
So after listening to your tweets and comments, I am SO pleased to announce that the pearls of wisdom are back for 2010. I would love love love to have 52 pearls for this year, and post one a week as a regular feature. I have a couple of pearls from last year, but I need about fifty more! So in order to do that, I need your help. Won't you please submit a pearl of wisdom? I know many of you submitted some, but you can still submit more. And if you have not submitted one yet, please consider submitting one.
By pearls of wisdom, I mean things you
really wish you had known earlier in your life. Think of it as writing
a postcard to your 22 year old self, or your 17 year old self, or your
13 year old self, or your 30 year old self - the only requirement is
that it has to be an age you are not currently at. It could be an age
in the past, or in the future. Please send submissions to
citygirllifestyle at gmail dot com and be sure to include how you want
to be cited {this is especially important if you blog anonymously} -
you don't need a blog to participate either. Please also feel free to send pictures with your pearls {whether your own or pictures you like that can be reproduced under Creative Commons licensing}. When you were submitting pearls last year, many of you have said the exercise was any number of the following: powerful, cathartic, fun, unexpected.
Not convinced? Here are more links:
*More background on the pearls project
*Pearl prompts
*All of your pearls from last summer
Photo credit here (thank you Melita for discovering it).
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
Searching for 50 pearls of wisdom!
Posted by City Girl at Tuesday, January 05, 2010 3 comments Links to this post
Labels: blog events, mindful City Girl, pearls of wisdom
Monday, January 4, 2010
Antidote for the Monday Morning Blues
*Enjoyed yummy guacamole and ceviche at Oyamel, a favorite since the summer
*Visits to the National Portrait Gallery to see photographic portraits of the American West followed by the Smithsonian American Art Gallery (same building) to see the outgoing exhibition on the New Deal and art
*A bento box lunch at Teaism with a law school friend from out of town
*A couple of sushi dinner, including at Tono Sushi where I had lots of delicious yellowtail and salon sushi
*A trip to Barnes and Noble, where I browsed to my heart's content and picked up Vegan Yum Yum
*A pedicure with soba cha tea from Teaism in hand (I highly recommend this approach to winter pedicures by the way)
*Discovering that there is a metro-accessible craft store (A.C. Moore in Rockville is a short walk from the White Flint metro)
*Caught up with several friends
*Full Moon yoga on New Year's Eve, followed by a yummy dinner cooked by husband
*Collaging a dreamboard for the new year
Photo credit: D Sharon Pruitt / CC BY 2.0
Posted by City Girl at Monday, January 04, 2010 2 comments Links to this post
Labels: listmania, mindful City Girl
Sunday, January 3, 2010
Julie & Julia and Urban Grit
[As an aside, and speaking of not-so-pretty, I am completely avoiding Julie Powell's second book, Cleaving, based on the reviews and her response to the reviews.]
Anyways, but back to urban grit, which is really what I am thinking about today, insofar as it relates to portrayal of a true story and blogging. You see, Julie & Julia touches on urban grit, but very delicately, which makes sense, because that's not what you want to see in a movie.
This is all relevant to someone whose blog is called City Girl Lifestyle and who likes to blog about pretty and nice and positive things, many of which relate to living in an urban environment. And there are many, many positive things to blog about and I really do believe that a blog is about putting one's best foot forward. That's why, if I was not reflecting about urban grit specifically, it would never occur to me to mention things like, there was a dead frozen rat on the sidewalk of Mass Ave, a block east from fancy Dupont Circle, for FIVE days, before finally, someone removed it. Speaking of rats, they are far far worse in Washington, DC than in New York, though sidewalk roaches in summer are pretty horrifying.
And being able to walk everywhere and rely on public transportation is the best thing ever, until temperatures are in the 0 degree neighborhood, at which point you find yourself hiding at home and starting to understand why people insist on having garages that they can step into from the comfort of their own home and why they drive everywhere. You get the idea - mind you, the hot water is running and plentiful in my building, and the heat works, so I am feeling very fortunate, since I had several weeks of icy cold water when I lived in New York.
