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Tina Sado

@writeathomewithtina

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Writer/Storyteller/📙worm/She Shells
Don’t look at your feet to see if you’re doing it right, just dance - Anne Lamott
all pics are mine unless noted

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When we moved into our new home, dear friends of ours gave us a little house-warming gift (well truthfully, it was more for my husband) which was a quirky set of salt and pepper shakers.

Knowing how much he loves to gamble especially in Vegas, they gifted us miniature slot machine shakers with “LAS VEGAS” in all caps at the top of each one.

We laughed at their tacky design and the fact that my husband doesn’t cook and I don’t gamble. Even so, they were the perfect bit of kitsch my kitchen needed.

I reverently placed them on top of the stove and can proudly proclaim they haven’t been moved or used since!

A few days after our friend’s visit, I happened to look up and noticed 11:11 on the oven clock right below the shakers. How perfect! A good luck sign perhaps? I snapped a pic and sent it off as a cheeky follow-up thank you.

The following week my husband flew off to (you guessed it) Las Vegas to gamble of course!

And as luck would have it, or the universe, or whoever’s in charge up there, he won!

In fact, it was the strangest cash-out ticket he’s ever gotten:

$1,111.11.

I always ask what are the chances? My gambler husband would ask what are the odds? But we both agreed the universe hit the jackpot.

#theartofnoticing
#payattentiontothesigns by @writeathomewithtina

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3 months ago

I often wonder if what we encounter as we go about our day happens randomly or if days unfold in some sort of cosmic divine order. Is it merely coincidence when we notice connections or experience synchronicities?

We had a painting contractor hired by our builder arrive today. He walked up to the porch just as I was sweeping it and when our eyes met we laughed as I said I was cleaning up just for him. He pointed to my Chris Stapleton t-shirt telling me where he saw him perform and I, in turn, shared where we also saw him and we immediately bonded over our love of country music.

Contractor Mark was missing his front teeth and he had no real voice. He spoke in a deep, raspy, exaggerated whisper. He was what I refer to as a salty dog. A little rough around the edges but a heart of gold.

He asked if I’d ever visited Nashville or traveled through the Smoky Mountains. I asked if he’d ever been to the Ryman Auditorium or The Grand Ole Opry.

He shared how he grew up in West Virginia in deep poverty in a community that also suffered through drug addiction brought on by a coal industry that had dried up, taking with it their livelihood.

He then asked if I had heard of “THE ROCKET BOYS” adding, “that’s where I come from.” I thought for a moment and said it sounded familiar but I wasn’t sure. And we let it drop.

Hours later, he was painting in a room where I had a basket of books sitting on a chair. He happened to look over and saw “THE ROCKET BOYS” on the cover of one of them. He turned to me in astonishment and said “You have a Homer Hickam book?!” I was thinking “a what book?” He motioned me over and then pointed to the book cover.

Sure enough, front and center was a book by the author of “THE ROCKET BOYS.”

Turns out I had read that book, a memoir by a young man who escaped poverty in West Virginia, something our painter knew about all too well.

We both smiled over the fact that the name of a random book he’d mentioned (one I’d read so long ago I barely remembered it) was on the cover of a book sitting in plain view and um, how coincidental was that?

And so I wonder yet again. A nod from the universe or just coincidence?

What do you think?

#guided
#signs by @writeathomewithtina

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3 months ago

This unretouched photo is remarkable not only because of how the fading sunlight played off this barn’s unique design but also because I snapped it from the passenger seat of a moving car in one take. We were traveling along a winding two-lane road at sunset through the back roads of Kentucky.

That road trip opened my eyes to what abject poverty in rural America truly looks like. Homes with garbage heaps piled on the side of the house, broken down cars, collections of rusty hubcaps, tumble down trailers on the side of a hill.

I wondered how these people survive. No big box stores, no grocery stores, no drug stores. Tiny towns with one church, one gas station and in one town, a burned out motel sitting abandoned.

There’s something about an old barn I find captivating and this one was a standout (literally.) Surrounded by the beauty of rolling bluegrass hills, it sits in stark contrast to the unsettling images of poverty I did not capture, but will not soon forget.

#barns
#oldbarns
#barnsofinstagram
#kentucky by @writeathomewithtina

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4 months ago

Beachin’ at Emerald Isle, NC means …

Blue skies, waves crashing, salty air blowing, glasses raised, tan lines, beachy hair, seashells, long beach walks, sandy crabs, great food, slow days, games, rest, happy hours and family @carlysado @drew_sado

#beach
#beachlovers
#beachdays by @writeathomewithtina

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4 months ago

#hsp
#ｈｓｐ by @writeathomewithtina

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4 months ago

I recently got my first tattoo (and if I say “first” does that imply I will be getting more?) 🤔

I can’t answer that!

But I will say that a lot of thought went into getting this one. It was never going to be a simple flower or a bird or a butterfly. Not that there’s anything wrong with those images. It was just that mine had to have special meaning.

And boy does it. In fact, it’s been the tattoo that keeps on giving. How is that, you ask?

Initially, the word “sisters” was to honor 45 years of friendship with a group of five women I’ve known since college. We all got our tattoos together, all using a version of a heart. I even added a little number six in the short string at the the balloon’s base for the six of us.

But when my husband first saw it he immediately thought of his mom, my beloved mother-in-law who was one of SIX SISTERS. It never occurred to me. But I loved that this tat had another layer of meaning.

