2019: Recovery

June Gunaratne recaps 2019 in this blog posts and reflects on what made it impactful. She celebrates the one-year anniversary of her moving to Austin and building a community of family and friends in her new home.

Testing the Waters – Journaling

To encourage journaling and talk about the therapeutic effects that journaling can have to working through trauma and processing emotions.

Rounding Third and Sliding into Home

We are in the home stretch towards 2020! Finishing up this blog post while watching Game 7 of the World Series where my Astros are grinding it to the death is surreal. 2 years ago I was taking care of my son, watching the World Series, as he was a newborn and we secured the…

Patience in a Time of Transition

When I first wrote this blog draft it was my dear friend Reem's birthday. She was set to be induced early today for the birth of her 4th child, Sophia Grace. This is the first girl for her and her husband, Ruben. We met March of this year when I first started working in Austin…

Decluttering & Hoarding

Updates: I began working a month ago at an amazing nonprofit organization in Austin. Im moving into my own apartment on Sunday. I've found a new daycare in a span of a day, yikes. Life is looking up, the part that is of particular interest to me is the phase I'm going through in relation…

Comfort PT.1

Let's dissect what it means to be at ease. What is comfort? 1. a state of physical ease and freedom from pain or constraint: room for four people to travel in comfort. • (comforts) things that contribute to physical ease and well-being: the low upholstered chair was one of the room's few comforts. • prosperity…

Valentine’s Day

I am so fortunate to have the family and friends that I have, they're more than what I could have ever asked for. They know my needs more than me at times. SO many people have been here to help me up after I've fallen. Even to intervene before a fall has taken place, the…

Jamaica Kinkaid – & my Activism Fail

That the native does not like the tourist is not hard to explain. For every native of every place is a potential tourist, and every tourist is a native of somewhere. Every native everywhere lives a life of overwhelming and crushing banality and boredom and desperation and depression, and every deed, good and bad, is…

Audre Lorde

A Litany for Survival BY AUDRE LORDE For those of us who live at the shoreline standing upon the constant edges of decision crucial and alone for those of us who cannot indulge the passing dreams of choice who love in doorways coming and going in the hours between dawns looking inward and outward at once…

Sick Day

Well, I'll keep it short. I was so happy about daycare and we both got sick. Aint that something? I just thought it was so funny how excited I was and that same day my baby started showing symptoms and two days later I was down for the count. We're over it now. Today marks…

Daycare

Someone messaged me telling me they read my blog and were now thinking of starting their own blog to vent... hmm. That wasn't my intention when creating the blog haha. I was hoping that yall would be able to relate to some developmental milestones of my son who is nearing 16 months in a few…

Frustration

I had a brief exchange the other day with a facebook friend about temper tantrums. She's a mom of a 3-week old and a step-mom/coparent to a 5-year old; she believes that temper tantrums are avoidable. I do not. She believes that kids should do as the parents says and I would like to qualify…

Body Positivity

I don't have a fun picture to post of my mom bod and this will not be an analytical piece like I said I would like to make in my last post. This is my first post of 2019 because it's something that all women deal with due to our fluctuating curves. Mine just happen…

Reluctance

This will be my last blog post of 2018. The topic we're looking at is: hesitation. I chose this topic because the fear of failure has oftentimes prevented me from starting or executing plans. This thought sprung up as I am approaching sleep training my son, having to create a plan and being consistent. The…

Primavera

    Rafael M San Juan Primavera Originally, this post was suppose to be an art review (don't count me out just yet). A little about the piece, it was made by Rafael San Juan for the detrás de los muros exhibition in the Bienal de La Habana 2015 and was donated to be a…

Diana Hinek

  I encountered Diana Henik, birth doula and photographer, on Instagram (@artshapedphotography). I was drawn to her by looking through her feed, her photography is captivating and visceral. I couldn't tell where her job ended and her life started. I enjoyed her images because they captured the joy of (carrying, creating and giving) life, she…

WTF? What even is a ‘Low Key’ Nurturer?

When I began the blog, I had intentions on being a ‘mom blogger’. I assumed and chose topics that covered basic ‘mom’ taking care of baby processes. I wrote about washing bottles, because these were ‘mom’ things I hadn’t thought about prior. I had so many ideas but they felt so impersonal and in my…

Tips to Freelancing and Moming

This summer has been so good to me! I had a fairly busy summer full of different photography and creation work. I had three different photography projects. I had two parties that I'm helping with/ planning. (My dad's party was yesterday and Buddha's is in a week). Of course, none of it would be possible…

The Countdown to the FIRST birthday

Yesterday was Buddha's monthaversary & After 11 months ... I've realized: Baby blues are real - ruminating on the barren emotional landscape of my transition into postpartum & sympathizing with new moms and their struggle to maintain ... it's so hard to navigate with a seemingly unforgiving ANXIETY. I. Feel. You. & it fades, trust…

Tips to Multilingualism

Here are some tips to creating a multilingual house: playing music in the secondary or tertiary language, for Spanish I've been playing Maná or Julieta Venegas and looking up lyrics. Naming body parts in each language , bonus points for directional words (besides, on top, below etc.).. were not at cardinal directions yet, Counting and…

The Conscious Parent

I am reading The Conscious Parent by Shefali Tsabary at the recommendation of a friend of mine who recently had her son. Congratulations Kimari! She is an avid book reader and a great mind that I admire, so I took the suggestion to heart and began reading it (better late than never). I'm going to…

