of my world here at the beach
… click to embiggen
and for others participating in My World, Outdoor Wednesday,
Watery Wednesday, Midweek Blues,
and Thursday Thirteen

South Breeze Farm hosted the Giving Thanks Challenge and I participated at Small Reflections in November of 2008 and decided to continue indefinitely … generating the following list one day at a time throughout the month of August. I’ve decided to transfer the lists at the end of each month from Small Reflections to Happily Retired Gal … just because. Click to see previous lists already published here.
1. for the pair of season’s tickets to the Pacific Chorale concerts that I won in a drawing. The first concert on Sunday evening was magnificent 😉
2. I was home with ‘L’ called this morning to let me know she was going to be in the area and wanted to meet for breakfast. We had a wonderful visit and a tasty meal.
3. I had time & opportunity to REST today when I realized I wasn’t feeling top-notch … and that the Vitamin C, chicken soup, extra water and rest seemed to stave off whatever bug was trying to take hold.
4. I managed to finish creating Peace Globes and posts for each of my blogs in time to post before I went to class tonight.
5. for all those participating in today’s Blog Blast for Peace: Dona Nobis Pacem.
6. for wonderful ‘catch up’ cell phone visits with ‘C’ and my sister … both of whom are traveling in RVs with their husbands.
7. I’ve managed to stay ‘functional’ …(if not totally healthy)… by mindfully limiting my activities the past week or so.
8. the folks (vacationing from New York) renting the house next door for a month seem friendly and have two standard poodles — Katie, the elder white one, is standoffish but Molly likes to play with Ned, the young black male 😉
9. I managed to visit the grocery store today so I’ve got fresh produce in the house again … finally!
10. for what I learned in my first ‘Fix Your Own Computer’ class tonight … and for the lessons to follow. Hopefully I’ll figure out what causes my Dell 1720 laptop to crash so regularly and get it fixed … finally 😉
11. Service Champions checked out my furnace this morning so I can turn it on to take the ‘edge off’ on chilly mornings again.
12. for my DVR so I can fast- forward through commercials when I do watch televised programs … saving about 20 minutes out of every 60 to use for other endeavors.
13. Stephen King has written and published a new book … I’m looking forward to reading it 😉
14. for a fun catch up phone visit with my writing buddy from Taos this morning and a beautiful warm sunny day outside as I watered my overly dry yard.
15. my sister called last night after having no cell signal for the several days.
16. to reconnect with a former student in the Jury Pool yesterday … we had a nice chat before getting sent to a court room for Jury selection that will continue tomorrow morning at 9am. So far I’m still in the audience watching and listening … so I guess we’ll see what happens next.
17. that even though I was selected for a jury, we were released in time for me to drop by home to feed the fur-kids and still make it to my my evening Adult School class by 6pm. It was a LONG day, but I managed to stay focused until 9pm and drive home safely.
18. California courts are ‘dark’ on Wednesdays giving me the day off because tomorrow will be another LONG day starting with Jury Duty and ending with an Adult School class from 6-9pm again. Hopefully I’ll have time to drop by home to feed the fur-kids between the two activities.
19. after coming down with the flu yesterday morning and coping with nasty symptoms throughout the night, I was able to keep a few soda crackers and a bit of chicken soup down … then sleep this afternoon … finally.
20. that (although not totally healthy yet) I’m feeling much improved this morning and even managed to create a Haiku Sky Watch Friday post at Sacred Ruminations using a mosaic I created last week … though I don’t know how much energy I’ll have to visit blogs today because my head hurts. I’m hopeful the trial continued yesterday without me since there was an alternate juror, but no one called me back after I called in sick.
21. to be feeling MUCH better today!
22. my sister called and we had a nice catch up visit on the phone … they’re visiting with friends in Northern California and will spend Thanksgiving in McKinleyville.
23. I had energy enough to take Molly to Dog Beach in the morning and to the groomer in the afternoon … so she’s clean, soft & sweet smelling for the holidays 😉
24. I went to the Water Store today because it will be closed tomorrow through the weekend. I also did my grocery shopping today and saved almost $50 with coupons!
25. to be celebrating my 1st Blogoversary at Happily Retired Gal, my WordPress blog.
26. for phone calls from family & friends today.
27. I walked down to the beach to watch and photograph this afternoon’s glorious sun set over the ocean.
28. the laptop didn’t crash during the 6 hours it took to make a full backup of my PSE6 catalog.
29. my sister and her husband are finally headed for home and should arrive in a couple of weeks so we’ll spend Christmas together this year. Hopefully they’ll stay here for a while before hitting the road again.
30. I’ve kept this daily gratitude list for 13 months. I’m trying to decide whether or not to continue the practice. Guess I’ll see what I do tomorrow 😉
FYI – My previous Gratitude Lists can be found here at Happily Retired Gal, my WordPress site. It is my intention to keep this ‘Daily Gratitude List’ in my sidebar indefinitely because I believe it makes sense to focus on what’s right in our lives regularly. Click for:
2009 Lists – October, September, August, July, June, May, April, March, February, January
2008 Lists – December, November
“The beautiful thing about learning is that no one can take it away from you.” B.B. King
Click for comments at the TOP of the post under the title, rather than at the bottom ;–)
39 comments
Comments feed for this article
December 1, 2009 at 9:46 am
Louise Cannon
Oh, the beach. I so often wish that were MY world! Never-ending beauty!
December 1, 2009 at 5:00 pm
Eileen
I love your beach photos, very pretty. It looks like you have been very busy.