And then I got together with my siblings one evening and over dinner my tattoo came up in conversation. My younger brother looked at me and said, “You know dad had SIX SISTERS right?” Oh my gosh, of course!! But I never made that connection either!

So now this tattoo has yet another layer of meaning that I never realized when it was originally inked.

I guess I love it more now than the day I got it and it makes me wonder if the universe had a little hand (or heart?) in making this tattoo come together.

@chartertattoo_

#tattoo
#tattoed
#tattooedgirl
#tattoos
#littlestoriesofmylife by @writeathomewithtina

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4 months ago

Fun little moment when I wrote out the words on each step and uncovered the shape of the words as a whole.

Image captured on a recent trip to California. I can’t walk past (or up and down) steps that have been painted in any way with words or pictures and not snap a photo. Anyone else?

I
Will
Start to
Volunteer
Buy locally
Learn to sew
Take my bike instead
Eat organic vegetables
Find a handmade alternative
Take my own bag to the store
Get my hands dirty in my garden
Get an Orange County trails guide
Build with recycled materials
Do my research before buying
Choose the green alternative
Read a book in the hammock
Spend time outdoors and,
Sleep more soundly
Knowing this is
Making a better
World for
You and
Me

#orangecounty
#theartofnoticing by @writeathomewithtina

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5 months ago

Sometimes the best thing you can do is step outside your comfort zone and just do it.

@chartertattoo_

#tattoo
#tattooed
#tattoedgirl
#tattoos
#littlestoriesofmylife by @writeathomewithtina

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5 months ago

“I’m not a crafty person. I don’t particularly like making crafts. I’m not good at it and I’m not very creative when it comes to making things.”

I’ve convinced myself of this BS narrative for YEARS. And yet, here I am, immersed in something crafty (making decoupaged shells) and really enjoying it. WHO ARE YOU? I laugh to myself.

And then I begin to remember I was the kid who did cross-stitch, who once made a set of clothespin dolls, who learned to knit, made a purse out of fabric scraps, made macrame bracelets in grade school and sold them to friends at recess. I made fabric-covered picture frames from cardboard cutouts and gave them as Christmas gifts. In short, I liked making things.

So what changed? I think I know the answer.

As we grow up and become adults, we slowly lose the pieces of ourselves that we don’t (or can’t) make time for. It seems as if those pieces are stolen from us, bit by bit, without us being aware. Until one day, you wake up and you’re 65 still holding onto stories about yourself that just aren’t true.

Rediscovering who I was as a child has given me the freedom to not only change the narrative but reclaim the right version.

(Hey Grandma! Remember that time I found your slide projector and figured out how to make individual slides using clear adhesive on the pages of a magazine and wrote a script and put on a funny slideshow in your kitchen? Me neither! But I’m remembering it now!!)

All this is to say that I’m reexamining what stories I tell myself about who I am.

Who we become is most definitely shaped by our lived experiences but who we were designed to be is with us from birth - our likes, our dislikes, our interests and our dreams.

There lies the distinction.

#decoupage
#shell
#decoupageshells
#seashells
#flashnonfiction by @writeathomewithtina

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6 months ago

“I GOT A SHE SHELL!” the pint-sized toddler sitting next to us on the beach excitedly gushed, her arm extended toward us, a sandy little hand clutching the tiniest shell.

The grin on her face put a smile on ours. Her unbridled joy at finding what, in her world, was an immeasurable treasure was, in ours, nothing more than an unremarkable part of any sandy beach anywhere.

And yet, for all the years that have passed since, we still remember that line with fondness recalling the singular moment when a seashell became a “she-shell.”

I’ve recently come full circle from that day on the beach. I began a new hobby taking ordinary shells and turning them into little treasures. (Yes, I too have a she-shell or two … or twenty.)

I’m giving them away (for now.) Each one contains a little message on the back (my version of “a message in a bottle” you might say.)

If a message in a bottle “embodies the human desire to connect … trusting the unknown forces of the sea to deliver that message,” than maybe one of my “she-shells,” once a part of that vast sea, will deliver a few words to someone who needs to receive them as well.

That’s my intent, anyway.

This is Harper. She’s a little older than the toddler we met on the beach that day. But her grin is the same. She’s holding one of my shells and with it a piece of my heart.

#seashells
#decoupageshells
#flashnonfiction
#micromemoir
#nothingisordinary by @writeathomewithtina

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7 months ago

January in Ohio. When the preparation to go out and walk the dog takes longer than the dog walk itself.

Extra thick leggings ✅
Snow gloves ✅ (my husbands, because mine are suddenly MIA) 🙄
Snow boots ✅
Extra layers ✅
Winter hat under hood ✅
Flannel scarf to breath though and fog up sunglasses so I really see nothing ✅
Earbuds for podcast to try and distract me from the misery I’m in ✅ by @writeathomewithtina

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9 months ago

I guess birds of a feather really do flock together.

Another decoupaged shell I made letting me know it’s going to fit in just fine here. Happy accident.

As the lyrics from “I’ve Seen It” by Grammy nominated singer, songwriter Olivia Dean’s song say:

“The more you look, the more you find
It’s all around you all the time…”

#shell
#shells
#serendipitymoments
#serendipity by @writeathomewithtina

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9 months ago