Baby Wearing

(Disclaimer: this isn't an ad and I've only tried the following two baby wearing items). I use the ergo baby original on a day to day basis when it's a shorter trip/ not a lengthy walk involved or somewhere space restrictive/not handicap friendly (stroller is a huge wheeled apparatus). It's made of organic cotton so…

Happy Summer Solstice

Updated: June 22nd to add spiritual progress and clarifications. Today was the first day of summer The longest day of the year ... It's the final season before Buddha (more on why I decided to call my son Buddha later) turns one. SAD FACE!!!! The day we came home from the hospital was the fall…

Father’s Day

This weekend, I learned the importance of understanding the intentions that motivates someone’s (in)action. I have an amazing father that is not my blood, nonetheless he is an absolutely amazing man and father. He’s caring, honest and always speaks highly of me and my son. He has raised me for the past 20 years and…

Graco Trax Jogger Click N Connect

We finally broke the jogging portion of the jogger in last Monday, with a 30-minute run at the park. It went absolutely wonderful! Baby loves the outdoors, so this was a fun activity for us. We had used the stroller before at markets and to take walks around the neighborhood and it's always been enjoyable.…

My prenatal self-care

Just to tag along with my self-care post from last last week...I want to share some self care routines I had during pregnancy. & Here's a picture of me at 28 weeks I wanted to share because I miss my belly and my son is 7 months today. Around this time my belly began itching…

Self Care as a Mom

Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.
Audre Lorde

How to Wash Bottles (& Other Assorted Baby Items)

Here's a story for the ages: I didn't know I had to wash bottles. No, seriously 4 days postpartum, delirious and fresh out of the hospital, I boiled bottles after swishing them around in soapy water. *palm face* 5 months into it, the routine below is  what works for me. Just in case there are…

Returning to the Workforce; the Interview

"Is Friday good for you?" "Yes, or if you would like to schedule for a further date as I might be contagious, I understand. " "So, Friday at 11am is good?" "Sure." I answered the phone Wednesday with my voice going in and out and agreed to a job interview that following Friday. This is…

My Delivery Story

Context: Hurricane Harvey occurred 3 weeks before and we can talk about that later. I last saw my OB/GYN the Wednesday before for my, then, weekly checkups and she told me I was a centimeter dilated, she said this was normal because of the weight of the baby pushing on my cervix. She set my…

Repurpose

When this blog was started in 2013, I had the intentions of keeping my friends and family in the loop of my study abroad adventures. Now, almost 5 years later, this often neglected domain is being revisited and repurposed into a blog that will voice my perspective as a new parent, former cultural commentator, and…

Veronica Longoria

  I had the pleasure of meeting Veronica Longoria at the monthly Open Studios JoMar Visions hold (every third Saturday of the month) while she was painting a portrait on a woven canvas. I picked up a card from Longoria that had a small portion of, “Different Shades of Me” (2012), it sat on my…

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Houston Art Events Counter Current Festival April 18 - April 23 Schedule World Fest Fri - Sun, April 21 - April 30 Schedule Artist Village at the Willow Waterhole Music Fest Sat- Sun April 22-23, 11AM-6PM Willow Waterhole Greenway 5300 Dryad Dr, 77035 Free Facets of A Mirror Sunday, April 23, 3PM-7PM JoMar Visions 5247-5249…

Los Cortadores de Caña (1943)

Los Cortadores de Caña (1943) is an oil painting created by Mario Carreño (1913-1999) depicting cane cutters in a field of sugarcane. The subjects, the cane cutters are in full motion and their bodies seem to meld with their environment – the tropical colors at the fringes of their skin are sometimes indistinguishable from their…

Remote Houston

Remote Houston an interactive and participatory performance piece hosted by the Alley Theatre has been extended until the 20th. The last I heard there were only showings left for next Tuesday (5/16) and Wednesday (5/17). Rimini Protokoll, a Berlin based artists' collective who has been producing similar city-wide shows in Europe brought their act to the…

2015 Ka Palapala Po‘okela Awards: UH Press Nominees

I wish I could be there. So many good publications that can’t be found on the mainland – makes information more attainable for when we can’t all be in Aotearoa NZ. -_-

News from University of Hawai‘i Press

The 22nd annual Ka Palapala Po‘okela Awards celebration is scheduled for Thursday, April 23, 6 to 9 p.m., at Imin Conference Center (Jefferson Hall) at the East-West Center, which adjoins University of Hawai‘i’s Mānoa campus. Hawaii News Now reporter/commentator Howard Dicus will again be the ceremony emcee. The awards are presented annually by Hawai‘i Book Publishers Association to honor Hawai‘i’s finest books and their authors, illustrators, designers, and publishers.

Titles with a 2014 copyright date were eligible for this year’s awards. UH Press has a wonderful group of nominees (listed alphabetically by author’s name):

North Shore Place Names: Ka‘ena to Kahuku, by John R. K. Clark
(Excellence in Hawaiian Language, Culture & History)

Ocean to Plate: Cooking Fish with Hawai‘i’s Kusuma Cooray, by Kusuma Cooray; designed by Mardee Melton
(Excellence in Cookbooks; Excellence in Design)

Hawaiian Plant Life: Vegetation and Flora, by Robert J…

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Tentative Trip Presentation

Hello, I wanted to have an interface where I could show people my experiences in New Zealand because it was such a beautiful country full of cultural treasures from the indigenous Maori and the guests from nearby countries. Since this is a retrospective piece, I would like to describe these geographical spaces within their historical…