Well, this may well be the longest adventure yet! In 2010 the Next Chapter Book Blogging Group tried our first ever mail-around! Together we set out to explore The Happy Book by Meg Leder and Rachel Kempster, both of whom encouraged us with enthusiasm. (You can hear my interview with these lovely ladies here.) The Happy Book is an interactive delight, full of prompts to share pictures, drawings, poems, memories and reminders of where we find joy. What a perfect book to share.

Interest was so high that I created four mailing circles with participants in the US, Canada, the UK, Australia, Germany and the Philippines. With loving care, my friend Danette even followed up on the book, checking to see where it had arrived, ensuring the receiver knew here it was supposed to go next. (See, I’ve seen quite a few mail-arounds that… um… well, never made the “around” part.) Eventually it became clear that the plan was really ambitious and that life, well, life has its own plans.

But even so, through all the distance, through all of the challenges, through all the things life threw our way…

One book made it home!

Thank you to everyone who added their joy to the adventure, whether it was in this book or in one that is still roaming or whether you joined in for our Friday happy check-ins. It really is true what they say: shared joy is doubled joy. Thank you for all the smiles.

This week for The Next Chapter’s journey through The Happy Book by Meg Leder and Rachel Kempster, we’re sharing little excerpts of writing that moved us deeply, the kind of writing that makes you pause and drink it in and fall in love with reading and writing all over again.

What I share with you today is a passage I have read over and over again. It’s one I never get tired of. One that inspires admiration and gratitude for Jane Urquhart’s gifts. One that touches me, challenges me and invites me in every single time. I hope you enjoy it.

Excerpt from Changing Heaven by Jane Urquhart

“She wants to write a book about the wind, about the weather.

She wants the words constancy and capriciousness to move in and out of the sentences the way a passing cloud changes the colour of the page you read outside on a variable day. She wants there to be thunder, and then some calm, then some thunder again. She wants to predict time in relation to change and to have all of her predictions prove wrong. She wants recurrence. That cloud that looks like the face of a man you might fear or love – she wants that cloud to appear on the horizon, then disappear, then appear again. She wants to be forced  indoors by tempests and driven into air by heat, to be caught miles from shelter by a squall. She wants to see the Great Lake altered by the activity of the sky, to see a still moorland reservoir develop white-caps for the first time in its life, to look upon the spines of animals whose fur has been blown in the wrong direction; to see their eyes reflect rain, sleet, snow. She wants the breath of the wind in her words, to hold its invisible body in her arms. She wants the again and again of that revenant, the wind – its evasiveness, its tenacity, its everlastingness.

‘We’re blessed and cursed by the wind here,’ one of the villagers might say to her, shouting to make himself heard above the gale. and in the weeks, the months to come, she will change her mind about the wind, as often as the wind itself will change is mind about the organization of the sky or how much further it should twist the trees.”

What words move you?

For The Next Chapter’s The Happy Book assignment this week, we’re exploring the joys of comfort. The timing couldn’t be more perfect as I’ve been incredibly busy getting ready to head to San Francisco (I’m there right now!) and getting everything ready for Jamie Ridler Studios to run smoothly while I’m gone. In the midst of all rushing about, I found I really wanted to make myself a nice cup of English Breakfast, curl up on my red couch and start creating a comfort collage.

As well as creating a monthly dreamboard, I have a journal that I write and collect things in and I also keep something that could be called a dream journal. It’s an artist’s sketchbook with blank pages and between dreamboards I sometimes turn to this book, gluing in pictures that particularly move me. Lately I’ve also been starting a new practice: creating a journal spread for what I’m yearning for. This provides an opportunity to expand what you’ve discovered on your dreamboard. For example, maybe you have one picture on your dreamboard that represents “travel” or “health” or “love”. You can develop those dreams even further by creating a collage dedicated exclusively to them.

When I was creating these pages, I noticed that to me comfort was warmth and glow and that brought about the discovery that what I had thought of as comfort in the past was actually serenity, which for me is all spacious, white and light. This is a fine distinction and is opening up all sorts of possibilities in terms of my home, my colours and yes, my comfort. When I cast back on the appearance of red in this year’s dreamboards, I think maybe a part of that colour’s message to me has been comfort.

What is comfort to you?

In this year’s session of The Next Chapter book blogging group, we are playing our way through The Happy Book by Meg Leder and Rachel Kempster. Every week I share an assignment from the book and we explore that particular colour of happiness through the week and then share it on Fridays. (Btw, it’s never too late to join!)

This week’s assignment was to gather stars and fill a couple of pages. I love stars and it was time for me to move into my new journal, so I decided to transplant my happy stars. I had planned to cut out hundreds of stars from all kinds of patterns and textures and glue them in until the page was full to overflowing with stars. But as I started working on it, my memory kept going back to a favourite quote of mine, “We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars” Oscar Wilde. And so, I made this instead.

Happiness is following where inspiration takes you.

What made you happy this week?

For this past week’s Happy Book assignment we’re paying attention to our present, to the moments in our lives that bring us joy. I thought I’d gather mine in images this week, which also reminded me why I love doing my Project 365 so much! I’ve been a bit remiss in my picture-taking this year, so it was good timing for an energy infusion!

The picture above is when Justin & I went shopping for clothes for our upcoming trip to my brother’s wedding in San Francisco – the third in my “become a more confident traveller” excursions!

This week I finished crocheting a wavy throw that I made with scraps of yarn from previous projects. Learning the wave is one of my new crochet manoeuvres! Previous to this all I have done is granny squares. I’m also in the midst of making a granny square blanket for my sister Suzie!

One of my biweekly treats is going on an art picnic with some friends at a local cafe. It never fails to brighten my mood, no matter the weather.

Usually at the art picnic I grab a magazine and collage a page in my journal. Here’s my page from this week. I’ve been thinking a lot about confidence lately. In fact, I have something brewing for next year!

The fall is showing up in all sorts of beautiful ways. I stood for a moment under this tree, sun dappling through the remaining leaves and little yellow treasures falling all around me.

A powerful part of my present is drawing an Osho Zen Tarot Card each day. I share them in the mornings on Twitter and on Facebook for some focus and inspiration every day. I haven’t seen this card for quite a long time! It’s amazing the trends and turns you notice when you draw a card from the same deck for years.

One of the big giggles of my week was watching Jinx discover this wastepaper basket. She absolutely could not figure out that it was too small for her to curl up in, so she kept circle and circle and circling within, trying to get comfortable. Hmm… I’m wondering if there’s a message there for all of us!

What made you happy this week?

Feel free to join us in The Happy Book adventure. It’s never too late to join in The Next Chapter.

For this session of The Next Chapter we’re playing through The Happy Book by Rachel Kempster and Meg Leder and we’re having a blast! Each week I randomly pick an assignment from this interactive journal and this week we’re sharing our favourite dance tunes. How fun is that! And today we can visit each other for a virtual blog dance party, dancing to new tunes every where we go.

Now that you’re here, why not stay a while! I’m sharing the DJ playlist from the summer’s Groove Back event. I know it got us moooving!

Everyone’s welcome to join the dance party! Fridays are even happier when there’s dancing! And  It’s never too late to join The Next Chapter. Why don’t you come and play?

The Next Chapter book blogging group is starting a new phase of The Happy Book; we’re playing our way through with joy! Our first Happy Assignment was to carry a mascot around with us for a week. This had me giggling from the start. I hope you enjoy watching my adventures with Dwayne.

And if you’d like to join in, please do! There’s lots more fun to be had. To find out more and to sign up, click here.