Do you love Sadie’s warm fuzzies from the City Love trilogy? Do you want to make some for your friends? You can totally learn how from this Epic Reads DIYA video!
This is so cute I can’t even. If there’s anything better than a warm fuzzy it’s a bunch of warm fuzzies in a jar. With glitter, of course.
Here’s to spreading the city love! ❤
Happy summer solstice week! Oh yes. Summer rolling in deserves a longer celebration than just one day. The first day of summer is a reason to celebrate all. freaking. week.
I love all things summer so much I can’t even. Flip-flops. Happy sunshine. Lots of green outside. Longtime readers of this blog know that I am addicted to summer fruit. Raspberries, blueberries, strawberries, blackberries, cherries, watermelon, cantaloupe, honeydew, peaches, plums, nectarines…summer fruit is my bliss. I seriously could eat summer fruit every day and never get tired of it. So I will be celebrating with lots of fresh, colorful fruit this summer!
Another reason to celebrate summer is that, although daylight time did start decreasing by about two minutes per day the day after the summer solstice (which was on June 20 this year, but could fall on either June 20, 21, 0r 22), there are early sunrise times and late sunset times pretty much all summer. Which is fabulous for people like me who are not feeling sunset anytime before 7pm. Summer makes it easy to keep us where the light is.
This warm fuzzy from Elle Luna is all about following your passion, allowing the light in your heart to shine brightly and guide your way towards creating your dream life.
There is so much truth in this. No matter what your big dream is, visualizing your goal and then taking steps every day towards achieving it is a recipe for success. There will be pain along the way. There will be tears and frustration and anger and several meltdowns. But if you never give up, if failure is not an option, you will achieve your goal. Your manifested goal might not look the way you thought it would exactly. Or it might be so similar you will be in awe for the rest of your life. You won’t know how your dream turned reality will look until you begin.
Be what you are. Starting now.
Wishing you the best. summer. ever. ❤
Love love LOVE this warm fuzzy ❤
New York City stands with you, Orlando.
Love and support from the 9/11 Memorial Survivor Tree. This is your memorial in honor of the 49 beautiful souls who were tragically taken.
We will never forget.
❤
Yesterday evening I looked out my window and saw some kind of event happening at one of the brownstones across the street. Actually it was like people were setting up for a big event. There were all these guys in suits and sunglasses walking around. Big black cars were parked. A white tent was set up from the door of the brownstone leading down to the sidewalk. At first I thought it was a wedding. But then I noticed that there were only guys standing around. No women. And the guys all looked like security. Especially the one standing guard outside the front door. There were police barricades along the sidewalk. The NYPD and FDNY were here. When I left for the gym, I saw that the entire street was blocked off. I looked at the brownstone with the tent outside. Five security guys in suits and sunglasses stared back.
Joe Biden was visiting a friend.
Or a relative. My doorman wasn’t sure. But according to him, Joe Biden makes this visit across the street about once a year. The street is always blocked off. Tons of security is on the scene. And the tent is put up so that no one has an aerial view of the Vice President entering and leaving the building. Lots of windows like mine were overlooking the scene. You never know who could be behind any of those windows.
This got me thinking about the extreme measures Joe Biden takes every year to visit his friend. He goes to these extreme measures for his visit, yet I have friends who live right here in New York City with me who I don’t even see once a year. And visiting them would take a lot less effort. I thought about how easy it is to get entrenched in your routine. Creative New Yorkers, the ones who came here to make their big dreams reality, are laser focused, driven, passionate people determined to succeed. We tend to be inflexible when it comes to protecting our professional time, and personal time if we are in a relationship. Which sometimes means less time for friends.
Who are the VIPs in your life? Do you have friends nearby who you have been meaning to spend more time with? Or friends who live far away you haven’t spoken to in a while? Summer is a good time to make those plans, pick up that phone, and rekindle your most meaningful personal connections. Because if Joe Biden can block off an entire street just to see his friend, we can certainly have dinner with ours. When an old friend visited me the other day, I wanted to share some of the best parts of New York living with her. Including my fave cookie (rainbow almond) at my fave place (the High Line).
The ways in which friendships change over the years fascinates me. How you can be friends with one person for 20 years and still have all the most important things in common, while you might only have another friend for a few years before you grow apart. We never know how our friendships will change. Or if they will end. Let’s cherish them while we can.
Shower the people you love with love, friendly neighbors ❤
TGIM! Today’s Top Five is going to be cat quick, as I am on deadline with line edits and have snuck over here like a ninja. So here are some super fast things…
1. New York City! I will be at the Barnes & Noble B-Fest this Friday, June 10 from 5:00 to 7:00pm at the Citigroup Center B&N. There will be games and prizes, including a raffle of those ginormous canvas book covers hanging all over the store! Hope to see you there.
2. I am loving this Booklist review of Lost in Love: “Teens who are drawn to new-adult titles and dream of romantic, parent-free summer escapades will be well rewarded.” Like all of my previous books, the City Love trilogy is YA, but I was hoping it would have crossover appeal. Good to see Booklist agrees! You can explore Lost in Love things here, and City Love here.
3. So there’s this sculpture called Looking Up by Tom Friedman that is on temporary display on Park Avenue. The second I read about it, I knew I had to go see. I mean, Look up is one of my main mottos, even right on the cover of City Love. It’s also a theme in So Much Closer. My whole thing is that we miss so much when we don’t look up. When we look up, not only do we discover beauty and history that we probably passed without noticing a hundred times before, but we invite positive energy into our day that can make magic happen. Anyway, I bookmarked an article about the sculpture and made a note to go see it before July.
The other day I was walking down the street when I looked up and noticed a cool sculpture. It was of a guy looking up. I was like, “Sweet! Look up!” But I totally forgot about the sculpture I had bookmarked. The next day I found it and realized I was on Park Avenue when I saw the guy looking up. I saw Looking Up without even realizing it at the time…all because I looked up. Full-circle meta, yo.
Then last night I looked up from my computer to look out my window and saw this.
There were lots of rainbow pics on social after the storms we had. But how many of those rainbows were radiating from a water tower? And dude, I have a thing for water towers. Always look up…
4. Taking a fangirl moment, I just have to say that this diagram perfectly quantifies my eternal love for the soul mate magic of How I Met Your Mother and Jason Segel as Marshall.
I have been a huge Paul Simon fan since forever, so this dorktastic intersection of a fave musician and a fave show in science/math form blows my mind. Well played, HIMYM.
5. I will leave you with a warm fuzzy for the week about your time. Make the days count.
Much love ❤
Susane Colasanti - Blog 