Hygge Holiday Challenge ~ first update

Dec. 1 ~ start a gratitude list

• Three children ~ Barbara, Sandra, and David.
• Seven grandchildren ~ Kendall, Cali, Brandy, Kenzie, Chase, Jamey, and Cady.
• Six great-grandchildren ~ Raegan, Jaxon, Shelby, Jonathan, Micah, and Shiloh.

Dec. 2 ~ add relaxing scents

I lit a vanilla-scented candle and bought a new hand soap scented with coconut water and mango to use in the kitchen.  I'm already using hand soap in the bathroom that's lavender-scented.

Dec. 3 ~ more gratitude

Since I'm retired, the challenge on the list makes no sense for me:  "sleep in 15 mins or more."  I can do that any day.  Instead, I'll add to my gratitude list.

Randi Schenberg

I'm very grateful for the Crown Center for Senior Living for being the great place for active retirees that it is.  That means being thankful for the wonderful people on the staff and the board.  Randi Schenberg, the Community Relations Director, was the first person I met at the Crown Center, when I applied to live here.  In February, Randi was given the 2017 JProStl Pillar Award, and I posted a 2-minute video about it on this blog.  Thanks, Randi, for your smiles and all you do for the Crown Center!

Dec. 4 ~ learn a new skill

I'm still trying to learn how to operate my new computer.  I've been very annoyed trying to use Windows 10.  Oops!  Being annoyed is not very "hyggeligt" ― it doesn't create a cozy environment.  I'll get someone to help me with the new laptop, but not today.  I'm going to get comfy, instead, and read a book.

Dec. 5 ~ get the Hygge book

I went to the University City Library and got a copy of The Little Book of Hygge: Danish Secrets to Happy Living by Meik Wiking.  Loosely translated, hygge is a sense of comfort, togetherness, and well-being.  It's about an atmosphere and an experience, like being cuddled up on a sofa, wearing cozy socks, and covered by a soft throw during a storm.  And don't forget to light a candle or two.

Dec. 6 ~ "unbook" yourself

Too late!  I had already agreed to drive my friend Barbara somewhere today.  Watching her enjoy old friendships was also joyful for me, so it worked out perfectly.  On our way back home, we stopped at the pharmacy to pick up prescriptions for Barbara and for another Crown Center resident, since we were going there anyway.  She and I also had lunch together in the Circle@Crown Café and visited with several people, including Judy and Marianne.

Dec. 7 ~ send a thank you note

I looked through my cards and found this one that says "Thoughts of you..." on the front and on the inside "...are the happiest kind!"  Who and why shall remain between the recipient and me, but the card is on its way.

The challenge
Click this link to see the complete Hygge Holiday Challenge calendar.

Laura's award

Laura accepting her award on November 17th

Laura Greenberg, who is Crown Center's Community Engagement Manager, has been recognized by the Metropolitan Volunteer Management Association as the 2017 Volunteer Director of the Year.  Here's a quote:

"Laura has engaged Crown Center volunteers and provided them with meaningful, fulfilling volunteer experiences."

I'm one of those volunteers.  I work in our small library, mostly re-shelving books, but also going through boxes of donations to see what is likely to be of interest to our elderly readers.

I also have been an "ambassador" for some of the new residents who moved into the Crown Center.  Laura assigns us as needed, and we show the new folks what's available here:  the library (of course), our Circle@Crown Café, the fitness center, bus trips to shopping malls or eating out together, workshops available each month, the dining program, where to dump our trash.  You know, all those little day-to-day things, though I think we probably have a lot more activities than most independent living retirement places.  And that's thanks to Laura!

Congratulations, Laura!  You deserve it!

UPDATE:
I ran across this article just now that fits perfectly with Laura's job: Volunteering Is the Best Kept Secret for Mental Health.

Hygge Holiday Challenge

Hygge Holiday Challenge:
Since I just learned about this minutes ago, I'm already behind with this challenge.  But ... and this is important ... I'm smiling because this seems like a way to be loving to myself.  First, I need to run over to the University City Library and get this book:

The Little Book of Hygge: Danish Secrets to Happy Living ~ by Meik Wiking, 2017, psychology

Embrace Hygge (pronounced Hoo-ga) and become happier with this definitive guide to the Danish philosophy of comfort, togetherness, and well-being.  Why are Danes the happiest people in the world?  According to Meik Wiking, CEO of the Happiness Research Institute in Copenhagen, the answer is Hygge.  Loosely translated, Hygge is a sense of comfort, togetherness, and well-being.  "Hygge is about an atmosphere and an experience," Wiking says.  "It is about being with the people we love.  A feeling of home.  A feeling that we are safe."  Hygge is the sensation you get when you’re cuddled up on a sofa, in cozy socks under a soft throw, during a storm.  It’s that feeling when you’re sharing comfort food and easy conversation with loved ones at a candlelit table.  It is the warmth of morning light shining just right on a crisp blue-sky day.  This book introduces you to this cornerstone of Danish life, and offers advice and ideas on incorporating it into your own life, such as:

Take a break.
Be here now.
Turn off the phones.
Turn down the lights.
Bring out the candles.
Build relationships.
Spend time with your tribe.
Give yourself a break from the demands of healthy living.
Cake is most definitely Hygge.
Live life today, like there is no coffee tomorrow.
Get comfy.

From picking the right lighting to organizing a Hygge get-together to dressing hygge, Wiking shows you how to experience more joy and contentment the Danish way.

I googled the word Hygge and got this, which seems to contradict the book cover (hoo-ga):

"Hygge (pronounced hue-guh not hoo-gah) is a Danish word used when acknowledging a feeling or moment, whether alone or with friends, at home or out, ordinary or extraordinary as cosy, charming or special."

