Thankfully, it was flowers instead of rotten tomatoes…What I got up to in January and now.

February 6, 2016February 6, 2016 jacquelineobyikocha39 Comments

Yes! I started my YouTube VLog Channel this January. It was something that I wanted to start doing a while back, but kept pushing it back and getting jittery until sometime last week, my little reminder that I set for myself prodded me after I had written a short poem in a restaurant.

Of course, the voice of procrastination tried to convince me to put if off till the next day when I would feel more comfortable but the little voice of encouragement within me asked ‘What is the worst thing that can happen?’ What do you stand to gain? How would you feel if you don’t do it? Once I clarified these thoughts in my mind, I pressed the button.

One thing that I have learnt, is that there is never a perfect moment. It may never be perfect, but what I know for sure is that, you are the one that perfects your moments and days as much as you can. It didn’t turn out so badly and I got some decent feedback as well.

Why am I vlogging you may care to ask?

Asides from reading poetry, I want to use it as a platform to start working on my Inspiration and Motivational channel as a Lifestyle coach. However, it’s one day at a time and in stages. There are so many learning curves and things to be done.

Here is my second Vlog below, if you would like to listen and this is the link for the previous one just in case you missed it.

JAZZ

All that jazz.
I listen to the tinkles of the water
The thrums of the guitar
And the deep rhythm of the bass

No words said
You stare me in the eyes

The mirrored look
Caught within your pupils
Reverberates all the Love
Trapped inside

Aching to flow out
A syllable at a time.

Family · Life · Love · Parenting · Photographs · Poetry/Poems

Since You’ve Been Gone…

February 5, 2016 jacquelineobyikocha42 Comments

I see you around the corner, the likeness of your eyes in the eyes of a total stranger down the shopping aisle.
It startles me.

I see you in everything that I look around me.
In the random formation of the clouds.
I sometimes see your wise eyes peeking through and winking at me.
It gives me joy.

I hear you in my thoughts. Your words of wisdom, of love, of encouragement
Are etched upon my soul.
They keep me warm.

I hear you in the music. The music that you loved so much, that I grew up knowing that love.
They sounds of music comfort me.

I see you in my little boy’s face. Sometimes, I stare at him so hard, as I seek tell tales of you written in his genetics.
It leaves me amazed.

I see you in the hands of a gardener pruning plants, in the gentle waves of a blooming plant, you loved all things green and they did so well in your hands.
It makes me smile.

I feel you in the drumbeats of my heart, because you are me and I am you. Everyday, my thoughts dwell on you, for in every little thing I see you.

I visualize you looking on from high up and I wish my hands could stretch up so high to give you a hug.
I get some comfort from the warmth of the Sun, telling my mind that you are with me.

In the smile, in the laugh, the stare, the walk, the phrase in a young child’s face.

I catch myself holding one-sided conversations with you and your imagined responses prompt me to sigh, to laugh and to cry.

I see you.
In everything that I am.

To you my dear dad. Always.

Yesterday was World Cancer Day, I lost my dear dad to Cancer two years ago. Sometimes, the pain is just so raw that it clogs my chest and my throat. He was a very lovely human and a fabulous dad. If there is one ailment that I could wish away from the World, it would be Cancer.

To those battling The Big C, may abundant Grace and Strength remain your portion. We will beat it. Blessings.

Creative Writing · Friday Fiction in Five Sentences · Love · Photographs · Short Stories

The Basket Of Flowers…Friday Fiction In Five Sentences.

February 5, 2016 jacquelineobyikocha40 Comments

His palms got sweaty and his heart rate increased as he approached the door.

He has no idea what kind of reception he would receive, but he was willing to try.

He has loved her from their kindergarten days, from her little flouncy skirt and swinging ponytails to her grown svelte alluring confident self and sleek bob.

As the boy next door, he had watched the dates come and go from the sidelines, wishing he was the one; now it’s time to take a chance and knock.

Suze opens the door, a huge smile weaving on her face as his words stammered and stuttered along, she buried her nose in the beautiful bouquet of flowers, heaved a sigh of content and relief, ‘I thought that I would have to wait forever,’ she said.

Blog-hopping · Blogging · Love

Here Is Your Invitation….RSVP Please

February 3, 2016 jacquelineobyikocha181 Comments

Bring out all the whistles and the bells,

Turn up in your dancing shoes and your glad rags,

Let’s have the bottles of wine and cookies,

Some decadent chocolates, cakes and ice-cream would do too,

All the good vibes that’s on your mind.

It will be happening live.

Let’s jiggle and mingle

And show some love

#It’s a love thing connection time.

I hope to see you at this party

‘Cos it will be blog-hopping 🙂

♥ ♥

Love · Poetry Vlog · Poetry/Poems · VLogs

Yay! My First Poetry Vlog 1… Please don’t throw tomatoes or your shoes at me ;)

January 29, 2016January 31, 2016 jacquelineobyikocha100 Comments

♥ Love Rations ♥

When you batter me with the whip lash of your looks
And the coldness of your words,
My heart and soul shrivels from the lack of warmth.

