Greetings to all who venture here,

Tonight is November 13th, an enormous and full moon penetrates my peripheral through the window as I write to you. After heavy rains that have by the grace, filled the salmon run creek behind our home with the much needed water the salmon just might be able to make their journey homeward

upstream...

The soundings of the night birds from my studio desk are also with me.

I am so filled in the moment with a depth of gratitude beyond words-gratitude for all the whirling, all that is ringing, all that is unfolding around our world. So much is happening, how are you experiencing it? Life is becoming very focused for those who choose to see through the veiled

Sisters Singing the new anthology published by WildGirl Publishers out of Santa Cruz CA. and edited by Carolyn Brigit Flynn is an incredible collection of creative expressings from the musings (muses?) of women. 139 to be exact. As the subtitle to the book continues, incantations, blessings, prayers, art, songs and sacred stories by women. All contained within a hefty 394 pages.It will be available to the public via amazon.com starting Feb.9th 2009, but it seems that a couple of bookstores in Santa Cruz have it now, so happy finding it!

Why you ask, am I writing about this Notre Dame of a book? Well, for starters, it is just magical to behold. Many women within its pages are published here for the first time.Writers having reasonably young or winding road writing careers found their way to the editors desk by the winds of fate or destiny.

Carolyn Brigit Flynn as editor, seems in every right to be a a joy of a teacher, extremely capable in the art of helping a person develop their writing voice,( there were many writers within the book who seem to have worked with her for years).As well she is perhaps a patient if not perservering woman with incredible vision, depth, stamina and an inclusive wing span. The experience I have of this marvelous book is that it offers  unpretentious access into all the life experiences bosomed within the pages. It shows how a woman with a passion can create a resonance, calling a world into connection.

On page 166, Mother Mercy made its way into the song section, and for some reason that perhaps belongs to the knowing of ancestors and a dearly departed friend, a bird whispered into Carolyn's ear that she should call me and ask if I would sing at the book release event. This past weekend 300-400 people gathered in Santa Cruz, on the sacred grounds of Holy Cross Church in Santa Cruz to midwife  Sisters Singing into the world! The experience will be one that I will carry in my heart always, ushering in what I feel for myself, to be a re-emerging passion to sing in public/for the public, for all of our collective hearts and souls for the awakening of these times.

The evening prior to the big event was spent in the company of sixty of the women whose work appears in the book. 60 fine and fabulous women each sharing a bit of how and what brought their work to the pages of the book! How incredible and fortunate were we all to experience the face, the facings and sounding of each of the voices, the voicings of the journey of each woman as she introduced herself to the collective whole of us, creating and becoming the web of us...a prismatic event laden with the presences and echoes of ancestral wisdom; the unseen who guide us through life's detritus to mend and reweave;breath-filled, luminous threads of the infinite web, re- connecting for the benefit of all. 

What a week this is!

Gabriel is turning three, another book release party, this one is called, Hands at Work,  by Summer Moon Scriver and Iris Graville and it is an astonishing visual as well as literary collection of gorgeous hands photographed at work with the passion they possess and their stories recorded and written by Iris Graville, of how they came alive with what they do. Alis' midwife hands surrounding the head of a newborn and how her hands came to their present calling is the first story in the book. A poem of mine appears amidst a circle of healing hands.

Surely this is a time for the awakening of hope. Our choices are few, our lives precious and temporal.

Waterblessings and happy readings,

Alysia

Mapping and tracking

ancient routes remembered and traced

only to find what we forget to remember

Corpus and soul  sounding and body

instruments in the making of peace

Up into the stars

stardust

down unto stardust

once again

Today is a beautiful day; the sun is out and the boys are napping, so I am taking a moment to write a few thoughts.

First of all, I have hope that everyone who is reading this is finding the time to pick up a newspaper, search for a blog (www.truthdig.com is a good start), any blog and read them!

We are living in such  amazing times. When could a person ever go on-line and research to the far ends of any spectrum to expand ones' awareness regarding any topic, idea, subject you can imagine?

I was listening last night to Speaker's Forum on KUOW in Seattle. Michael Meade, an extraordinary writer, storyteller, sharing his latest book, The World Behind the World, Living at the ends of Time. Wow... go get the book and read it! Soul food to feed our spirits and to fuel our daily living with hope, purpose and perserverance.

Peace,

Alysia

I am so excited this year to offer a raw food lifestyle for this retreat! The difference in all of our live's since going live is so profound that I am compelled to share this with others who desire to open up their life to the Divine force in such a way

           This year's retreat:

                               A woman in all her uniqueness...

can share with others a similar yearning for personal growth and attention, self-expression, having her own time to be with her very own hands and heart, to discover feelings and stories, to play and sing, to share in deep listening to others and to be listened to, especially by the birds and the wind, to sauna and sleep and weep and laugh under the light of the moon, to learn to prepare and eat healthy organic raw foods, and to meditate and contemplate and to experience just plain fabulous times with other women who are equally unique in their yearning to feel and be alive in all that is her life...

Cost: 5 day residential and meals                w $745.00
         3 day residential and meals                 w $545.00
        3 day non-residential including lunch w $345.00

Please e-mail me or call @ 425-486-2476 if you have more questions of would like to have a groovey flyer posted to you!

Waterblessings,

Alysia

Greetings to all,

Today is a sunny Seattle day! So much rain lately has produced a prolific burst of green everywhere, including happy weeds...

This spring has brought many changes to our land, we have extended the garden three times its earlier size to accommodate our penchant for green things to eat year round! New chicks for slug control and a lovely pair of wild ducks are hopefully about to fill the pond with fuzzling wonderments, especially for little boys...

