Things I liked in June
*a non-comprehensive list
Dear Kula Diaries friends,
This is my monthly conglomeration post, where I share a seemingly random mix of things I’ve enjoyed over the past month. I do this for a few reasons:
I love sharing new happenings and discoveries!
It’s a way for me to intentionally focus on things that feel good to think and write about.
What you focus on is what you continue to create and find. Intentionally putting your focus on things that you like is a powerful practice that helps to raise your energy … I highly recommend it as a self-guided tool for cultivating good energy within your own heart.
Ok, here we go!
I got a piano!
I took piano lessons MANY, many years ago… and I’ve wanted a piano for a long time, but it never felt like a high priority to purchase one. My parents own a piano, and when I have visited their house, I usually spend as much time as possible practicing. I find it very relaxing… and it’s also a massive workout for my brain. As a violinist, I’m used to reading music in the treble clef … not the treble AND bass clef (at the same time!). The eye hand coordination of playing piano for me… and reading two different lines of music at once… is hugely challenging and different, but I find it unbelievably restorative and fun.
A few weeks ago, a friend of ours happened to mention that he knew somebody who was giving away a piano… he wondered if I might be interested in it? Immediately, this piano was a YES for me. So, about a week ago, we drove to their home to pick up the piano. With a lot of help, it was loaded into our truck… driven home… and then my (very kind) neighbors assisted with unloading it into our home. I’ve been practicing every single morning and every single evening, and I absolutely LOVE IT! It has brought so much joy into my life to have something to practice…. something that I am, very much, a beginner at doing. As a violinist, I’ve spent almost 40 years playing music in the treble clef. Piano, of course, includes both the treble and the bass clef. I can literally feel my mind stretching as I attempt to read two clefs at the same time — it really is such a challenge for me!
Here’s a short video of me playing Bach’s Prelude in C-Major:
I had a conversation with my mentor, Glory, recently about my tendency to overwork myself. When I feel anxious or restless — particularly if I have ‘nothing to do’ my ‘default habit’ is to try to do more work, in an attempt to soothe my anxiety. This will often temporarily soothe my anxiety by helping me focus on something, but it will ultimately not be restorative or restful. At the end of the day, I’m left feeling dazed and confused and even, sometimes, irritable. Playing the piano, however, is different. It isn’t work… but it does allow me to softly focus on something in a relaxed way — while simultaneously exercising my mind, yet also giving my mind a break from the exhaustive effort of running a business.
Update on Homestead 2:
Over the past year, my husband and I have been collaborating with one of our neighbors to build a tiny little meditation hut on our property. This tiny hut was ‘born’ as an idea when my husband left his job with the railroad. After spending nearly 10 years working odd shifts and barely seeing each other — we realized that we needed to put some effort into focusing on what we actually wanted to create together. We walk every single morning, and we started speaking out loud about some of the things that we were dreaming about doing — and one of those things was building a small meditation nook. But, there was a problem: neither of us knew how to build anything… and I definitely didn’t trust us to learn how to build a tiny hut on a steep slope by watching a few YouTube videos.
As if by magic, a new neighbor moved in down the road … and I was surprised to discover that he had a dream of building tiny huts! We started to talk about what this little hut might look like… we scoped out a location… and *poof*… more than a year later, Homestead 2 is almost finished! It’s been a slowly rolling project for a variety of reasons, but I’ve loved watching it come to life.
Over the past few weeks, we’ve had the pleasure of watching the final touches start to come together for Homestead Two: the beautiful floor and the blue pine walls. It’s not fully finished yet, but last week, I carried my sleeping pad down to the hut and I cracked open the window so that I could listen to the creek and I laid on the ground and just listened to the sounds of nature. Eventually, Homestead Two will have a small futon bed and some meditation cushions. I’m hoping to be able to spend a lot of time down there… doing nothing. Each morning, after I’m finished my walk, I tiptoe down the steep rocky steps to find the secret hut, nestled in the woods. I close my eyes and sense its becoming: everything that it took for this hut to be born from an idea. It is a reminder to me that, in some way, thoughts do become things.
