Announcing the Winner of the BEAUTIFUL YOU Giveaway

This was an incredibly difficult giveaway to select from! I wish I had seven books to give away ~.~

The good news is that I scored a visit to my school by Rosie Molinary on Oct. 26th from 12:30-1:30pm during which she will be doing a lunch time series presentation in our library -for girls, women, teachers, staff, parents and male allies at the Imperatore Library and she will have books available there!

So if you are affiliated with the Dwight-Englewood School in anyway try to be there!

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Ok so the top contenders addressed the audio interview with such conviction it made my heart smile everytime! Take a look at some of these comments:

1. Colin- "...the best part's when y'all are talking about process, and how it's destination vs. journey when really it's always just been about journey."

2. Luisa- "i loved the part where you talked about the toxins to your body that no one really mentions like gossip, and criticism. it reminded me of a scene from mean girls where they al look in the mirror and take turns saying something they don't like about their bodies. rituals like these seem to happen often and have become almost routine. the become addictive, you tend to keep going and going and you keep finding little things here and there, and when your friends join in its just a hate bash on our bodies..."

3. Carla- "I sooooooooo related to the struggle with people commenting on your weight loss and the discomfort around that. I actually wrote and performed a piece about that very thing years ago and it prompted me to find it. It's called 'Serenity'..."

   ...I mean someone will say, "You have such a beautiful face" and in the back of my head that little voice is translating it as "It's a shame your a little overweight, otherwise you'd be a knockout", "a knock out", yeah, a knockout"...

   -excerpt from Serenity by Carla
4. Jane- "I loved both your questions and Rosie's responses. The aspect that spoke most loudly to me was about her thoughts on straightening her hair - "to make her life easier." For nearly a decade, many years ago, I permed my hair "to make my life easier." How interesting that we saw doing opposite things to our hair was perceived necessary and a means to being more presentable than what is our own natural state..."

5. Laura- "...One topic that I can definitely apply to my own life is the section about not joining in when your friends decide to criticize themselves. This is something that I would never have thought about before because it seems like such a natural reaction. Now that I am more aware of it, I hope to not do it again."

6. Tania- "...I've a ton of opinions and thoughts on this subject especially as a woman of size who is ok with being of size who accepts herself fully. I'm the girl who does straighten her hair but I do it not for society or praise but because I like the way it looks on me, but I also embrace my curls..."

   And last but not least...

7. Gera- "Omg, this interview was so great and it really touched my heart. I definitely understand each and every one of Rosie's points and they were all eye-opening and just plain genius. I am a young woman (HS) who is totally aware this notion of image; however, I try my best to not let it get the best of me. I am a woman of size and am completely comfortable with my body. If I ever decide to change something, it'll be because I want it for myself and not because of other people's opinions. I can honestly say that I am so excited to read this book and I know I will love it just like I loved this interview!"

   So what is a blogger to do??

   Well I took a suggestion by my co-worker Caitlyn, and I placed the numbers 1-7 in the bingo machine and let the wheel of fortune take the decision right out of my hands!                               The winner is...drumroll please...wait for it...

   CONGRATS TO GERA!!!!!!

   The Poster For Rosie Molinary's Visit to the Dwight- Englewood School!

Reconsidering Columbus Day

AND REMEMBER: BE HERE TOMORROW to be a part of the blog tour for Rosie Molinary's New Book Beautiful You a Daily Guide to Radical Self-Acceptance there will be a fantastic podcast interview (my first podcast eva!) that you can listen to, a book review and a GIVEAWAY of a bright, new, shiny copy of the book!

So you know where to be tomorrow!!!

-Ciao Amarettogirl

October Winds

There are some new brightly colored leaves blowing on the horizon for this site during this awesome month of OCTOBER, my 'favoristist' month ever!

So let me start laying it out for you...WAIT FOR IT...

• HALLOWEEN DELIGHTS...I am the founder of the Black Hat Society and every year for the past 7 years my hub and I host a costume required annual Murder Mystery Dinner for All Hallows Eve...check out my hand-sculpted marzipan candied witch fingers! So get ready to see a NEW HALLOWEEN card and a line up of past favorites getting reprinted. Yikes!

