So yesterday was a sort of weepy, shaky, pregnancy hormone filled kind of day. The kind of day where small things make you cry and you have a generally fearful feeling in the pit of your stomach. Know what I mean?

And big things, well, they did more than make me cry. Sometimes, I fill up with so much despair listening to the suffering in the world, it's hard to breathe.

And then I'm reminded of Byron Katie's wise words who says: 'this is not your suffering, don't add to the suffering of the world by suffering something that isn't yours to suffer'.

I'm not always able to follow that advice and I think there is something valuable in expressing the sadness I feel when others go through a terrible ordeal, but Katie's approach also helps me ground and send out positive stuff, compassion and love, and 'being in the now-ness' rather than just adding suffering to the suffering that is already there.

And the other day, Andy and I received some news which would mean a financial change for us (negatively) which stressed me out for a little while until I caught this bit of information on the radio:

"People in Haiti are bracing for a hurricane while many people are still living in make-shift houses after the earthquake."

And that just kicked my whole view on life into perspective again. Why am I worried about a small change in finances while I have a beautiful roof over my head, a beautiful family who are healthy and happy. I eat good food every day. I am expecting a new little baby, I do the work that I love etc etc. I have a thousand million blessings. I live an incredibly privileged life. And while I am not downplaying or devaluing the pains and sorrows that can occur in a privileged life, remembering how amazing my life is compared to many many people on earth, helps me find gratitude again. It helps me regain a little perspective when I get too mopey.

And coincidentally, my latest painting is called: 'Gratitude' which is so fitting.



I did a video of how I made this painting too:



If you want to join in on the challenge, you can post your work HERE.

Here are some more detail shots of the painting.







BUY THIS PAINTING HERE


And we celebrated Dylbee's 2 year birthday which was wonderful! The weather was beautiful and just the right amount of lovely people and kiddos came. Here some picsies:





Babies, toddlers, "grown ups" & a biiiiig mess! ;)



Dylan & George and Lila in the background



Dylan and George



Mmmh cake!



Dylbee and mummy's cool tattoo in the garden



Yayyyy! Dylan was given a broom as a bday gift, he loved it!



He worships this water/ sand table!



Bath time after a full day of fun



And the mummy, 27/28 weeks preggo with nr 2. :)


In the mean time, I am working hard on Life Book! Registration will open on October 3rd.

For more information GO HAVE A READ HERE.



Huggas and banana cakes. x

Apparently the lovely planet Mercury is in retrograde, and while I'm not a great follower of the planet and stars, it's true that whenever that darn planet does its retrograde thing a lot in my life goes haywire: Things keep going wrong, everything suddenly gets complicated, I become an emotional mess and feel the great urge to hide in a room for a week surrounded by chocolate.

So, I'm in Holland and it's lovely to see everyone, my parents, my brother, old friends. But the first 2-3 nights Dylan decides to break his lovely habit of sleeping 10 hrs straight in favour of waking up every 1-2 hrs. By the 3rd day I was so wrecked that I kept crying whenever someone spoke to me and I wailed at Andy: 'we have to go home, I can't do this! I keep getting RA flare ups, am a complete physical wreck and now I am not getting any sleep either!'

Then I calmed down, looked at baby animals in Amsterdam Zoo (Artis), and felt a tad bit better (though a horrible man screamed at me, he thought I was jumping the queue, which I wasn't, so I cried again!). There were a baby lion, a baby elephant and a baby gorilla in the zoo. Baby animals do make a lot in life better, I think.

Then, I took some practical measures to improve the sleeping situation for Dylan and luckily, last night, he slept like his good old self, though I still kept waking up anyway, but it was a different kind of disturbance then having Dylan need me every 2 hrs.

So, today, I feel more rested, and a bit better, though Mercury keeps f*cking with me. And I'm totally trying to find my inner zen about it all, but at the moment chocolate works better than zen. Or rather: I am able to access chocolate more easily than zen.

Here are some fun pics from being here so far:

Me and my bro:



Me, my bro and the most magical man in the world:



Dylan & Daddy in Artis (Dylan 2 weeks away from being 2 years old!)



Dylbee look at the 'rhaa rhaa' (Lion) he's tiny, you prob can't see him:



Baby lion! (Squee)



Dylan is loving his 'Obaa' (in Dutch: Grandpa = Opa, but he keeps saying: 'Obaa' ha ha). Every morning he wakes up and the first thing he says is: 'Obaa?'. Ha ha. Haven't taken pics of them together yet but will do and will film as well. :)

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Preparations for the biggest course EVAR have begun. Registration will start in October. Keep watching this space. "Life Book - an honouring and celebration of YOU!" is coming soon to a server near you! :D

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And don't forget, if you want to win any of 7 amazing prizes, do leave a comment HERE, or HERE. :)

Willowing.ning.com has recently surpassed the 5000 members mark which I think is a BIG REASON to be happy!! :D And because I'm happy and want to celebrate this momentous occasion with you, I am doing a BIG MASSIVE GIVE AWAY! :D Woop woop!

Sarahjayne was member 5000 and has already won the equivalent of prize number 1! Woohoo! Congratulations Sarahjayne!



What can you win?

Prize 1: Free access to 4 self study groups + 1 place on Life Book - worth $298.00
Prize 2: Free access to 3 self study groups + 1 place on Life Book - worth $252.00
Prize 3: Free access to 2 self study groups + 1 place on Life Book - worth $195.00
Prize 4: Free access to 2 self study groups - worth $96.00
Prize 5: Free access to 1 self study group - worth $56.00
Prize 6: 1 fine art print of choice - worth $25.00
Prize 7: 1 pack of postcards with Tam art - worth $16.00

How can you enter?

