BeGood Haul by molly-robles featuring cowgirl boots

Easily my favorite BeGood Purchase:  4Sight Adventurer Sunnies!

For every pair of sunglasses you buy, they give a new pair of
 corrective glasses to a person in need.

Uniqlo faux leather jacket
uniqlo.com
I mostly decline to buy new leather because it feels like I'm funding a creature's demise.  

Uniqlo
uniqlo.com  
Its hard to tell in the picture, but they are jodhpur style knit pants.  A cozy au-courant alternative to leggings :)

Laredo cowgirl boots
amazon.com
I heart my cowgirl boots so much <3 small="">

Vintage '90's cross-body Coach bag from ThriftTown in San Francisco.  What a score!

East Of India Into Each Day Large Framed Wall Art, Paper/Wood
amazon.com
Word.

Aurelie Cowl Neck Top Dark Lavender
amourvert.com
Organic cotton deliciousness purchased at BeGood in SF.

Organizing, Part 2: S.P.A.C.E.

This is my bare bones method for organizing of any sort.  It has transformed my hectic world into a fluid & fun experience!  The S.P.A.C.E. concept is something I learned from brilliant organizing guru Julie Morgenstern, author of Organizing from the Inside Out.  This system reduces each item in your world to its purpose in your life, creating vacuous space and facilitating fluid function. YAY!

First, thou shalt analyze the area to be made magnificent.  Refer to Organizing Part 1: Get Real with Your Needs.

Sort

Pull out everything in the chosen area and sort strictly according to how you use each item....K....

Purge

Recycle, throw out or archive or store anything that hasn't been used recently.........Mmmmkay...

Assign a Home

Group the keepers according to how you use them and assign them homes where you use them.  Use sticky notes.  Now you will know what, if any, storage container-y things you might need to get.  Make a list.  *I will list my favesie organizers for different areas of the home in a future bloggy thingy.

Contain

Get the containers you need, put your goodies in them. Put the goodies where they go. Label them if there is even the slightest doubt about the obviousness of what goes where. Labels on people: Not Good. Labels on people's stuff: Way Good. *teehee*

Equalize

Keep up on the putting of things in their places day by day. Your system is set to make

that easy, so stay committed. A space for everything and everything in its space! 

Live it, love it, DO IT!!!  It will make your life so fluid.  YAY!!!

Organizing Part 1: Get Real with your Needs

You have to get real with what your needs are before properly organizing any space, especially your personal clothing closet because it's such an extension of you. This is time to get out a sheet of paper and actually list or bubble graph (my fave) answers to each of the 4 questions that follow.

What works for you? What are the areas you know you got it going on, both in life and in the area you are organizing? What about this space makes you smile?

What doesn't work for you? What are you consistently misplacing? Is there any thing you never have a place for? Is there anything that you can't do because of the clutter? How do the disorganized spaces make you feel? If people visit,

do you sketch out about what they might see?

What is super crucial to you? What makes you? What moves you? What do you need to have ready to go at any given time?

Why are you doing this? Make a list or graph or collage or something like that of all the blessed lightness you will enjoy when your space is organized. Hang it in the space until the project is done (or keep it up if its pretty).

Now you will have real intention behind your organizing project & it will be fun & enlightening, & long term functional. YAY!!!! 

Making Kombucha Home Brew

So, recently I had an excessively fermented kombucha scoby and a buildup of empty store bought kombucha bottles in the recycling bin.   This was my cue to get back into home brewing kombucha- it's the best anyways.

Here you see a close up of the overgrown scoby. 

Like everything, it starts with water:
Boil water.  Make tea.  Dissolve sugar into tea.  Allow to cool completely.  Pour into glass gallon jar.  Add scoby & mother liquid.  Top off with water to fill jar.

This is the original recipe I got from the local soul sister that gave me my original kombucha culture 2 years ago.

I used 3 green and 3 black tea bags. I used organic unbleached white sugar even though I've heard straight white sugar works the best because its so purified.  I should note that everything I used in the process I cleaned with white vinegar first.  Vinegar is awesome for cleaning!!!

The brew.  In three weeks I will have some magical living tea!  Yay!!!!  I'll keep you posted....

Closet Upgrade

So I couldn't bear to post a before picture. Too much exposure. Just trust me, it was chaos. Random mishmash of plastic hangers has been over for a while.  I upgraded to black no-slip hangers a year ago. But since summer, everything needed resetting.

I hung tops, dresses and trousers on the low bar and sweaters and coats on the high bar.

I hung a jewelry organizer on the open part of the back wall. An over-the-door hook set hangs purses and scarves I think I'll want to pull this season.  I have a gazillion shelves, compliments of The Closet Lover.  I folded pullovers and hoodies and put them on the chest level shelf. Naturally, I put pants on the two shelves below the sweaters.