• Author Interview and Podcasts!!! This month marks the release of Author, Rosie Molinary's new book Beautiful You: A Daily Guide to Radical Self- Acceptance and I have received a review copy (without payment) and been fortunate enough to land a phone interview! So as part of her blog tour I will featuring a review, the audio podcast interview, Q&A post and most likely an AWESOME giveaway all on OCTOBER 12th so be HERE!

• NEW ART! I've become a bit obsessed with working with inks lately and playing with computer manipulation so stay tuned for some of those!

• New BLOG face! I'm designing a new banner and refreshing the look of this site....woo hoo

• Introducing a new feature on BODY LOVE and being a BODY CHAMPION inspired by two my favorite blogging Latinas, Elsita from the Hidden Seed and Rosie as in the author of Hijas Americanas & Beautiful You! In fact, You can scroll down to the next post to check it out NOW.

• New sister links to this site!

I'm super excited to start posting the new entries routinely! Its going to be a busy month so check back often - and remember it might look different!

- Ciao

On Championing My Body

Well I said things had changed around here, except these changes were self-initiated and in no way thrust upon me ;) I'm about to share it all, but not without a pretty strong dose of responsibility first.

In 2007 I was sitting on the sofa and I decided to wake up and be an agent of change. I invoked the words of Ani DiFranco

any tool can be a weapon if you hold it right...

My weapons of choice, a camera and paint brush.

At the time I was inspired to action by Oprah. She had just opened her school in Africa for girls, The Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy. Seeing some of those girls walk to school through violence, destitution and seemingless endless odds, inspired me to my core.

Imagine for a moment that we all do currently hold within us the memory and experience of the collective consciousness of women throughout history and all of their adversity. Then imagine that we also hold a common bond with all women globally - does this not create a tremor in your soul?

It seemed at first, that so many other disciplines are more conducive to DISSENT and revolution than visual art; music, theater, film and video.

Click photo by m.diaz

If I could, I was determined to find a way to use my skills as a visual artist and my occupation as a visual arts teacher to provoke change in this world. I wanted desperately to begin to try to address the daily frustrations around me in my own backyard. Therefore, I developed, designed and implemented the HERstory project at my school (you can see the photograph component of the Herstory project if you click HERE). I embarked on a mission to unlearn lies and re-educate with the truth inorder to assist young women (at the time specifically young women of color) to analyze the image-based world they live in, perceive themselves and their bodies in a manner that did not derail them from; wisdom, potential, capability, self-sufficiency and leadership.

2007 Herstory opening the girls & me

I debuted the HERstory project publically in Boston, Mass. in 2008 and presented it again refined and improved nationally in both New Orleans, Louisiana, and Denver, Colorado at the National Association of Independent School People of Color Conference - a conference that consists of primarily educators, students and administrators of Independent schools. Seeing as the face of the nation has changed so has the demographic of private schools around the country. So many of our young women of color co-exist in these schools still as minorities - when often they come from homes, communities and public schools in which they are the majority.

I have now spoken to a room of over 200 educators from around the country about the importance of implementing out of the box teaching methods to inadvertently inspire self-love, acceptance and potential for leadership. Educators who can should teach about; the history and origins of cosmetics, altering definitions of aesthetic beauty, the lure and volatile power of physical attraction- that of the female enslavement to it (one of the greatest acts of mass self-deprication in lust for an unattainable and non-existent ideal that I have ever seen), and most importantly how not to punish but to love, nurture and embrace all that they are.

Yet I've known all along that the reason I was doing that self-less work after school and teaching myself public speaking to peers was perhaps because the one who needed the most self-acceptance was me. The truth is, I came from public schools, inner city life and a divide between two islands (Puerto Rico where my father has lived his whole life and Manhattan where my mother and her family traveled to during one the first air-borne diasporas to this country). My youth was troublesome to say the least, and keeping up with the Jones' in my adult life has also caused its share of self-deprecation in my life. It was so much easier to do all the hard work at the service of others than to face that reality in myself. me today

Yet doing the Herstory project began to inadvertently affect me. By doing all the research and the developing of the innovation; the classroom application, the gathering with the young women and doing readings from 'Women Who Run with the Wolves' I was slowly transforming myself. Shepherding young women served me as much as it did them. I was inadvertently and unknowingly planting the seeds I needed to sprout my own inner core of confidence and self-acceptance. Of becoming a person who lives life not as a body champion- because that would imply that I have arrived and well I don't ever expect to arrive...instead a person who is fully present in the act of championing her body.

