November Gratitude Challenge | Day 4

i crumble today, heading head first down a big black hole.

i block everyone out but the dog, and retreat to safety.

i allow myself to feel, and let my emotions flow; i write

and i cry. i see how miscommunications can so easily

lead to misunderstandings. i don't lay blame, but rather acknowledge the raw feelings and why they are there.

i use tools, that i have learned from wise teachers and pull from

past experiences.hoping to find release and light.

slowly the pain eases and some possibilities arise.

i understand i can change my mind tomorrow, but for right now

it seems right.

 

i am grateful for noticing, grateful for moving through the pain

and into the light. grateful i did not hit force quit like i use to.

grateful for the beauty i find every day in this life.

  

tiny things i noticed. . .

a one lone rose in the yard, how good it feels to wrap my hand around a warm cup of tea, juice from my apple dripping down my hand, the smell of root vegetables braising, packing for a gathering, how good the dog is at licking away tears and how beautiful the fog was laying over the river this afternoon.

~words and image by Cathy Sly

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today is the fourth day of our november gratitude challenge, where we are featuring an image and text from the hello there, friend community. details are on our blog. if you'd like to play along, there's still plenty of time! you can sign up on the blog or using the link in our instagram profile. we'd love to have you! b + L

November Gratitude Challenge | Day 3

i'm in the midst of embracing middle age, and feeling grateful for being able to shed many of the rituals and regimens of trying to appear youthful. it is freeing up time in my life and space in my medicine cabinet.

 ~words and image by Tara

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today is the third day of our november gratitude challenge, where we are featuring an image and text from the hello there, friend community. details are on our blog. if you'd like to play along, there's still plenty of time! you can sign up on the blog or using the link in our instagram profile. we'd love to have you! b + L

November Gratitude Challenge | Day 2

Have I always been grateful (enough)? I'd like to think so. But I'm not sure, especially in my younger days. So much I took for granted. Still do, perhaps.

 
The years tacked onto my life are a gift in this way. The gradual accumulation of days lived and subsequent wisdom gained. 

While making this photo, there was a breeze which I hadn't known from inside my house. It wasn't felt until I stepped outside, until I was trying to frame this shot. Today's breeze didn't stop for me; it kept blowing. It was I who had to wait for it. Patiently. Had to wait for it to still for just a moment. So that I could press the shutter. So that the leaves and the air and I were together in that moment.

Still. And *in it*. fully. I didn't know how to do this in my younger days, but I'm more aware now. This is my gratitude practice. To get still. To be in it as fully as I am able. Breeze or no breeze.

                                                                           

 ~words and image by Michelle GD.

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today is the second day of our november gratitude challenge, where we are featuring an image and text from the hello there, friend community. details are on our blog. if you'd like to play along, there's still plenty of time! you can sign up on the blog or using the link in our instagram profile. we'd love to have you! b + L

November Gratitude Challenge | Day 1

Especially since I had my youngest son, I dread fall. I can't even see the beauty of it, because all I can think about is that it is going to be winter at any moment. I feel myself getting sad, feeling like I will be locked inside the house for a whole season, and all of the coats and outerwear that having three children requires. This year, I am forcing myself to stop and look, appreciate what I am seeing, and stay outside as long as possible. This year, I am grateful for not only the beauty of fall, but that I can SEE the beauty of fall.

                                                                           

 ~words and image by Misty Prochaska.

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today is the first day of our november gratitude challenge, where we are featuring an image and text from the hello there, friend community. details are on our previous post. if you'd like to play along, there's still plenty of time! you can sign up on the blog or using the link in our instagram profile. we'd love to have you! b + L

November Gratitude Challenge!

Why, hello there! (Yes, we’re talking to you, our readers and beloved audience. Hi!)

Over the last year, we’ve been brainstorming ways to include more voices and experiences into our blog, and how we can build community within our readership. From this, we launched our guest posts in the spring and they’ve been an amazing addition to hello there, friend.

But we want more: more community. more gratitude, more voices. So we’re excited to announce that our November Gratitude Challenge will start on November 1. And we want you to participate!

For the month, we plan to take a break from our regular exchange and feature members from our community. We’ve set up a private Flickr group where we invite you to share photographs + text about gratitude all month long. We’d like you to participate as often as you can, challenging yourself to find gratitude every day. Each day, we’ll choose one community member’s post to share on the blog and our Instagram account. Sound like fun? We think so.

You can sign up here on our website or using the link in our IG profile. Once you’re signed up, you’ll receive an email invitation to the private Flickr group (and a few extra goodies from us).

We are so grateful for all of you and can’t wait to celebrate this month of gratitude with you!

xo,

beth + Lindsay

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hello there, friend,

when i was a new mother, i was desperate for companionship, connection, and validation. i wanted women in my life who i could be honest with. i wanted to know that i was not alone. i was lucky enough to find a tribe of women who who were a lifeline to me. although our parenting styles were quite different, as were our beliefs and values, what brought us together was our desire to be heard. we weren't afraid to talk about what was hard, we laughed and cried with each other. we became like family to each other.

i thought for sure when my kids were older that i would have more time to cultivate relationships with women, but i've found the opposite to be true. it's harder than ever to find the time, and although i don't have the same desperation i had when i was a new mom, i continue to crave community and friendship with like minded women. i still want to know i'm not alone. i still want to be heard and understood.

in some ways our desire in writing here is to cultivate community. we explore what it means to be a woman - whether wife or mother, sister, daughter, friend. the ultimate gift, as you say, is to know you aren't alone. we all struggle to live a life with integrity. we are all finding our way and my hope is that we can help each other as we go... because we're all in this together.

xo,
b

p.s. don't forget to sign up for our november gratitude challenge and our newsletter either by using the link in our IG profile or using the signup feature on the blog. and please, check your spam/junk mail folder for an email from us!! (that's where mine went!)

Hello there, friend,

This morning I spent some time with a friend and another younger woman who was a new mom. It's funny how seasoned I feel after just a few years of this gig. It's also funny how desperately I wanted to encourage this woman, to tell her that it's so very hard on each and every one of us, that every day is a push or a pull, but that these little people make it all worthwhile. She was feeling discouraged and overwhelmed, and I kept thinking, does this feeling ever go away?

What I know is this: we need other women around us to encourage us. We need people to point to the good and the lovely, to notice not just the beautiful things about our lives but that we are beautiful too. We need people who can see us. What a gift to be able to do that for someone else. What a gift to be able to say, this is my experience and maybe it's yours too. That somehow we can share enough to let someone else to know they're not alone. And that we might not feel quite so alone too.

xo,
L