Fresh F.I.G.s – Week 1

I hung up my template for the F.I.G. collective next to my work desk, because I figured that way I will not forget about it. F.I.G. stands for finding joy in gratitude. If you want to know more about how this works, head over to Elisabeth’s blog where she explains it all.

We are already half way through week 2 for this week 1 recap, but later late than never I say. So here we go.

February 1 – I re-potted most of my indoor plants and now they have space to grow again. Everything about the process made me happy: having sunny weather to do it outside, smelling the fresh dirt, choosing new pots where necessary, watering the plants after, finding them new spots in the living room.

February 2 – I got a surprise gift today. My colleague cam back from visiting her family in Egypt and she gave me this really awesome canvas bag with a palm applique on it. She has a similar bag I kept admiring so she got one for me. I do have the best colleagues.

February 3 – I was taking the bus home today and it arrived at the stop just as I arrived, too. This usually never happens. Either the bus is late, or it’s early and then I am too late, or it is already full and it does not take any new passengers. So this was really nice.

February 4 – My son fell asleep during German class. So you would think that is nothing to be grateful for, right? It’s not, but I am grateful that he told me even though he knew I would not be happy about it. German class starts at 6:30pm in the evening and he does not like it much anyway so I can kind of understand. But that he was so honest about it really made my day.

February 5 – The feeling of my body being all tired out after gym class.

February 6 – I took my bike to get to work today and the weather was lovely and the breeze on my face was the best. There were birds singing and it smelled like spring.

February 7 – I planted some new plants in my front yard. First I got to pick them out at the nursery and then I got to plant them. I am not a big planner when it comes to gardening. I often just go see what they have, research on the fly and see what works.

One step in front of the other

Watch your step

I have a hard time putting my feelings about what is going on in the world into words. I am still as heartbroken, disillusioned and deflated as I was 2025. I had to be offline for a while. Reading the news each day to find out what hellish thing the government is cooking up next was and still is a lot. The only other thing I kept holding on to was Instagram to have something easy and quick.

I tried to make and keep up with in person connection. On a personal level the year has been good to me. I still have my job what is a miracle in itself considering the turmoil the US academic research is in, my online book club is keeping me reading (stumbled on via Instagram and met in partly person for the first time last summer), the kids (both in high school now) are doing well, made some new friends, caught up with some old ones and managed to finish a couple of house projects including a complete rewire. We got to visit our families in Germany last summer, vacationed on Corfu, Greece and visited our friends in Las Vegas. So on we go, one step in front of the other. I know I am lucky and am thankful for it.

The local county has a winter walk challenge I joined. They send out an e-mail each week with prompts what to look for during your walk and you can submit a picture in order to win a price. The above is my submission for week 1’s “Watch Your Step”. I am going to start posting about this weekly from now on – maybe it helps me getting back to my online community that I neglected for way to long. I hope you can forgive me.

Something to look forward to: my friend’s birthday tea party

What are you looking forward to?