I'm so ready to try something like this.  My version of the rules is to do the things on the list that fit me and my life.

1.  I'm willing to "start a gratitude list," but not "turn off the phone before bed."  Why?  Because I'm retired and live with other retirees, some of whom count on me to be there for them (even in the middle of the night) if they are having a bad reaction to a medication with the room whirling around or if they need me to drive them to the emergency room in the middle of the night.

2.  For the same reason, I'm willing to "go for a 30-minute walk" ― hey, it's on my agenda anyway ― but not "w/o phone."  My mobile phone is always in my pocket, in case I need assistance or someone to come get me.  Yes, I understand why this may work for young folks, but I'm 77 years old.

3.  I won't "invest in a cozy sweater" because I have enough sweaters to last the rest of my life.

4.  "Have a dance party"?  Hmm, I'll have to think about how to adapt that, like maybe dancing around my apartment by myself.  Or maybe I'll "party" by inviting a couple of friends to go out to eat together, letting our words dance all over the table.

5.  If the suggestions don't work on the day suggested, I'll shuffle them around and do what I can when I can.

Anyway, here's to having a fun December doing things suggested by or dreamed up because of Albie's list above and her "How to Hygge for the Holidays."  Thanks, Albie!

Readers’ Workouts – Dec. 5, 2017

Hosted by Joy's Book Blog

Goals for this week:

Tuesday ~ walk in my neighborhood (cardio)
Wednesday ~ exercise with Melissa (strength)
Thursday ~ chair exercises and squats (endurance)
Friday ~ exercise band twists and pulls (flexibility)
Saturday ~ floor exercises (strengthen core)
Sunday ~ walk in my neighborhood (cardio)
Monday ~ chair exercises and squats (balance)

Here's a week's worth of challenging myself, since it apparently takes something like this to make myself exercise.  My twice-a-week group let me down.  When nobody showed up twice in a row, I called the whole thing off.  Now I need to find a way to do it on my own.  Maybe this will work.

What advice would you give to your younger self?

Hey!  I did get around to it!  I'm answering the questions I posted for Thanksgiving, you know, the ones none of us has attempted to answer yet.  Actually, I did tell a couple of friends my answer to this one, and now I'll share it with you.

"What advice would you give to your younger self?"  I told my two friends, "I'd tell myself not to get married."  Yeah, I didn't do very well in picking a husband.  "But what about your three children?" one of them asked.  Well, there you go.  Back in the 1950s and 1960s, one certainly did NOT talk about choosing to be a single mother and raising children on my own.  It was not done.  Oh, no, no, no.  Unless, of course, one was divorced.  Which I was.  So I raised them as a single mother, anyway, albeit with their father getting them on weekends and such.

Okay, I may have to keep pondering this question.  Otherwise, this advice would impact my three children, their spouses, their seven children (and spouses of the two grandchildren who got married), and my six great-grandchildren.  Here's a 2016 family photo with all 21 of them in it, along with five people from my children's father's side of the family.  (He died six years ago.)

I guess I'll have to re-think this advice.  (Is that like recalibrating?)

Beginning ~ in the ghetto

Losing Moses on the Freeway: The 10 Commandments in America ~ by Chris Hedges, 2005

"I stand across from the Mission Main and Mission Extension Housing Project in Roxbury on a muggy July night.  Scattered streetlights cast out dim yellow arcs on Parker Street.  The remaining slate-gray metal poles, with their lamps shattered by rocks, leave the strip of asphalt gap toothed, with lonely outposts of pale spotlights and long stretches of darkness.  The unlit stretches are uncharted oceans of fear.  They are filled with dangers imagined and real.  At night, in the ghetto, I cling to light."

Here are the ten commandments, plus the epilogue, from the table of contents:

Decalogue I ~ Mystery
Decalogue II ~ Idols
Decalogue III ~ Lying
Decalogue IV ~ The Sabbath
Decalogue V ~ The Family
Decalogue VI ~ Murder
Decalogue VII ~ Adultery
Decalogue VIII ~ Theft
Decalogue IX ~ Envy
Decalogue X ~ Greed
Epilogue ~ Love

Chris Hedges, a former foreign correspondent for the New York Times and Harvard Divinity School graduate, explores the challenge of living according to these ten moral precepts we have tried to follow, often unsuccessfully, for the past 6,000 years.  The commandments, he writes, do not save us from evil.  Instead they save us from committing evil.  He illustrates how the commandments usually choose us ― and how we are rarely able to choose them.  We cannot protect ourselves from theft, greed, adultery, or envy, nor from the impulses that lead us to commit evil acts.  In honoring the commandments, we free ourselves from self-worship and are called back to the healing solidarity of community.  It is in the self-sacrifice championed by the commandments that integrity, commitment, and, finally, love are made possible.

Gilion at Rose City Reader hosts Book Beginnings on Fridays.  Click here for today's Mister Linky.

Word of the day ~ HAD

Someone "explained" how the last sentence SHOULD have been written for clarity, entirely missing the humor.  The "fun" point being made, however, was that a sentence could actually use the word "had" eleven times in a row and be grammatically correct.  Count 'em ― ELEVEN.  The sentence needed careful punctuation, using commas, quotation marks, and a semicolon (not counting the period at the end).  But if it has to be explained like this, then it failed with lots of people.  Probably most people.

Thanks, Analytical Grammar, for sharing this on Facebook.  I started stringing "had hads" together as soon as I read your opening comment:  "The word of the day is HAD."