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Jennifer Searls

Window Thinking

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January 31, 2014

January 2014 Reading

Reading

After turning in my best reading year ever, it felt like 2014 got off to a really slow start. At the end of the first week I had only completed one book and it was a Little House on the Prairie read aloud I’d started with the boys in December! David enjoyed the lead and …

Read moreJanuary 2014 Reading
January 21, 2014

My Reflections on NYT Article: The Art of Presence

Window Thinking

This NYT article The Art of Presence came through my twitter feed today and the headline stopped me. As I read the article I flooded with memories and resonance. Do be there. Don’t compare, ever. Do bring soup. Do not say “you’ll get over it.” Do be a builder.  Don’t say it’s all for the …

Read moreMy Reflections on NYT Article: The Art of Presence
January 6, 2014

2013 Reading Reflections

Reading

2013 was an amazing year of reading for me. I read 121 books; 94 authors. On New Year’s Eve my sisters, who read stacks of books themselves, asked for an infographic of my list and no doubt that would have been easier to read than this rambling and rather random review….. Genre: 18 Memoirs 75 books fiction/historical fiction …

Read more2013 Reading Reflections
December 1, 2013

Presence: Light for the Journey

Grief, Window Thinking

Thanksgiving landed on the calendar quite late this year. Today marked the final day of the Thanksgiving holiday even as it also marked the first Sunday in Advent. I was born the Tuesday before Thanksgiving, nearly a month too early. My lungs were not ready so I spent my first days in an incubator connected …

Read morePresence: Light for the Journey
September 30, 2013

Hiking Arctic Valley

Alaska, hiking

Gorgeous fall colors, mild temperatures (low 50s) and the promise of clouds opening to sun rather than rain inspired our family out for a hike yesterday. I’ve been frustrated with my seemingly slow recovery from endometriosis surgery, but it’s been a month now and I was ready for this challenge. We could have gone any …

Read moreHiking Arctic Valley
July 10, 2013

Byrd Baylor: A Portal to My Childhood or A Glimpse into my Future

Window Thinking

I think I discovered Byrd Baylor’s books when I was teaching a 4th grade geology unit. From Everybody Needs A Rock: Everybody needs a rock. I’m sorry for kids who don’t have a rock for a friend. I’m sorry for kids who only have tricycles bicycles horses elephants goldfish three-room playhouses fire engines wind-up dragons …

Read moreByrd Baylor: A Portal to My Childhood or A Glimpse into my Future
July 9, 2013

Turning Pages To This Year. This Day.

brain injury, Window Thinking

Mid June – July is littered with  markers for events that have changed my life. On June 19, David and I celebrated 15 years of marriage. This is what I worked on, but unfinished, I never posted: It was an awkward love, Ours. Victims of small-town matchmaking drawn together by a mysterious Love that would not …

Read moreTurning Pages To This Year. This Day.
July 8, 2013

Practicing Hope With Maggie

Reading, Window Thinking

So I like to read. A lot. In eager anticipation of her visit to Loussac Library tomorrow I’ve been reading Linda Sue Park’s books to my boys and last week in Keeping Score I read this description: The library at Grand Army Plaza was one of Maggie’s favorite places. mom had taken her there ever …

Read morePracticing Hope With Maggie
May 17, 2013

Evidence of Things Not Seen

Alaska, Window Thinking

I read Anne Lamott’s latest book Help, Thanks, Wow: The Three Essential Prayers during a stretch of gorgeous March weather. The days here in Anchorage were getting longer, the sky was blue and the sun was shining. One afternoon Ethan and I even squeezed fresh lemonade and set it outside to chill. There were still …

Read moreEvidence of Things Not Seen
May 14, 2013

Taking Off My Shoes and Finding Home

Window Thinking

Country Road take me home, to the place I belong….. John Denver In April we flew to Oregon and spent 2+ weeks fully immersed in an unusually warm and absolutely glorious Oregon spring. We left piles of Alaska snow and a string of days stretched backward to months spanning a very long, white and cold winter. …

Read moreTaking Off My Shoes and Finding Home
April 5, 2013

Leaning In & Looking Back

Alaska, Window Thinking

The other day I watched through the window as an older lady and her caregiver navigated the narrow path of dry, bare pavement that etched its way through our snowy, ice-packed street. The older lady was using a walker to aid her steps and all of the sudden I remembered: This picture was taken the …

Read moreLeaning In & Looking Back
March 13, 2013

Hanging Out My Laundry: thankyouthankyouthankyou!!

brain injury, Reading, Window Thinking

Ethan and I were in the hospital the morning after his birth when the doctor on call for our family practice clinic came to check on him. I was surprised to see this doctor because he did not practice in our clinic, but at a clinic in a nearby town. He’s a long time family …

Read moreHanging Out My Laundry: thankyouthankyouthankyou!!
March 10, 2013

I’m Pregnant But Don’t Tell My Mom: A Broken Hallelujah

brain injury, Grief, Window Thinking

I had a bunch of broken ribs when I was pregnant with Ethan. I have no memory of the car accident that broke the ribs, but I remember the first trimester + broken ribs. I found out I was pregnant the day before the accident. After a long, hot June Saturday tromping through central Oregon …

Read moreI’m Pregnant But Don’t Tell My Mom: A Broken Hallelujah
March 1, 2013

Marking 6 Months and Finding Home

Window Thinking

The word home summons up a place….that you have rich and complex feelings about, a place where you feel, or did feel once, uniquely at home, which is to say a place where you feel you belong and that in some sense belongs to you, a place where you feel that all is somehow ultimately …

Read moreMarking 6 Months and Finding Home
February 19, 2013

Build A Bear Snow Child: Living the Adventure

Reading

My favorite lines in The Hobbit come at the very beginning of the story when Gandalf seeks out Bilbo and asks him to join him on an adventure: I am looking for someone to share in an adventure that I am arranging, and it’s very difficult to find anyone. I should think so–in these parts! …

Read moreBuild A Bear Snow Child: Living the Adventure
February 15, 2013

Hope In Half A Banana

Grief, Window Thinking

I think we lose sight of the beauty, the most beautiful things I look back on in my life are coming out from underneath things I didn’t know I could get out from underneath. You know, the moments I look back in my life, and think, those were the moments that made me — were …

Read moreHope In Half A Banana
February 11, 2013

Joyfully Living in Maximum Slope

Alaska, Seasons

In the seemingly endless grey days of a typical Portland winter I struggle with seasonal affective disorder and a few winters ago I began using  this lamp to help me cope. Needless to say, when we moved to Alaska I packed it with an anxious eye toward the infamous short days ahead. In the heart of our …

Read moreJoyfully Living in Maximum Slope
February 10, 2013

#alaskamagic

Alaska

Last weekend I snapped this picture with my phone and uploaded it to Facebook: “Awesome way to start the day.” It was 10:30 on a blue-sky Saturday morning in Anchorage, Alaska. While the boys skied with their jr nordic peers, David and I headed out on the trails ourselves. Indeed, it was an awesome way to start …

Read more#alaskamagic
February 1, 2013

Losing the Map and Finding the Way Home

brain injury, Window Thinking

I saw a picture of a handsome curly-haired birthday boy on Facebook last week. When his Teacher-Mom took her maternity leave 10 years ago, I took my first teaching job – hired to teach her 4th grade class. I loved teaching. The challenges, the relationships, the creativity, the opportunities. My imagination easily skipped ahead and framed …

Read moreLosing the Map and Finding the Way Home
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