1. Put the willowing.ning.com button in your blog sidebar. Simply copy and paste this code in the appropriate html box.

<a href="http://www.willowing.ning.com" _mce_href="http://www.willowing.ning.com"><img src="http://api.ning.com/files/qwIAE7Sz9VlJAtqIYClHSj2PJyMiXgomtF-0YhiIkBVuH2TLRH1OL8amppGhR3B2AMo8Ya-z6C4nGJ*mTm2HyefcgGM8zfMZ/0026ayqz150.gif" border="0"/></a><br /><br />








2. If you don't know how to add a code to your side bar, write a little blog post about willowing.ning.com - mention the give away or anything else about the site! :)

3. If you don't have a blog, mention this give away or this site on your facebook or twitter.

4. Lastly, leave a comment on this post or in the discussion forum on my ning site: http://willowing.ning.com/forum/topics/the-big-massive-give-away-is-h

I will announce the winners on Monday 8th August - so the give away will be open for a while! :)

Good luck to all who enter and a big THANK YOU to all of my ning members, I appreciate and value you all! :D

Big hugs!
Tam xoxo

'Jellyfish' is one of my favourite words, also 'pancake' and 'la fourchette' is my favourite French word.

I want to call something Jellyfish Pancake but I don't know what and not my second son, no. (Still undecided on that one too btw!).

I'm having one of those 'meh' days today. This pregnancy is so much more typical than Dylan's one. I had a very few proper pregnancy symptoms with Dylan, but with this one, I had actual pregnancy sickness and mood swings (bad ones!), also this baby is SO much more active, he wriggles around a lot.

Anyhow, I've been doing a bit more art journaling lately, I keep wanting to do another art video and also a vlog, but I just can't find the energy for it! I managed to do the below art journal pages. I love how I can really express myself in these pages. It feels cathartic and healing just doing them. :)













Poor Dylbee has been sick for a while with coughs and sneezes and a blocked nose, but I've been feeling really connected to him and so in love with him. He is also much more cooperative now. Doing a nappy change is actually not a Greek Drama anymore which is a relief. And he's generally more easygoing and fun to be with. The other day we did art together (ok, I did art mostly and he did it for about 5 minutes and then decided it was more fun to throw the crayons everywhere, hee hee, but still). /Edit: today he was going mental though! :S Sigh, breathing through it!

Here is our masterpiece! By Dylan da Vinci and his mummy:



He also loves to do 'tummy touches' which is where we 'bump stomachs' hee hee! Lookit:



And yesterday he was such a hoot in the bath, look at his naughty look! ;)



In other news, the Digital Dreams course is almost finished, another week and a half left and I'm so proud of the students! Some of them are doing so well and the whole course just went really well! :)

After this course, I'll be working hard on the 'Life Book Course' (so excited about this one, I might explode) and I might squeeze in the 'Fairytale Series' course, which is a course that would exist out of 5 lessons, each lesson we'd be creating a different fairytale character, but each lesson can be bought by itself. So people who are on a lower budget can also join in by just signing up to a few lessons instead of the whole course. :)

Need to see if I can fit that one in though before the new baby comes.



Gotta go to bed now. I have another driving lesson tomorrow morning! Lessons are going great btw! I'm working on trying to get my theory done now as I can't register for the practical exam before I've passed the theory one!

Hugs and snugs. xoxo :)

"Let Your Heart Sing"


:-) I'm very happy with the above digital piece which I created during the lessons week 4 & 5 for Digital Dreams. (You can still join if you like btw, if you want to learn how to make art like the above, just go here: http://www.willowing.org/artclasses-DD.html to sign up).

I've been feeling pretty exhausted lately though. I keep getting new viruses over and over and my back ache is still not gone. I often just want to take a week out and just sleep and sleep and sleep.

Baby number two is now 22 weeks gestation! I'm much less involved with this pregnancy than I was with Dylan, and I think the baby knows because it keeps trying to get my attention by kicking me! ha ha. It's a really active baby, much more active than Dylan ever was! It's nice though, it's like he's saying: oye, don't forget about me, I'm here too! Ha ha. In 2 weeks time the baby is officially viable which means that if he came early, there is a 50% chance he'll survive, amazing! I know it's early in the pregnancy to start wishing for him to be here already, but I do look fwd to him being out and healthy and happy and then I can kind of get my body back.

Dylan is a sort of up and down little toddler lately, he has days where he is very difficult to be around, he complains about everything and whatever you do, nothing is 'good enough' to appease him, and then on other day he is this hilarious, easy-going little boy who is just so delightful and funny! He's still not talking much, but unlike a while back when he was also not interested in trying, he's actually interested in trying now. It's quite funny though, because you'll go: 'Dylan can you say "monkey"'? And he goes: 'boobahf'. LOL. Something completely not even similar! Ha ha.

He's also lately learned to do 'thumbs up' and it does it to everything and everyone, lookit:



This is one of the most hilarious pictures I've ever taken of him!

But yes, it's tough sometimes, it's very up and down and the battle of wills can be exhausting, but in so many other ways it's also just so wonderful. A range of emotions on the spectrum.

Anyhoo, this is a short but sweet little bloggie post. Hope you are all well! <3