On the inside of the other door (they're french style, opening out) I hang my steam pressing pad- I steam most of my clothes before wearing.

I put luggage and out of season items I don't want to part with on the way up high shelf. Also, grubby work clothes have their own shelf, up high but in reach. I got cheapo adhesive hooks at AceIsThePlace and hung hats in any remaining spaces.  Petitioning the landlord & The Closet Lover to build me a shoe rack.

 Getting dressed is so easy breezy now. 

Running Away With Myself

I am completely floored by this new running technique. It's a timeless concept, but the book by ultra marathoner Danny Dreyer has been around since 2004. There is a book, and audio guide, a DVD & a whole interwebby world ChiLiving.com that hosts a companion Chi Walking program & a bunch of wellness resources.

So you're familiar with the chi concept, right? Well, chi is our life force and the living force in all things. Immeasurable wavelengths of chi flow within and between and around and (insert preposition) ______________ all things. Hey, what's a preposition? Anywhere the chi can flow. Hahaha.

Chi is constantly in motion. Tensions obstruct or skew its powerful flow. The manifestation of that in the body is stress and inflammation. Those things are notorious demons to runners. All athletes really. Heck, All people really!

The Chi Running idea works the tai chi concept of energy connectivity and flow. Your whole body can move and flow fast and smooth by releasing tensions and connecting your chi with the chi of everything around you in a balanced and circuitous motion.

So running Chi Running style is just assuming a 1 legged pose & falling forward. Letting your instinct prevent your fall, you assume the same pose on the other side. Lower legs and small muscle groups are left relaxed & the big core muscle groups do the work so your joints don't get thrashed by static pavement pounding. The middle of your foot strikes the ground, protecting your ankles & knees. All of the jerky bouncing is replaced by smooth circular motions & you go way farther, faster, without fatigue.

Posture is super important. If you keep very centered and long you avoid being a wobbly wheel on the road- or as I like to say, "running all wonky". I pretend that the crown of my head is hanging from a cable & my spine & neck hang like a cord from my head. From this hangs my fountain of chi- the hip carriage. The cable, in my mind pivots from a central point in the solar plexus zone, between heart, navel & middle spine.

I got a lot of cool visualizations from the Chi Running audio guide (available as a CD or .mp3). The one about the turning of the internal wheel at that solar plexus pivot point strikes me as total genius. I picture a wheel powered by breath & heart that turns me down my path. If my wheel is aligned, it glides smoothly wherever I will it. The four corner connecting points for my limbs become cog-like extensions of that main wheel.

I picture my inner cougar, too. I empathize & imagine myself like the mountain lions that are naturally perfectly adapted to moving swiftly in this environment. I feel myself being supple and relaxed as well a s strong and intentional, just like a real cougar!

Chi Running & focus on running & form & the juju of it all totally renews my motivation to move! I feel like this is a precious gem of knowledge & I want to share it with you so we can all be out there enriching life by running with understanding & flow.

If you've ever been vaguely interested in running, you should check this scene out. It's completely amazing. If you see me on the road, high-five!

Light & Lovely Banana Omega Muffins

Omegas From Coconut Oil, Walnut, Hemp Seeds & Eggs Make Epic Breakfast Muffins

1 3/4 Cup Pamela's Wheat Free Gluten Free Baking Mix*
1/2 Cup Raw Agave Nectar
4 Tablespoons Softened or Melted Coconut Oil
4 Organic Omega Eggs, beaten
1 Teaspoon Organic Vanilla Extract
1 Cup Mashed Bananas
1/4 Cup Hulled Hemp Seeds
1/2 Cup Walnuts

Gotta Thank Grammy for the Square Muffin Tin- Loves <3

Hearty, but not heavy or grainy.

Just Sweet Enough

Da Dank! Loaded with Omegas and gently sweetened with agave & bananas. I wish I could make a zillion & give them to everyone, but I gotta settle for sharing the recipe & enjoying some feedback (& some taste testers maybe?). Mmmmmmm......can't type..... .....eating muffins.

Maybe One More...They're Super Healthy

*Pamela's Baking Mix Ingredients:  Brown Rice Flour, White Rice Flour, Cultured Buttermilk, Natural Almond Meal, Tapioca Starch, Sweet Rice Flour, Potato Starch, Grainless & Aluminum Free Baking Powder, Baking Soda, Sea Salt, Xanthan Gum
I use Pamela's for freaking everything!  It is so good & light & delicious.  Divine for pancakes & waffles (I had given up on both as too heavy until I discovered Pamela's).  I double the eggs on all the recipes to make sure my vegetarian young people get protein & omega fatty acids.