I’m looking forward to watching the final steps of Homestead Two come to life… and I’m looking forward to spending our first night in this little hut… and also for the opportunity to share it with others. It is a remarkably peaceful place, and I feel so truly grateful that I will be able to share this little nook and have a tiny space that will offer such deep rest and reconnection with nature.
Book Update: Dungeon Crawler Carl Series
I’m devastated.
We just finished listening to the last available book in the Dungeon Crawler Carl Series.
Honestly, I don’t know what to do with myself? How can I even exist in my car anymore without hearing about the adventures of Carl and his magic-missile shooting cat named Princess Donut?
It’s been tough. But, I’m hopeful that book 8 is going to be released sometime this year.
If you haven’t read this series of books, it falls into a genre of, ‘Lit RPG’. I’d like to mention that I am not a gamer. I do not play role playing games. I have never played Dungeons and Dragons, and I am not interested in playing Dungeons and Dragons. However, I absolutely LOVED this book series. It’s funny, inappropriate and endlessly entertaining. As the series progressed, the books just kept getting better and better, and the characters became more and more incredible.
If you decide to read these books, I’d like to make an unsolicited suggestion: LISTEN TO THE AUDIOBOOK with Jeff Hays as the narrator. Jeff is a one-man show who does all of the voices and they are so incredible that you will feel like you are watching a movie in your mind. He is, without a doubt, one of the most gifted audio book narrators that I’ve ever listened to, and he brought the story to LIFE.
Overall, this entire series was highly enjoyable and fun… from start to finish. I’m eagerly anticipating the arrival of Book 8!
Two new podcast episodes!
Call me biased, but these are two of my favorite podcast conversations that I’ve ever had. I spoke to Kelly from Fit is Freedom last year, and she just released the episode this past week. Our conversation is really effortless and fun, and it’s also a great primer to peeing outside, if you have any friends who are new to the world of outdoor hygiene (you can listen by clicking on the image):
Secondly, I was interviewed by the incredible Aderonke Bademosi Wilson, who I co-hosted a mindfulness gathering with last month. Aderonke is one of the most wonderful humans that I’ve had the opportunity to meet — she lives in Bermuda, where she is both an abstract fine art photographer and business consultant.
Aderonke’s interview was different than any other podcast interview I’ve ever done, because she asks the same eleven ‘overwhelmingly positive’ questions to each of her guests. These questions are specifically designed to cultivate a sense of uplift and connection — and it resulted in a really beautiful conversation that elicited some new stories and experiences that I’ve never talked about before. I had so much fun with this conversation (it’s honestly one of my favorite interviews ever!), and I hope you love listening to it as much as I enjoyed it! You can listen by clicking on the image below:
Chocolate: Dubai Chocolate from Costco!
Disclaimer: I have NOT tried the n original, viral Dubai Chocolate — which comes in at over $20-30 per bar. I did, however, purchase this bag of ‘Dubai Style’ chocolates from Costco. The original Dubai Chocolate was created by British-Egyptian chocolatier named Sarah Hamouda, the co-founder of Fix Desert Chocolates. Dubai Chocolate contains a scrumptious combination of pistachio and kadayif, which is a type of sweet spun pastry.
Every single night as a part of my evening routine, I usually eat some combination of berries, yogurt and homemade granola … plus, a square of some type of chocolate. Recently, I discovered these small Dubai chocolates from Costco, and I simply cannot get enough of them — they are absolutely scrumptious, and while I have nothing to compare them to, I can completely see why so many people went bonkers over Dubai Chocolate. If you don’t feel like spending a fortune to have a bar shipped to you — I feel like this Costco version is a pretty good substitute.
