Home-Camp and Sisterhood

August is a very special month for members of my beloved IGGPPC as it is the month of Iggle camp! 

For five days we “get together” and watch movies, tv shows, play games, go on scavenger hunts, bake and craft TOGETHER! But since this is a pen-pal event and we all live in different parts of the globe it's more of a virtual camp. Although this year we did have a lot of activities promoting getting out and moving around, form going out to catch pokemon to Yoga challenges on different locations around each of us.  I know it ’s a very strange concept and hard to grasp for "outsiders", but if you’re in, I swear it’s super fun! You can read all about it here.

What makes camp different from our day to day experiences in the community is that, instead of being separated into age groups and everyone doing monthly activities at their own time, we all try to do things live and interact as a group. We also get sorted into troops so you get to meet all sorts of new friends from every age-range. This year I was sorted into Troop Firebolt which is all about Harry Potter, so not a good match for me lol. I honestly don't know how troops are created or how campers get assigned to them, but despite my lack of enthusiasm for my troop's theme I had a great time with wonderful and magical friends. And fortunately there are a whole lot of activity options that don't involve Harry Potter :P

I've been told I'm a Hufflepuff so I went with it for my troop's ID

Camp crafts are always my favorite and below are some of the ones I created this year. I also learned to make friendship bracelets (not pictured.) Believe it or not I've never made them before! Now I'm excited to swap with some of my friends :D But I think my favorite craft this year and the one I can totally see a use for, for more than just fun, was stamp carving! It was awesome, and so much easier than when I tried it in middle school. This time it came out right!

I also got to escape the “camp grounds” (my place) and go chase the Hello Kitty Truck that finally made an appearance in MA. 

How cute is this?!

I was still participating in camp while out in line for the truck though, being out gave me a great opportunity to get a lot of items for my scavenger hunt and go practice yoga outdoors. 

Plus my outfit was a camp closet-challenge of being a character in red. Can you all guess who my character was?

This year, August became extra special, because apart from all the fun above described, after more than half a year since I found out of it's existence, I finally got to join a new community which is the OTSPSS which stands for On the Same Page Secret Sister. A project devoted to sending cheer to someone else and letting them know someone's thinking lovingly about them for six months. It’s meant to lift up spirits, create a sense of community and sisterhood and bring a monthly, dependable ray of sunshine to look forward to even if you're month happens to be lackluster otherwise! It’s such a beautiful project with a very encouraging and positive community and I’m so, so happy I finally made it in! 

It’s a super fun project really. Think secret Santa but throughout the year in 6 month-long sessions. Half the fun is trying to figure out who your sister is and of course in the process getting to know someone new and hopefully build a strong friendship with them. Each session you get two new people to interact personally with. The sister that showers you with love and the one to whom you are her sister and you get to shower with joy.

I sent out my first package over a week ago and I’m already almost done planning for September and this past weekend I received my very own package from my sister which is super exciting! I honestly don’t know which part is more fun. But either way August was a great month for letter writing, new friendships (even if they're distance ones) and late summer campy fun!

Can’t wait to see what the next season brings :D

Is This a Test?

August has been crazy! Running around trying to squeeze as much summer fun before the season ends while creating, editing and submitting work to different and new art opportunities. Going to Manhattan to deal, for my very first time, with professional printers while producing more images still, trying to figure out school stuff and all while being very sleep deprived!

If you remember back in March my apartment was flooded, which I know is something I manifested and there was a lesson there to be had ( if you missed it you can catch up here.) What I didn’t get into was how absolutely awful my building’s new management is. They did the bare minimum back then to help and things have just gotten worst over these months. 

I don’t want to be putting more negativity out there so let’s just say they have made living in the building less than desirable... 

I looked into moving earlier this summer but things didn’t line-up and the message from the Universe seemed to be clear: Stay put for another year. To be honest though, signing the new lease felt wrong! But what could I do if no other options fell into place and obstacles to move kept popping up? At leas my little unit has always seemed like a safe heaven to me and I love it or I did until this month. The entire month, under feeble excuses like changing light fixtures that did not need changing, these people kept coming into my place, getting everything dirty, leaving my door unlocked for who knows how long while I was out of town and breaking parts of my closet that fell on me as I walked in to check on things! 