December 1, 2009 at 5:17 pm
rebecca
Ooohhh I like your new header! And the pics of the dogs playing in the water looks so fun!
December 1, 2009 at 5:28 pm
Ebie
I have been to the beach last weekend too! The weather cooperated! Beautiful photos and love the dogs playing!
Happy one year anniversary to your blog!
December 1, 2009 at 5:34 pm
Carver
Looks like a fun time on the beach for dogs and humans alike. Great shots.
December 1, 2009 at 6:05 pm
Pam
Your beach scenes are delightful. We are so lucky to live be the sea and be able the enjoy such pleasurable sights.
December 1, 2009 at 8:26 pm
Martha
I love watching dogs on the beach, they have so much fun.
December 1, 2009 at 8:32 pm
quiltworks
great collage! I like the doggy silluettes!
… Visit my contribution “Martha’s Vineyard Sunset”
December 1, 2009 at 9:45 pm
Carletta
Such lovely beach scenes! It has turned cold here with some snow forecast for later this week so I really enjoyed seeing these warm happy photos. 🙂
Thanks for the Welcome Back.
December 1, 2009 at 10:15 pm
sallie (FullTime-Life)
lovely beaches. And I enjoyed your gratitude list, which somehow I’d missed up until now. A good idea! I hope you are still feeling better and that you enjoy your visit with your sister and b-i-l when they get there.
December 1, 2009 at 10:56 pm
Evelyn
Lovely set of photos
December 1, 2009 at 10:57 pm
Japa
The beach is always a fun place. These bunch of shots are amazing and wonderful.
December 1, 2009 at 11:56 pm
ladyfi
Oh lucky you – sun, sea and sand!
December 2, 2009 at 12:05 am
Gattina
I wished I could “run” (lol) over the beach too !
December 2, 2009 at 7:19 am
gengen
Oh they are very pretty beach is fun. Happy watery Wednesday.
December 2, 2009 at 7:28 am
Sheila
Lovely beach scenes! It’s pretty chilly here right now, and when it gets this way, I miss the beach. Sorry you’ve been sick and hope you stay warm.
I enjoyed reading your gratitude info. That’s so neat!
Happy Outdoor Wednesday…
XO,
Sheila 🙂
December 2, 2009 at 8:03 am
Nicci
I love the photos. It makes me feel so peaceful. I also love the gratitude list.
December 2, 2009 at 8:45 am
hip chick
Lovely pictures of the beach. Here on the East coast it’s to cold for those types of beach shots.
December 2, 2009 at 10:16 am
Riet
YOur pictures and mosaics are beautiful
December 2, 2009 at 10:30 am
seniorhiker
These are great mosaics (both versions) of pictures for Outdoor Wednesday. You have a wonderful gratitude list as well.
December 2, 2009 at 11:06 am
bj
I love this post…all that water is so awesome….
Thanks so much for stopping by to see me today…
Isn’t Christmas FUN !!!
xo bj
December 2, 2009 at 12:23 pm
moorebloglife
those lovely blue skies look wonderful. We started out to day with clouds and they are clear another thing to be grateful for in sunny Calif 😉
December 2, 2009 at 1:56 pm
Sally
I love, love, love blue skies and palm trees!
December 2, 2009 at 2:19 pm
aviewfromme
What a world! Love the beach and that beautiful water. Man I would just be there each and every day! I would be grateful each and every day for that. ~Jeanne
December 2, 2009 at 2:31 pm
Joe Todd
Can’t count the times I’ve made a “gratitude list” and you know how much I like the beach. Thanks for the post
December 2, 2009 at 4:26 pm
Mary
Your collages and the photos you used to assemble them are wonderful. Thanks for sharing them with us. I hope you are having a wonderful Outdor Wednesday.
December 3, 2009 at 6:06 am
dianne
one of the happiest scenes in the world is dogs running on the beach
December 3, 2009 at 7:27 am
sandy
lovely collage as always how do you do it so well sandy
December 3, 2009 at 9:10 am
CountryDew
That beach looks very inviting! And I loved your gratitude list. It really helps to take stock of things sometimes.
December 3, 2009 at 9:10 am
calicocrazy
Those are gorgeous beach photos, I miss the beach. ~ Calico Contemplations
December 3, 2009 at 10:06 am
Alice Audrey
You are so lucky to live near the beach.
December 3, 2009 at 11:09 am
Heather
Beautiful beach photos, though they are so at odds with the snow blowing across your page. Speaking of, there are rumors we could see our first ‘real” snow of the year today. I keep checking the window, lol.
December 3, 2009 at 11:44 am
Pamela M. Kramer @ A Renaissance Woman
WOW – The beach is your backyard? Great shots.
December 3, 2009 at 11:51 am
Shelley Munro
Beautiful photos. There’s nothing better than walking on the beach unless it’s walking on the beach with my dog.
December 3, 2009 at 1:07 pm
Brenda ND
I love your pictures. You make me want to visit. Thanks.
December 3, 2009 at 3:18 pm
celticlibrarian
I love the running Doggies one. 😀
December 3, 2009 at 4:32 pm
Hazel
Nice pictures, the watery wednesday shots especially caught my attention. The giving thanks challenge is a great meme. Releasing gratitude from our hearts is therapeutic.
December 7, 2009 at 3:49 pm
carly
Great shots straight out of the camera. I love beach shots!
December 7, 2009 at 6:54 pm
Kathiesbirds
Very sparkly and shiny and wonderfully wet in your world!