What an awesome undetaking and blessing is required to be truly alive

Greetings!

Today was the second day in a row in a long, long time when the skies weren't completely gray! Yesterday was a day of gorgeous blue skies and temperatures in the 20's!

What a drab, wet and cold winter it has been here in Woodinville, at least.  But with all the weather we have been having,the much needed rain has brought the much needed snow that rests now upon the mountains. It is beautiful as well as a relief to see both mountain ranges with white peaks everywhere.

We are nearing 6 months on our raw food lifestyle, and yesterday for an unexpected birthday present I received a Vitalizer Plus, which is a groovy blender-like (without the blade) gizmo that creates a vortex in the water within the container. There undoubtly was an easier way to describe that, but you can go to www.vortexwatertech.com and learn more if you'd like. At anyrate, we are learning more about hexagonal water and the boys love to watch it happen! The animals definately seem to enjoy this "new" water, and it tastes so good to us as well. We already in one day notice differences, that is to say, detox continues!Everything we are reading about raw continues to be true, and the more we learn and experience ourselves, the more involved, motivated, and inspired we are becoming. We are deeply blessed with fantastic Farmer's Markets through the winter here in Seattle, and we eagerly await the time soon when we can begin to start our seeds in the greenhouse and work in our garden again!

Waterblessings to you,

Alysia

Greetings to you,

 Fall is upon us, with blue skies and the dropping of the alder leaves into the winding creeks, calling salmon upstream to a long journey back home.

 August has been an extraordinary month for me, marking a great change acoming. My two oldest companions, Chewie and Anubis were called upstream, and my dearest of friends, Judy Marz who introduced me to the Bon people has been diagnosed with lung cancer. As she walks between the wild side of somewhere here and gone, my life has received a nescessary dose of re-commitment to a life of being the best I can be.

Somedays and nightdreams are easier than others.

Life with two babes under the age of two is an awesome task for anyone, and at the ripening age of 46, I have made the choice to change my frequency  by eating a raw based diet to be able to stay atune with them. Someone yesterday asked me if that included sashimi... I laughed...they were serious...

Our whole household has gone raw, and we are learning how to make sure the boys have all their essential dietary and nutritional needs met. All I can say is, wow! so far. The energy level, the lighter we feel, the more active we become, and the more we can keep up with the boys! As Master Stanley taught me, you must eat conscious food to be conscious. I always believed this, but having moved farther afield from what primarily was a mainly vegetarian diet in the last few years, eating raw food feels like you're injesting light. You can actually feel your body, that is to say, I can feel my body absorb the nutrients and it feels like smiling from the inside out.

It just recently occurred to me that I could utilize my website to reach you, dear reader more than I realized. Perhaps it is that I am arising a wee bit out of tending to infants 24-7 and becoming aware of the world again. I must say, I feel that motherhood is changng me in more ways than I could have ever imagined.

Thanks for reading... I'm posting as well a letter I sent out to a few friends of "Nubie".

He is missed.

Waterblessings,

Alyisa

                                                Anubis

                 October 19th, 1992- August 29th, 2007

Dear friends who would wish to know about their beloved friend and teacher, Nubie... On Tuesday evening just after 11:00pm we had the awesome task of releasing this great soul back into the void. Ali and her wonderful connections, allowed us to administer the magic potion to Nubie that freed his spirit of such suffering. He went peacefully, willingly and comfortably. On Monday, I saw him sitting on Chewie’s fresh grave site and I knew the time was near. A few days before Chewie died, both Ali and I separately heard Poppy’s familiar howl echo through the house. I said to Ali that he had come back to help a friend cross-over. At the time, I didn’t think it to be Chewie.

 This time, she came for her large companion. As many of you know, Nubie has been on his way out for some time, particularly last October when he was down for the count. But up the giant rose and soon after came our sweet, sweet Raphael Lungtok. In March he went down again, this time it seemed via a stroke. Lisa Ganci was visiting and presto! Back up did Lazarus rise!The women gathered for a retreat in June and many attending were surprised that the white bear still roamed, albeit with a bent and sometimes twisted walk, but nonetheless always managing, tracking the whereabouts of the ever- pervasive soccer ball.

I send this to you because I trust that you loved him in your way as much I did, and that he loved your hearts as much as he did mine. It just was his nature to do so. He was a friend to all who met him, from kittens, to chickens, to children, to cranky old ladies. There is more at another time, when the moment is right, to share with all who might hear, the great teaching of just how he arrived at the gate of death’s door and what final riddle Anubis left for me to ponder. All I can say, is once again he has irrevocably changed my life. He held so much for me, shadow and light, giving me at first, the chance to catch my breath, and to breathe in again a potent love that would render me undone as I knew myself to be.  It is hard to truly miss a soul whose influence resonates everywhere I look. The old man that he had become, had us changing three sets of diapers a day!

The process evoked within me my long night of a dark soul. And in true Nubie fashion, he transformed his departure into a cosmic flashlight that I trust will lead me yet again, into the light of true living. His presence taught me to soften my angry and hardened heart into one that knows the power of saying yes to love and life, to motherhood, and to move more gently within the passage of time itself. He instilled within my core the gift of true patzienza, distilling it into a willingness to hope regardless of the abounding chaos. For many years to my good fortune, I have witnessed his devotion to all of you who were willing to be moved by that same force that was all of who he was. Always, I watched how he met each and every one of you. And the grace and beauty that radiated from your heart as you met him moved me so much as well.

Although his tired and worn frame now rests buried nearby,

 my life is abundant

 Glorious Nubie adventures and teachings, tears to laughter and love again

 children and chickens, treehouses and ducklings

 reassuring remnants of dog days and soccer balls

                                       “The king is dead, long live the king”