To top it all off they were banging, drilling and knocking on my door at ridiculous hours, that as tenants we could be sued for noise disturbances at those hours, which resulted in my before mentioned sleep deprivation.I tried talking to them but it didn't seem to be of much use, they clearly have no regards for alternate life schedules. It got so bad, all I could do was cry at some point and I thought I was really going to go crazy! 

Why would the Universe make me stay under such terrible conditions? I was even starting to pack despite still having about 10 more months on the lease and then it clicked! The lesson!! There is ALWAYS a lesson to these things and I needed to find it in order for them to go away. 

Last month at my intuition workshop our teacher was telling us a story of how she would butt heads at her former job with a really aggravating guy. It was getting insufferable, until one day it dawned on her that it was a reflection of her, when she accepted this and let go of the issues he brought up in her, gave them up for healing, the annoying guy "magically"  got moved to another area where she never had to see him again! My answer lied within this story.

So for the past week I’ve been trying to switch my perspective (granted I needed a little sleep before I could be more zen about things haha.) I’m not 100% positive on what my lesson is yet, but I greatly suspect is one about adaptability and more than anything flexibility. 

I’m working on figuring things out but my first order of business was, still is, to send Love and Light to these people. It’s so hard when people are disrespectful, rude, insensitive, etc. not to get mad and instead send them as much Love as possible, believe me I know! But getting caught up in negative emotions just gets us trapped in vicious cycles, some of these cycles even make you believe your apartment sucks and you're gonna end up in a psychiatric wing somewhere; While when we send Love and focus on learning something, we heal ourselves and change others for the better eventually. 

So Love and Light to the entire new management and maintenance team in my building while I figure out what else are they here to teach. Maybe that’s all there is to it,  a “practice test” to put into use everything I’ve been learning this year. What do you think?

Image from Elizabeth Harper's Sealed with Love

Trust

Hello everyone! Sorry I didn’t get to post sooner! July was incredibly busy and amazing!! Beyond any predictions I could have had and was so packed with different adventures, that I'm sure when I look back at it in years, it’ll probably make the list of one of the best summer months ever! But it wasn’t without its challenges, and the one lesson that kept up coming was TRUST. Which was very insightful since I thought my only predominantly recurrent lesson was patience haha.

Here's how the lesson presented itself in different forms through out my main adventures:

I started the month still at DisneyWorld with one of the most important members of my soul-family having a blast. But throughout our week of fun we had some communication issues and a recurrent theme of lack of trust, especially me towards him. We talked some issues through where he did mention I never trust him but we brushed most things under the rug so as to focus only on the fun. But as the time came to say goodbye I couldn’t help that familiar fear of the unknown from creeping into my heart. When were we gonna see each other again? Would he keep his word of not disappearing? What if the distance became too much to bare? Etc... These questions have always been there haunting me for years, but it wasn’t until this month that it clicked how much it is connected to trust issues! I need to learn to trust that it will all work out and that he will keep his word. Ghaa!! So hard! LOL

The second week of July I had to leave for a class field- trip to CT for a Native American museum. This is only about 2-3 hrs from my place and was supposed to be a one day thing. But the meeting point for my class was super far from me and I would have had to wake up dangerously (for me) early, so my mom decided to get us a room in the area and turn my class into a 2.5 days mini-adventure. Never being one to pass a trip of any kind I jumped on board knowing it was mostly about class and not driving without sleep. I'm still forever grateful and I'm SO lucky! Because as it turned out the class ended up being a bust :-/ The teacher was over an hour late! The whole group was already there but we couldn’t get in without our teacher since he had the tickets and group reservation. I then ended starving because as I was going to get a snack while we waited, our teacher showed up and decided to rush us so we could make it to an awesome-sounding seminar, but he got side-tracked, talked about things we had already covered in class and we missed the seminar and the local Tribe Chief cancelled on the rest of our activities because she was sick. At the end our trip only consisted of waiting outside the building and then wandering through certain areas of the museum :/ I was so upset at first and forgot again to TRUST the Universe to have my back. Thanks to this failed class trip, I got a super fun weekend away with my mom and because the class was a bust we were done earlier so I had more time to go out and take pictures which is my main art medium so yay! It was all for a reason, sometimes I still forget…

A week after that I went to a week-long retreat in upstate NY for intensive classes on Intuition and healing. And what’s the key source to develop those intuitive gifts? Thats right trust!! Every time during class I dismissed something or thought I had made it up and doubted my abilities I got things wrong (usually the thing I dismissed was the right answer,) but when I just went with it and removed the fear of looking stupid, I did excellent! That’s when I started to hear the Universe’s shouts for me to just trust, trust, trust! 