Everyone seems to be obsessed with my fat cells and the question 'how?'. Not as many seemed to be concerned with my health. Or why it was that I was progressively developing a weaker and weaker immune system every year. I had maxxed out with five bouts of chronic bronchitis in one year. I have been affected by every respiratory infection I could get. In the last five years I have made it up to two inhalers and concerns of silicosis. My energy level has been the bane of my existance since any one who knows me knows I want to do everything.

I began two years ago with trying to cut back on white refined sugar usage. Who I was: 8-10 bags of sugar in hot tea in chinese restaurants, tablespoons of sugar in cereal, every dessert always. It all seemed not to have too bad an effect when I lived in the city and walked everywhere...always. However after leaving the city and instantaneously losing all opportunities to walk anywhere, it all began to take its toll, especially on my health. When I first pulled back on white sugar I transferred the need to honey. Yet as my brother-in-law eloquently put it 'honey is still sugar'. The jury (science) might still be out on white refined sugar and its actual effects, but thats my verdict.

Last year I stopped my daily addiction to coffee and transferred to tea and finally began to enjoy unsweetened ice tea. This summer I terminated my co-dependent relationship with caffeine completely. Now I can enjoy a cup of tea every now and then but don't NEED it everyday.

This summer after seeing my father and his battle with diabetes, I took my health focus to the next level. I did fast for 48 hours to clean out my system and I detoxed (Chinese herb tea is and Chinese herbs are great for this). I retrained my taste buds. I would say that was the hardest part. I retrained my brain to turn away from anything that was processed and clearly unhealthy. I NEVER skip a meal. I did skip every opportunity to have summer desserts, but NOT to punish myself but to stay committed to treating my body as sacred. I drink water now 'like a fiend' roughly two twelve packs of bottled water a day. I taught myself what the size of my stomach is and I learned to honor that through portion control, instead of satiating myself to sleep. I EXERCISE every day on the treadmill that was gifted to me this summer when my intention was made clear.

me and my children photos by m.diaz

Final answer when folks ask how - the real answer is SELF-LOVE- real love, like a husband who wants his newly pregnant wife to eat only organic food- I chose to love myself that way. If you love yourself deeply - it doesn't matter how you eat. What matters is that YOU ARE HEALTHY, at peace and treat the vehicle that is your body with respect.

-Ciao Amarettogirl

Change

a budding peony stage I photo by m.diaz

Well, as my regular readers have deduced I have slowed down on the blogging through these past few months of July, August and September.

There is a reason and some up and coming behind the scenes changes that I've been working on for the last 3 months that I will soon reveal here on my blog.

But first a word on the word change...it seems to be the 'hot-button' word for my place of work this school year as is the notion of 'accepting it'. This ofcourse implies that the change is thrust upon you and not self-initiated. Fortunately in this technologically savvy world we're living in, I'm a big believer in innovation, stepping into discomfort in order to bend, stretch, learn and rustling ancient architecture. I also believe you can never stand in the same river twice...

However, I'm not a big fan of changing just for the sake of changing, or accepting changes that are counterproductive or an impedement to seeking your best possible life, or providing no actual improvement to the potential of learning. And I believe if you find yourself in one of those latter aforementioned negative states of change, you should not just accept it- in fact I believe you should never just accept daily discomfort and discontent, but instead change again, and again, and again until the process yields a journey of fruitful gains and you find yourself in a state of workable calm.

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Click to read more ...

Farewell to My Island Once Again

Once again the time has come where I end my time here on the island- leave my little room with the mattress worn through with my body's weight concaved into the center and return to my other life in the states. My entire life I have lived divided between these two places (my mother in the states and my father on the island) yet leaving either one has never gotten any easier - in fact, it has become slightly more difficult each time the older I get...

These little red flowers will forever be such a significant part of my childhood memories in Puerto Rico. My cousins and I would pick them and pull out the super fine thread-like inner stem in the center of the flower and drink the droplet of juice that came out- over and over again. Then we would take one flower's empty stem and insert into the now empty center core of an other flower and make a delicate, natural chain of flowers we could use as crowns or necklaces.

Jazmin & Alexi's Wedding

What laying back at the beach looks like. I have traveled to Europe, Greece, Hawaii and Mexico and gone to beaches in all of those places and never have I ever experienced any beach like those of my Puerto Rico. The warm, clear ocean water envelops me in a way I have no words for- only sensation.