Dry Shampoo: Amika and Prose
Yes, I do have dry shampoo and building a meditation hut in the very same post.
Confession: I only wash my hair 1x per week. In case you haven’t noticed, my hair is more like a mane than a ‘normal’ head of hair. I have extremely thick, very long hair that I haven’t officially cut since COVID. I learned how to trim my own bangs during the time of no-hair-salons… and, I just haven’t gotten around to going back to get a haircut. Oops!
While I don’t wash my entire head of hair every single day, I do wash my bangs every day, if I’m planning to wear them down. This is a highly technical procedure of shampooing my bangs only during my morning shower, which means I apply a tiny amount of shampoo to just the front of my head. Then, when I get out of the shower, I blow dry my bangs. I’ve discovered that when I don’t wash my full head, my bangs tend to get a bit flat or limp throughout the day, so a few years ago, I started giving them a spritz of dry shampoo after blow drying them (but before I hit them with my mini flatiron). I’ve found two different dry shampoos that I really like: Prose and Amika. Please note that I’m not paid to mention any of these brands, and these are not affiliate links. I only share things that I actually purchase, like and use.
Prose is a powder that is specifically formulated for each individual customer — you have to fill out a survey on their website and they formulate all of their products specifically for you.
The Prose dry shampoo does a great job of absorbing oil (which is really helpful when you have bangs — which tend to get oily from touching the forehead, even if your skin is not particularly oily). This dry shampoo is a powder that ‘poofs’ out of the container when you spritz it … then, I usually comb it through my hair and blow dry a little bit to brush away any ‘powdery’ looking spots. My hair and bangs are left feeling comfortable and dry all day long. Towards the end of the bottle, I do find that it is difficult to squirt out the last few bits of powder, and I’ve had to simply open the bottle and pour a small amount into my hand.
Amika is a brand that I recently purchased when I forgot my normal dry shampoo on a short trip. This is an aerosol dry shampoo that smells amazing and works really well. I’ve noticed that on days when I use it, my bangs ‘fall into place’ very effortlessly, and I never notice any annoying or oily feeling from having hair on my face. By the end of the day, my hair actually still looks pretty good — which is relatively remarkable. Usually, I get annoyed with my bangs and end up putting them up with a clip by the end of the day. On a recent trip to Salt Lake City, the temperatures were over 90 degrees, and my bangs never turned into sloppy strings of hair while using this dry shampoo. I’m pretty sold on it, and I think I’m going to be purchasing a full sized bottle.
Inside the Kula Mailbox
I write a lot of notes to Kula customers… and, as a beautiful side effect of this habit, I receive a lot of really special and meaningful mail right back! This past week, I received a piece of very special mail… a postcard from a Kula fan named Eliza that contained an original painting of an absolutely adorable Kula Cloth themed comic:
Eliza is a student studying textile design and technology, and she took time out of her day to paint this incredible image for me — and it made my day. It’s now neatly displayed above my desk at Kula HQ — as a reminder of why I started this business to begin with: to genuinely connect with folks and to have fun conversations around Leave No Trace and Hygiene.
You can follow Eliza on her Instagram @elizamsweeney or @elizasweeneeytextiles, where she shares photos of her fiber arts journey!
Jasper the Cat: Update
As I sit and write this post, I’m tickled with glee because Jasper just let me pet him! As most of you know, we trapped a feral cat last year on our front porch, and he has been living inside our house since last September. Jasper started out by living in a large cage… then we opened the door to the cage… then he inhabited the entire guest room… and now, he freely wanders our entire house. He loves to sleep on our guest bed or on the couch, and he has developed quite a friendship with Esa, one of our three non-feral cats. As soon as Aaron and I hop into bed in the evening, we can hear Esa and Jasper running all over the house playing together. Yesterday, I watched as Jasper walked into our kitchen and started licking Esa on his head. It’s pretty adorable.
