L'Shanah Tovah! Happy New Year! It's 5774!

And so my sabbatical year begins.

The Elul warm-up has come to an end, I celebrated two spacious and meaningful days of Rosh Hashanah followed by a lovely Shabbat, and now it's time for me to plunge in.

I hope to structure my sabbatical loosely around the Hebrew calendar. (I also have a theme planned for October, just to mix things up.) My plan is to have three layers to my sabbatical journey:

1) Daily Practice: I'd like to set some time aside each day for a variety of practices that give me a chance to reflect, create, and allow this journey to unfold (e.g. walks, collages or other art making, meditation, prayer, writing). I already began with posting my daily Elul practice, and hope to continue with something along those lines throughout the year, with a theme or intention for each month.

2) Projects: a number of projects have sat on the back burner for far too long (photo albums, scrapbooks, and long-promised handmade gifts top the list). Not only do I think I will enjoy working on them, but I also anticipate that I will feel much freer when I no longer have them hanging over my head. When my work schedule slows down starting in October, I hope to be able to devote one day a week to work on these projects.

3) Home: I plan to focus on one room each month with the intention of decluttering and generally making our home more livable and presentable. I am starting with our newly reconfigured office.

Last week I sat down with a calendar and attempted to sketch out the year ahead. Much of it fell easily into place, but I never did manage to set a theme for Tishrei, the month that just began. And a week later, I still don't have one. So maybe, that is this month's theme:

Be Open, Something Will Surely Present Itself

A large mushroom spotted on a walk this afternoon.

3 Tishrei 5774