Enough of the venting, I do have a point, I promise. You see, as much as I try to keep this blog authentic, I prefer to discuss the happier and more interesting topics of city living than the urban grit of every-day life. It is also how I try to live life - while I am not in denial about the bad things, I try to not let them take over. Try being the operative word of course.
Posted by City Girl at Sunday, January 03, 2010 7 comments Links to this post
Labels: books and magazines, creativity, mindful City Girl
Saturday, January 2, 2010
January Goals & Blog Update
*Sparkle and shine, whether in person, on the page and virtually
*Embrace to-do lists in sparkly pen, rather than feel like life is ruled by them
*Yoga two to three times weekly
*Incorporate more music and podcasts in my life (aka MP3 afternoon which I keep meaning to do since November)
*Collage twice a month, as I find it incredibly relaxing
*View every day as opportunities for unlocking potential
And, because we chatted on the topic of changing blogging approaches and blog identity crises, I have to let you know I am still mulling how to blog. In fact, one of the pretty little stars above was supposed to be about whatever blogging approach I picked and would pursue this month. Many bloggers are promising new and better blogs for the new year, with more graphics and varied media which is lovely, but I just kind of like to chat with you all the way we have been chatting for going on three years (especially if you read this blog when I mostly wrote about beauty products). I would like, at some point, a custom header, but I do like the simplicity of the above right now.
I have done the topic for certain days concept (Beauty Monday, What's Cooking Wednesday, Thursdays focused on balanced and wellness) for almost 18 months, and while so many blogs do that, and more are moving that route, I am torn. There are times I find the topic per day concept brilliantly helpful and motivating to write, not to mention helpful for readers, and others where I feel constrained. I may change my mind again, but for now I think I will keep What's Cooking Wednesday, because I try several new recipes a month and love to share them with you, and also add a category called something like City Girl Reviews - beyond that, though, I do not think I will make too many changes any time soon. Maybe I should change my tag-line from "Smiling Amid Urban Chaos" to "A Blog with An Identity Crisis"...
Posted by City Girl at Saturday, January 02, 2010 10 comments Links to this post
Labels: creativity, mindful City Girl, writing and blogging
Friday, January 1, 2010
So, It's January...
*Lots of sparkle, in the form of time with loved ones, twitter connecting and notes and journaling to myself (in sparkly pen, bien sur) - YES. I caught up with several friends in person, spent a little more time on twitter (I do need to use some of the resources some of you shared with me) and journaled and collaged a bit.
*Savor every minute of days off around the holidays and be less to-do-listy about errands - YES as well, which means I got tons of rest.
*Have fun with writing lots of holiday cards - Sort of - I did have fun writing them, but work was so insane until just a couple of days before Christmas, so I finished up many cards this week.
*Upload my MP3 with tons of delectable treats that actually make me use it (see November for background) - Fail - I am going to carve out a weekend afternoon sometime this month to work on that.
*Yoga twice weekly - Le sad, but no, that did not go well. I did go to yoga twice this week.
Something else I did this month which was new to me is that I really embraced December and winter. Usually I just complain about being cold and do not even like Christmas music that much, but this past month, something was different. I really enjoyed the snowstorm earlier this month, which is kind of unlike me. And by the way, how cool is it that someone made snow-pandas on K Street along with snowmen?
Posted by City Girl at Friday, January 01, 2010 2 comments Links to this post
Labels: mindful City Girl
Thursday, December 31, 2009
Dreamboard for the New Year
Posted by City Girl at Thursday, December 31, 2009 16 comments Links to this post
Labels: blog events, blogs I like, creativity, mindful City Girl
Wednesday, December 30, 2009
End-of-Year Meme
8. What was your biggest achievement of the year? Working through some health issues and losing 40 pounds (I had lost about 20 pounds in the latter part of 2008). The health issues are still ongoing, but overall I feel much better.
17. Compared to this time last year, are you: a) happier or sadder? b) thinner or fatter? c) richer or poorer? Happier, thinner and about the same.
Posted by City Girl at Wednesday, December 30, 2009 2 comments Links to this post
Labels: blogs I like, meme, mindful City Girl







