In My Vagabond Basket -- Buckinghamshire, England

It's six forty-nine in the morning. I'm starting this post from the dining room area of my English family's home in Buckinghamshire. The red kettle perches atop the double oven, empty wine glasses with red residue add ambience to the wooden counters and a vase of tulips obscures (but not quite) the two coffee machines.

You have a few families throughout Europe these days... but this one... this one will always be very, very special.

I will babysit four small munchkins this morning. I will bake lemon drizzle cake this afternoon. I will enjoy drinks with Bob and Anne this evening. Perhaps I will learn to crochet in the in-betweens.

Yesterday morning commenced with leading Charlotte in a half hour vinyasa flow. We set up our mats side by side and barricaded the living room door against curious dogs and children.

This is one of my favorite gifts to give. 

"I used to be so much stronger," Charlotte mentioned after the practice. "It's amazing how quickly it goes."

"Yeah, but I think you have to trust yourself. I've been feeling really insecure lately because I'm significantly less strong and flexible than I was when I left home, but something Michael said really helped me out -- "Aimee, just trust that your strength will be there when you need it." Maybe you needed something else this month. Maybe something more restorative. You can't judge yourself for needing different things at different times -- just be aware. And trust that your body will be there to support you when and how you need it to."

The children ate breakfast as I worked on a watercolor for Charlotte.

This is quickly becoming one of my favorite gifts to give.

Working with watercolor is a struggle for me. The quick drying nature of the medium forces me to accept strokes as they are and not finagle them into what I presume to be perfection. Unlike malleable oils, my watercolor won't be wet a week later when I discover I've sketched in the eyes incorrectly.

If I just embraced all my mismatched, misaligned body parts, I could be a very poor, inadvertent Picasso.

Then I put down my delicate brushes, picked up a sledgehammer and helped Charlotte demolish one of her brick garden walls that had fallen over during a particularly tumultuous storm.

This is not one of my favorite gifts to give, I thought as I swung the sledgehammer over my head and thwack against the bricks, but it still feels incredible to be able to offer so many different things. Yoga. Massage. Watercolor. Demolition. I'm a hobo handyman.

Violet and Harry wandered up and down the rubble, idly smashing perfectly good bricks into smithereens with small hammers and squabbling about who'd get the privilege of pushing the tiny wheelbarrow to the trailer in the driveway. I tried to avoid pummeling them with the sledgehammer as I goddess squatted and felt the deeply satisfying THUDs sending tremors through my hands and arms. I appreciated how amusing I must have appeared wielding this epic tool whilst wearing sweatpants, a frilly heart-patterned skirt and my timberland boots.

Violet and Harry were kind enough not to comment.

The rest of the day passed quietly. I stopped by Bob and Anne's for a cup of tea and chatted with amiable Bob for half an hour. The Followell family were so touched by the simple postcard I painted of their son that they'd decided to take the tiny painting into a framing shop in Princes Risborough to get it blown up and framed.

Wow... something that took me an evening to paint is providing that much happiness. I thought it would be something they'd smile at and then put in a ziplock bag somewhere. Just goes to show that I'm not in the position to judge the value of what I give. 

Speaking of gifts, Charlotte presented me with an early birthday present last night. She'd gone and gotten me addicted to pinterest and had noticed that I'd created a board called, "In My Vagabond Basket" -- for bits and bobs I can sell whilst on the road.

So she gave me a bag brimming with wire, wire cutters, bracelet attachments and other jewelry making necessities to help get me started.

Life gives me what I need.

I spent the rest of the evening learning how to crochet. And failing miserably.

My hands will be there for me when I need them -- a thought that made me feel moderately better, but didn't keep me from grumbling as I ripped my stitches apart for the 63rd time.

After hours of fumbling, bumbling, I looked at the swatch that resembled a malignant tumor.

One day you will be a beautiful hat that I will sell out of my vagabond basket. Along with painted rocks and sticks and shells and pressed flowers from every part of the world my wayfaring feet lead me.