Believed to be Beautiful: Teak Bowl

Fifth anniversary of our first day as a couple was this week. We selected this large teak bowl as our gift to those years and the many to come. It sits on our table holding the most important things: tiny pumpkins for fall, stacks of cards for after dinner games. Andrew asks me over and over again, can't I smell the wood? Can't I smell the teak? No, no, I never can, but I believe it's beautiful anyway.

Believed to be Beautiful: Tin

Each time I go to open this little tin, I forget for a moment what is inside. I open the lid and aha! there it is - the millinery rose I'd placed in there years ago. I love the treasure of it - the forgetting and remembering. I love that the act of opening the lid is as much a ritual as the experience that follows.

Believed to be Beautiful: Horse

Andrew rolled his eyes a little on this one. He was 75% off, chipped, strange, and really, useless, but I had to have him. Carried in my bag, wrapped in a handkerchief for the long walk home, I have never once regretted the purchase of this horse. He sits on a shelf near my desk, spending time with an old Avon owl, and I like to think that when no one else would, I brought him home, and gave him a small, static, beautiful life.

Believed to be Beautiful: Dice

You know those collections that just sort of...happen? A friend sends the tiniest die you've ever seen, then another gives you a small bag of dice with the most perfect green dots. Some are made of wood, others plastic. We use them, yes, but I love them more for their beauty than their practicality.

Believed to be Beautiful: Safety Pin

I lose a little more blue paint each year, tiny scraps flaking off as it's used for yet another project, but even though I an entire box of shiny, new pins, this one has always been my favorite.

Believed to be Beautiful: A Day Off

I know, I know, household beautiful, those were my rules, but having already broken them once with the work doodle, and really, being my own boss, I decided that rule breaking is really fitting for a day off.

On the schedule:

Waking up early and surprising Andrew with a packed lunch and scrambled eggs with Virginia ham and sharp cheddar, a treat of coffee from Andrew who ran out and pick up a perfect latte to sustain me long enough to lounge the early morning away, a phone chat with my mother about her impending graduation!, a long shower outfitted with new conditioner, enough time to place a thin-thickish line of jet black liner on my lids and really, enough time to talk myself out of it and then into it again, a green scarf wrapped and knotted around my neck, tall cognac colored boots thumping on the pavement on the way to the corner coffee shop, one triple latte and a seat by the sun, a cell phone photo when all other gadgets are forgotten, lunch at the museum cafe and a seat outside near the sculpture to enjoy my new book, cleaning the apartment, preparing dinner and a special dessert, grocery shopping for necessary supplies (apple streusel cake is necessary, right?), making plans with the hubby for a Saturday of apple picking and movie watching.

It's really, really beautiful.

Believed to be Beautiful: Stamps

I use them, all the time, the stamps in my life. I put them on letters to friends and family; I tuck them inside vellum envelopes and send them off, matching images with personalities. I like the ones from he 70's - vibrancy, activism, spunk. These I framed - not to keep safe - but to keep visible.