1. Flowers in the bathroom. I loved this bunch extra lots.

2. Morning walks. We still have to walk “in town” rather than by the river because of the mosquitoes, so there aren’t as many pictures to share to prove to you how lovely it is to talk a walk with my tiny family before many people are up and out. Sam has had a little bit of a set back, with the same issue he had with his back right leg manifesting now on the left. Hopefully we’ve learned something and it won’t get as bad this time around. No matter what, we’ll do everything we can for him and he has an awesome PT vet.

3. Practice. The drama with Shambhala leadership doesn’t change my devotion to my practice or the benefit I get from it. I’m still here.

4. Four baby dinosaurs, getting bigger every day.

5. My tiny family. I never get bored of just hanging out with them, doing practically nothing.

Sam “helping” me meditate

Bonus joy: Teaching yoga, insurance for our cars and our house stepping up and fixing stuff when a bad storm wrecks it, finding a good home for something I don’t need anymore, laughing with Eric, bumping into friends when I hadn’t expected to see them, our “new” fence, naps, good books (I’m reading Pachinko, a National Book Award Finalist, by Min Jin Lee), and good TV (Netflix just released another season of Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee), and good films (I finally watched The Florida Project and the little girl who played the lead, Brooklynn Prince, is amazing), Palisade peaches, cherries, barbecue, swimming on my back across the pool, my new swim fins, ibuprophen, CBD oil, a cold glass of clean water, getting the laundry done, hanging out with Mikalina, texting with Chloe’ and my brother, the way Carrie gets enraged about the same things I do, good neighbors, meeting new dogs, dark chocolate with salted caramel, butterflies, a soft breeze, the ocean.

1. The color of Robin’s eggs. Eric was able to sneak this photo of the ones in the nest in our lilac bush this morning. I love that something I planted is now keeping this tiny family safe and comfortable, and that there will hopefully be four more robins in the world because of it.

2. Morning walks. Even better, one of them this week was a hike, and Sam and I got to go along. I’ve also done two walks this week without my knee braces.

Post hike nap.

3. I can swim! During my lesson yesterday, I swam on both my belly and my back, with no props. I also floated, which I wasn’t sure I could do, (the secret is relaxing and letting go, duh). Today when we went to the pool, I showed Eric what I could do and was pretty proud of myself. I’m not gonna lie, for at least part of the time I’m still thinking “I’m going to die” but for some of it I can actually allow some joy.

4. My tiny family. This week I made sure to take pictures of Sam, which means I got a few more of him than of Dexter.

5. This tiny human. Her mom was also one of my very favorite babies ever.

Bonus joy: going to lunch at our favorite Chinese restaurant and eating so many appetizers that 90% of my actual meal came home with us and I wasn’t even hungry for dinner and then Eric and I split the leftovers for lunch today (that’s like three meals for the price of one), my coneflowers and lilies are blooming, after I’m done writing this post I’m going to get in bed to read and probably take a nap, going to the movies with Eric (we saw The Incredibles 2, Baby Jack was my favorite, that and the little kids in our row laughing hysterically), a big glass of cold clean water, air conditioning (it was 100 degrees here yesterday), my new race flippers for swimming, how quiet it is swimming on my back across the pool, Pilates, Wild Writing, being able to cross “clean out the garage” off the to-do list (until next time), meditating and writing in the morning, how cool it is in the morning with the whole house fan on even when it gets so hot during the day, how soft the dogs are after getting a bath, good books, good (and dumb so you don’t have to work too hard) movies, one of my favorite podcasts in season again (Put Your Hands Together, a comedy show hosted by Cameron Esposito and Rhea Butcher), Pop Tarts, good food and giggles with good friends.