To make the lesson even clearer for me I got a chance to learn how to fly in a trapeze, and let me tell you it was the most absolutely horrifying thing I’ve ever done voluntarily! But I HAD to do it to get those pictures of a new experience hehe. Even though while I was up high leaning over the edge I truly regretted it. The whole thing was a giant trust-exercise. You have to trust that the people holding on to the ropes of the harness are not gonna let go, you have to trust your body will have the strength and balance to climb a 30ft high, rickety ladder; once you’re up you have to lean your entire weight out of the platform and trust the person behind you pushing your hips further forward really has you and can hold your weight, then you have to grab the bar and jump off into thin air, and to get down you simply let go of the bar trusting everything will be ok!! It’s super scary and like a girl there said on her first try “It just doesn’t seem natural to just let go and jump at the nothingness beneath you.” And it so doesn’t! But if that doesn’t show you to trust I don’t know what will. 

Apparently I only listen to what the Universe is trying to teach me through travel and crazy experiences :P But hey! How awesome is it that less than two years ago the doctors said I did not have more than two days to live and now I’m swinging on a trapeze?!

I’m still struggling with this lesson, I’ve heard it and I’m processing but bad habits are hard to break lol. When it hits me that my true, close, local friends are down to one it’s hard to trust more are on the way since I’m such an introvert, it’s hard to trust my body is working for me and will release all the chemo weight on bad days when I can’t find anything to wear, it’s hard to trust things will work out with a certain someone when he just goes MIA for weeks at a time! It’s hard to trust the Universe’s plans when I get a red light for submitting my art to certain things I’m excited about and pushed to finish projects that are overwhelming and yet I can feel that if I just let go and trust things will just fall not place, I wonder why it’s so hard?

And what could've triggered this lack of trust, maybe it's always been there hidden from the conscious mind and it's now being brought to the Light to be healed... I guess it's time for me to keep practicing jumping off the trapeze platform, how about you? <3

Image from Elizabeth Harper's Sealedwithlove.com

June's Inside the Theme

I can't promise I will do this #Insidethetheme thing every month, but while I wait for my newest Family and Disney-venture to start (tomorrow! aahh!) I thought I'd give it another go since it's a fun way to let you know a little bit more about myself and connect to other members of the Iggle community ;)

This month's theme was all about crafts which was totally in sync with the creative energies at work in my life and it provided new ideas for me to try out! How perfect is that?! So without further ado here are my answers for the month.

1)What is your favorite type of craft, and why is it so amazing?

I'm such a restless spirit that, true to my hummingbird tendencies of trying out all the pretty flowers, I like or would like to try all the crafts that do not involve sewing/knitting or cooking. But I probably do tend to favor paper ones like scrapbooking, ATC's, DIY stationary, etc. Although, don't leave me alone at a Michael's 'cause I will want to take up EVERY craft as my new hobby!

2)What would your preferred weapon in the Craftamageddon be?

I would like to go with paper and micron pens but that could fall into the Fine Arts realm so if we're being strict about just crafts then probably washi tape! You can washi everything to make it better :)

3)Where on a scale from “Look At This Pair Of Shoes I Just Made” to “What Do You Mean You Own A Pair Of Scissors?” do you consider yourself? Do you have any funny craftastrophe stories?

I usually create more art than crafts but sometimes the line between these two is so blurry, and like I say I like to try all the crafts haha, so I guess I'm closer to the Shoe making side of the scale, as long as I don't really have to make shoes! LOL

My creative process is in itself a "Craftastrophe" hahaha, I'm constantly covered in glitter, glue and paint and manage to cut myself more than the paper :P So I can't recall a particularly funny story, I do find my attempts at creating a cup on the pottery wheel laughable if that counts...