Paseo de la Princesa - The Princess' Path - every year I visit I walk it - either alone or with fam- this year was no exception.

Saying Goodbye to 'Hershey' a local, wild, free and perhaps abandoned dog (sadly like so many others) that I befriended.

Some Supermarket Spices- thankfully there are still native industry products made.

Getting inked at home by my brothers personal tat artist. In this pic you can see my beaded arm and hand being held by that of my cousin's hand while I get inked with a Taino petroglyph of the sun on my foot. Three of the Nuyorican cousins visiting for our cousin Jazmin's wedding got inked that day.

My niece Chami and I - who didn't give me a moments rest while I was in Puerto Rico but who at this moment along with my dad- I miss the most and am finding it most difficult to balance out and justify being away from.

This will be the last Puerto Rico post for a while and stay tuned because while I was away my amazing husband worked his magic on the chicken coop and just you wait until you see that gorgeous thing!- Ciao Amarettogirl

Island Girl- Puerto Rican Vignettes II

Today we went to the Pueblo...and for my family that's Caguas and with all the malls around these days less and less shops have remained open and much of the integrity of the Pueblo shops has been lost, but they're still considered one of the places to go for more inexpensive versions of things.

Recovery

Ahh the cost of meds...and breath.

So I broke down today in a non-breathing fit hacking up my lungs and called the doctor's office barely being able to speak and hoped they'd fit me in.

Alas they did and I forced myself up rinsed myself off and went to the doctor. I had to inhale into one of those steamy medicated respirators for five minutes, get a whole lot of prescriptions tossed at me 'the kitchen sink', as my doctor called it, including a mega-antibiotic and a third inhaler. $130 big bucks later, I should be on the road to recovery.

Simply annoyed because I feel that the paper trail I've left of the countless respiratory infections I get in single year should be a red flag to someone to look into what's going on...but its just a band-aid fix always. Remember folks we have to be our own heroes in this life.

hipstamatic - breathe

So you remember when you were young and had a doctor or dentist appointment that hurt and you got a gift afterwards as a treat?? Well My hub and I do that for each-other and so I got some presents today!

my sorry your sick gifts from my hub!

-Ciao Amarettogirl

Monday Morning & My Fav Mags

The Day after Prom

Morning Fog lifting off of Cozy Lake at the onset of my morning commute My Faves Artful Blogger, Where Women Create & Somerset Studio Prom at Capitale in NYC

-Ciao Amarettogirl

The Ash Grove Doll House

Thanks to all you supporters of my Chicken venture! This city girl turning country is sure to meet some bumps in the road so stay tuned!

Its been a bizarre week and yesterday was no exception. I received notice from My Pet Chicken that the chicks won't be shipped now until the 14th of June (as opposed to the 7th) so that sets my summer plans back a week (but thats ok). I smacked my ankle into a metal easel that was sitting on the classroom floor and got sea-sick from a particular onion and potato soup. All that said, I've been feeling really fatigued and think I may not have caught up with myself from the frenzy of last week.

Like I've mentioned here before, some of the best medicine is simply having a new creative project to sink my teeth into. And though I have more than my share of those right now, one in particular that I'm anxious to share with you all is a real honor that has just been bestowed upon me.

My mother-in law, Ellen Emery's doll house handmade by her grandfather George H. Clarkson

I've been named the family shepherd/ guardian of a priceless family heirloom, my mother-in-law's childhood dollhouse. My mother-in-law is Ellen Emery, and this dollhouse was hand-made by her grand-father George H. Clarkson. George was a wonderful wood-worker. For most of Ellen's life the dollhouse has been in her parents home, the Ash Grove in Ithaca NY. It arrived to my home this weekend straight from the Ash Grove and it is in need of some serious TLC, which is exactly what I plan to give it.

The house survived the four hour car drive and some years of dust-collecting. It is fully wired for electronic lights. I'm so excited to get in there replace some badly aged carpets, clean up all the furniture, revive, and refresh everything. I'll be sure share my breathing some new life into this beautiful handmade structure with you all - and try to maintain its original integrity and authenticity for its true owner.

untouched dollhouse residents and furniture a stove from the original set of furniture in the houseAn Organ in need of some TLC a ramshackled room a magnetic chessboard set the second floor stairwell

-Ciao Amarettogirl