017 Cynthia Brian The Goddess Gardener StarStyle® Productions, llc Cynthia@GoddessGardener.com www.GoddessGardener.com 925-377-STAR Tune into Cynthia’s Radio show at www.StarStyleRadio.net I am available as a speaker, designer, and consultant.  

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