                          

4)3 Things You Would Bring To A Deserted Island, Craftamageddon style! (Because why wouldn’t you bring a glue gun and washi tape as opposed to survival necessities and loved ones?)

Only three? Hmm.. ok a giant pack of multicolor paper (that counts as one right?) Scissors and... WASHI tape!!

5)Show us a DIY project you are (sort of mildly) proud of

Ok so I showed you my most recent new crafts for this month on my previous post and I'm sort of mildly proud of them hehe, but I'm sharing these others from the past month I really liked, hope you like them too <3

Paper "Feather Smudging fan" for my Native American class

Glass bottle I stained for a friend

Angel silk scarf I painted for my mom

Aaannndd, that's it for this month! Hoped you all liked my little ramblings for June. 

Love, Light and Laughter to all of you <3

Transitioning Upwards!

Another month almost over and I have no idea where time has gone, how does this even happen?..

This month has been a really interesting one and seemed to just be building off the energies of last month. My social life dropped down to zero! And still it was one of the busiest months yet. Ever since my apartment flooded energies have been moving and redirecting themselves. 

I seem to be in a transitional period again and, talking to my few Spiritual friends, they’ve all noticed that recently.

The influx of creative energy that washed over me last month intensified throughout June and a lot of old art projects have been getting finished and new ideas born. I also tried new techniques and crafts that could eventually, potentially become something. 

A restless energy has also been lingering around making me itch for adventure. I want to go somewhere, anywhere! Try new things, make a change of some sort. I noticed this amongst my friends too, It could be the energies of the solstice influencing us but whatever it is, there is something in the air…

As part of this transition state I'm in, I’ve become more attuned with the seasons, my sleep patterns adjust to each season lately but now that the warmer months are here it’s more obvious, since I get tired and uninspired on cloudy, cool days and can’t wait to take over the world on sunny days (which is extremely weird for me.) My body seems to also be changing with the season, I’m tanner and my hair curlier without me even going outside! It’s very interesting to notice all these changes in oneself.

Of course as with any other transition I’m “losing” a lot of friends again. I’m not too worried since I go through this every few years. Of course there are the souls that stay with me no matter what and for them I am always deeply grateful, but most of them live very far away from me and my local "new" friends are the ones usually rotating. I started the year with about 10 friends, now most of them have transitioned themselves into acquaintances or occasional friends to go out with while the rest have totally disappeared, only one or two have remained true friends. Like I said, with every transition this happens and it makes sense since, with every transition you change, your interests and priorities change and you suddenly can’t connect to people in a different "wavelength" no matter how much you care about them, it's almost as if magically there's nothing to talk about for either party. But the fact that I understand the why or that it’s happened before doesn’t make it that much easier. I still long for a tribe of souls where we are all on the same page and can play together without judgement and lift each other up. 

Has anyone else found themselves in a recent transitional state and has had some of these “symptoms”? I’d love to hear thoughts and experiences! :)

Of course on the positive side of things my beautiful, generous pen-pals have kept that need for human connection and friendship fulfilled.  But why can’t they live close to me so we can hang out for real?! Lol 

Also as usual if you ask and fully trust in the Universe you will receive!  My sense of adventure has been satiated by having to go to a destination wedding (my cousins’s) and even though the situation makes me sad I get rewarded by  going somewhere haha and more importantly seeing some family I haven’t seen in years! As well as spending some days in DisneyWorld with my guy bff! Since he’s between 2-10 years old and I’m 5 it’s gonna be the most perfect time ever!! So thank you Universe for listening to my pleas and manifesting so fast <3 <3

Also I was featured in a Fine Art blog on a post about wild life photography! Check it out here. 

So I guess what I can take out of this month is to go with the energies and don’t resist changes and transitions, There was a reason for that “adventure” vibe as it got manifested twice in very different ways. And the transition makes me a better healer and intuitive by being tuned into the seasons and their energies and by phasing people out that don’t resonate with me to make room for those to come. In the meantime things balance out in life always and since I didn't have a lot of social contact at the beginning of the month I get to finish its last week surrounded by those few souls that have always been there for me and are my true family whether it’s by blood or not. 