While we are moving around the house, Jasper prefers to stay in a few ‘safe zones’: namely, underneath the dining room table… and underneath our coffee table. He also occasionally enjoys sitting inside the ‘condo’ part of our cat tree. Aaron spends a significant amount of time working with Jasper and petting him, but Jasper has been very resistant to my presence. Nearly every single time I approach, he runs away. But today was different. I don’t know what I did, but I skooched backwards on my butt towards Jasper… gently reached out my hand… and then petted his soft back as he lifted his butt up into the air (as cats do).
It has taken a long time and a lot of work for Jasper to get to this point, but he continually seems to be making progress. He’s a really special addition to our cat herd, and we love having him. At first, I felt some guilt about capturing him and giving him a home — but now, seeing him nestled into the softness of our guest bed… watching him play happily with toys and chase Esa around our house… and knowing that he never has to worry about whether or not he will find a meal… well, that makes me think that maybe, just maybe… he feels as lucky as we do to have him here.
A few final things:
I’m always on the lookout for good dancing music and great meditations, so I wanted to share some of my favorites. Each month I host a dance party for The Kula Diaries subscribers, and a couple of days ago, we danced to this playlist… which I loved:
I’m always trying new meditation options, and recently I’ve been enjoying these soundwave meditations by Shifternity on Insight Timer:
As a final reminder, one of my personal coaches, Hasna Atry (who I’ve mentioned many times in The Kula Diaries), is teaching a class for The Kula Academy. To this day, I take a weekly class with Hasna — and I cannot begin to describe the ways in which she has positively impacted my life. If you are even remotely interested, I would highly recommend this — Hasna is an incredible woman, and I know that this experience will open your mind and heart in a beautifully profound way. She is one of those people who has a pretty special way of moving through the world — and I know that all of us who know her are better for it:
People coming together for public lands:
I won’t focus too much on what I don’t like about The Big Beautiful Bill, because that’s probably pretty obvious: selling 1.2 million acres of public BLM land near ‘population centers’ (i.e. any town with at least 1,000 people) is disappointing, at best.
Over the last few weeks, I’ve had the pleasure of witnessing so many folks speaking up about how important it is to protect our public lands, and the effects of those voices were heard. The original BBB, which contained a proposal to sell more than 300,000,000 acres was changed. Now, it’s back… but it still includes a sell off of 1.2 million acres of public land. This is unacceptable.
If you have 2 minutes of time to spare today, make your voice heard. The Outdoor Alliance has a pre-filled out template so that you can quickly and easily send a letter to your senators … letting them know that you simply do not agree with this sell off of public land. You can find the form here (click on the logo):
As a former park ranger… outdoor enthusiast… and founder of an outdoor gear company, I simply cannot stress the importance of sharing your voice when it concerns public land. Many years ago, I was laid off from my job as a park ranger, and I watched as many of our WA State Parks were closed down due to a state budget crisis. Once these places are gone, they are gone. We do have the collective power to stop this!
Well, friends — that’s it for this month. Of course, there were so many things that I loved throughout the month — and I hope you can reflect back on your month and find a similar list. It’s OK to find joy amidst chaos. It’s OK to be happy — in fact, it is our joy and happiness that provide the fuel for change, resiliency and growth. It doesn’t take much to find a glimmer of good in the world. Shift your lens, even for a moment, and look at a plant… listen to a bird… feel your feet on the ground… sense your breathing… feel your heartbeat. These are deeply beautiful things that are taking place, at all times, around us. May these reasons help us to focus on what we want to create in this world, and may they inspire us to the ways in which we can create it.
Sending you all so much love… today, and all days!
Homestead 2 is so dreamy - I hope to one day take a “weekend” retreat there!
I’m so happy about Jasper! That’s such huge progress! <3
I love the reminder that we can find joy even in chaos. It’s the idea of putting on our own oxygen masks first. When we take care of ourselves, we can show up fully for the world around us. Thanks for the reminder!