Love and Light to all of you and happy 4th of July!  

May's Inside the Theme

Wow it's the last day of the month and I have no idea how that happened!! Everyone's already making summer plans and I'm stuck somewhere in like February of 5 years ago! LOL
Doesn't help that my school doesn't have a summer break...Although at least the summer classes are all outdoors and with tons of fun fieldtrips, plus we don't have finals so yay for that.

I didn't have any big enlightening lessons I felt the need to record this month which is probably why I forgot about the blog hehe. My month felt in a lull and a whirlwind at the same time, I got to discover new forms of energy healing through Qi Gong which was interesting and fun and now that I think about it might explain why my energy has been slowly picking up "speed" despite the feeling of lack of social life or eventful situations this month. The art magazine that features my photography came out this month too! That was super exciting; there were lots of birthdays that left me broke haha and I got to discover new fun places around my area with the warmer weather that allows us to explore more. Oh and for a week or so I thought I might have to move which was heartbreaking and exciting at the same time (seems there was a lot of polarity of feelings this month, did anyone else experience this?) that all turned out into an apartment hunting adventure where I came to appreciate what I already have more than I usually do, learn there's room for improvement and now I'm just putting my faith in the Universe and getting rear ended while this was happening haha. For now I'm staying put and the car accident was minor so no-one got injured thank goodness.
I've also been super busy with art projects as I got an influx of creative energy I haven't felt in years and have been digging up old projects that went to limbo once I got sick, so it's been a fun and interesting month although hard to reflect that in words...

Since that is all I have for my adventures in May I thought I'd give the IGGPPC "Inside the Theme" questions of the month a try so here it is, hope you all had a great month and I'll see you in June <3 <3

 

– What is your favorite fantasy story? 

I love fantasy that's probably one of my favorite genres ever, so it's hard to choose one story. Book-wise I love The Hobbit, but I also love Inkheart and the Kingdom Keepers series, but as the Disney freak that I am I probably will have to go with any story made by Disney Animation. My favorite Princess is Ariel and my favorite fantasy character on her own is Tinkerbell.

                                               

– What was your first experience with fantasy?

I don't remember it, given that I was born a few minutes away from the Disney parks and was raised on ONLY Disney the first couple years of my life. So clearly the generic answer id Disney but I think Dumbo and Winnie the Pooh were the first things I watched on loop as a baby...

                                          

– Modern technology allows fantasy stories to be told in a variety of different mediums now; do you prefer diving into a good old fashioned book, reading a colorful comic, yelling at your videogames while bathing in the blood of your virtual enemies, or snacking on all the popcorns in front of your TV or at the movies? (Listening to troubadours performing the ballad of Beowulf is also a totally valid choice.)

Books and movies are by far my favorite medium! Tv shows sometimes are good too (Once, GoT)  and I recently discovered the Disney Kingdom Figment comics and those are beautiful, but I usually don't like comics at all, so good old fashioned books still win, although listening to troubadours would be totally my favorite if they were easily accessible ;)

                                      

– Pets are a very popular choice in fantasy. Because pets are awesome. Which magical pet would you most like to adopt? (You can either go with a kind of creature, or a specific pet from a specific story you wouldn’t mind moving in with you – because let’s face it, we all want Toothless as a bestie.)

I always wanted to have either a magical, mystical talking tiger or a dragon of my own, but if I was to adopt someone specific from another story, I'd either get Pegasus from Hercules or Raja from Aladdin :)

                                              

– Your RPG play style: alignment, faction, race, and class. Do you play tabletop style or in a digital medium? I've never played a real RPG. When I was really little a friend of mine had a tabletop game that would capture our imagination so much we would act out everything and had our stuffed animals be different players but that's as close as I've ever gotten. TBH I'm always kinda curious but then they turn out to be too complicated, too violent or too expensive haha. So lets say my style is tabletop with my stuffed animal friends :P

                                                        

1 Year Celebration

This month was my 1 year anniversary since my last chemo!! Hooray!

I can't believe it's been a full year already. When I first started treatment I couldn't even fathom this day, I tried to imagine it but all my mind could come up with was not being poisoned anymore! At most I thought life would go back to what it was before, never could I have imagined what an amazing year I had in store :)

It takes at least a year for all the poison to leave your system. Doctors and nurses recommended not going back to "usual speed" for 18 months. My hair is still super short, I'm still struggling trying to lose the extra chemo-weight, my nails just this month started growing normally, I still don't have my full range of flexibility and strength back, the area where my port was still burns and hurts with certain movements and my cells are traumatized. For my body this year has been a loooooong journey, but it's starting to bare its fruits. For my mind the year went by in a whirlwind, and my Spirit has just been enjoying the ride haha.

But as a celebratory acknowledgement I decided to post a picture and short blurb significant experiences that happened each amazing month I've been alive and cancer-free! I hope it helps you remember that life is about the choices you make and it doesn't matter what doctors, experts or anyone else says, you do what's right for you at your own time <3 <3

-May 2015: 

 A friend of mine threw a Life Celebration party once I was well enough after the last treatment to go out. This was the first outing with a big group I had and it was awesome to have so many friends come to celebrate with me <3 a great first month indeed :)

-June 2015: 

 I was finally able to walk around my town with my friends and see the street art up close instead of through the car's window <3

- July 2015: 

 I got to go on a celebratory trip with my family to 8 different countries in Northern Europe including Russia! And it was one of the absolute best trips I've ever made, mostly because of how much love there was and all the family bonding that occurred <3 #lucky #blessed ;)

-August 2015:

 I came home from my trip in time to finally enjoy the music scene in town (and the gorgeous beach weather)! This was also the month I went to NYC with a group to celebrate a friend's bachelorette. There was a lot happening that month and I was strong enough to handle it woohoo!  

-September 2015: 

 This was the month I got a chance to meet new awesome people, including two iggles IRL :D (if you've read my previous posts about pen- palling you'll know what a huge thing this is for me!)

-October 2015: Halloween month! The best month of any regular year <3 

One of my closest friends and I were finally both healthy enough at the same time to go out and enjoy all the fun Fall activities in the area. I got to participate in a lot of Halloween related activities and meet lots of friends including the iggles again :)

-November 2015: 

 I was gifted by the Universe the chance to go on probably my most life-changing trip so far to Hawaii. This is where life clicked for me and I fell in love with the entire Universe <3 Shaka! This is also the month I unknowingly met my new teacher and was led to my new school.

-December 2015:

Another one of my uncles came to spend the Holidays with us and we just had some Xmas cheer at home. Not a usual thing in my family so it was very appreciated :)

-January 2016: 

 I started the new year in the mountains reconnecting with nature and healthy enough to start snow-shoeing for the first time ever! Also got an all clear from the doctors and got my check-ups much more spaced out and I started my first year of school :D

-February 2016: 

 Met a great new friend! Got to enjoy the beautiful winter festivities around town and got my port removed!! No more hospitals again! :D I was  also given the chance to patch things up with one of the most important souls in my life and celebrate my bday in Nature <3

-March 2016: 

 Life back to normal, going to concerts with my bestie, creating art and doing school work. I also signed with a Manhattan based gallery to represent my photography!! Such a great opportunity :)

-April 2016: 

And we've come full circle, started this month hanging out with my family and I'm ending it celebrating an absolutely amazing year of health! 

Life happened in between, had to do homework I didn't like, argued with people, lost friends, got injured, my apartment flooded, I got caught in the day to day stress of doing and getting things on time, there were days when I would get scared for my health again, put too much pressure on myself, etc... Life is just life, our choices, mind-set and believes are what create the reality we experience, but whatever you're choosing to create I just want to reming everyone and anyone who might be struggling or be scared about life post-chemo, it goes on! Things get better and you get to choose how to live it! 💜

Every day you're on this planet is not a blessing out of nowhere, it is a choice, what will you choose to create and manifest for your next amazing year? Whatever it is, if you get out of your head and believe it, it will happen! And always be willing and open to receive endless surprises and abundance from the universe, believe me it does happen.