As the icicles that drips from your eyes
Pierce my veins and leaves them frozen.

Your deliberate silence and denial
A negligence to my needs.

Your withdrawal of your love at will
Causes a ponder of thoughts.

If love is a chip to bargain with,
And we play chess with our hearts,
To determine who wins this game of shooting the darts.

Should your love be doled out in rations,
Dependent on my emotional engagement,
Or your emotional intelligence of the moment?

Taunting me with fast promises,
That fails to feel full.
Always leaving me with the need for some more.

Please click on the link to listen in and leave your candid thoughts, advice, constructive criticisms. Thank you

Life · Lifestyle · Love · Personal story · The Great Book Of Lists

My Lettered Mind… The Great Book Of Lists Chapter 1.4

January 28, 2016January 28, 2016 jacquelineobyikocha46 Comments

At a young age, deciphering the lettering in the pages of a book became No. 1 on the list of my favourite things and if it is possible to say, I would say that I gobbled up literature with such veracity, that one would think it was an Olympic contest.

The adventure that I have with books has led to a rhyme or two words.

Out of my forays in reading, I got to learn that I am an incurable romantic realist *if such a term exists* and I always look for the happy endings or at least something heartwarming.

I read several horrors after a fad and found it absolutely not to my taste.

Yes, I admit, the amount of Mills & Boons, Harlequin Romances, Barbara Cartlands, Penny Jordan’s, Barbara Taylor Bradford, Amanda Quick and the rest of the crew that I read, must have contributed some coins from my piggy bank to the authors pockets and it’s amazing how much content the brain can take in and still keep soaking up more each day.

Ah! These brings back the days of mobile library and the ice-cream van to my mind. The two always seemed to come around the school premises almost at the same time and now that I think about it, that ice-cream man must have been responsible for my love for sweets. Just imagine bringing my two favourite things together 😉

I digress. Back to some of the books that caught my mind, held my thoughts and stoked my imagination enough to steal into the toilet for a quick page of reading when I was meant to be watching the beans on the fire and yes, a page turned to several and the beans got burnt.

For this weeks The books that transport me, chapter 1.4 of TGBOL, these ones come easily to my mind:

Lorna Doone – Richard Doddridge Blackmore
Wuthering Heights – Emily Brontë
Jane Eyre – Charlotte Brontë
Little Women – Louisa May Alcott
The Basket Of Flowers – Christope Von Schmid
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn – Mark Twain
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer – Mark Twain
Oliver Twist – Charles Dickens
The Mayor of Casterbridge – Thomas Hardy
The Count of Monte Cristo – Alexandre Dumas
Pride and Prejudice – Jane Austen
Gone with the wind – Margaret Mitchell
Things Fall Apart – Chinua Achebe
Sands Of Time – Sidney Sheldon
The Secret Garden – Frances Burnett
Great Expectations – Charles Dickens
The Merchant Of Venice – William Shakespeare
Comics of : Archie, Betty & Veronica, Jughead, ASTERIX, TinTin
Fairy tales by The Brothers Grimms
Enid Blyton books

Numbers 18, 19 and 20, I pretend to buy for my children and still sneak in a good read and a chortle. Please, you are free to think whatever, I am still a child at heart 😉

Creative Writing · Humor - Bellyful of laughter · Love · Poetry/Poems

Sweet Indulgence…

January 17, 2016January 17, 2016 jacquelineobyikocha47 Comments

Honey sweet words you whispered to me,

In anticipation, they tickle me to my bones.

Pupils dilated, eyelashes flutter,

In deep sigh of sated, sweet affection,

The burst of sugary sensation,

Hits the right nerve centres.

It’s a chocolate dream.

Devotions · Gratitude · Hope · Inspiration - Motivation · Life · Love

I am grateful and blessed to have you as my friend…

January 13, 2016 jacquelineobyikocha47 Comments

Life brings friends our way who turn out to become our families in almost every sense of the word and I am particularly grateful for such a friend as my dear good friend Mrs. Ekaete Augustine-Edet.

We have journeyed together from our days as single ladies working at the French Embassy, Lagos Nigeria almost two decades ago, to today as mothers and wives and she has remained such a steadfast friend, sister and motivator.

She is one of the driving forces behind my starting my blog, because she believes in me and my writing skills. She kept asking me when I would start my blog, until I got started.

She is there anytime I call with a need or something on my mind. I had reason to make such a call and as usual she selflessly gave of herself, her time and her pocket.

I thank God for a friend like you and really don’t have much words to appreciate your kindness.

On another hand, I have been blessed with running into interesting characters since last week.

Two lovely neighbourhood dogs, Lola and Cookie and Meow, The cat seem to have adopted me for reasons best known to them, though I do stop to say hello to the cute dogs when I am taking my walk and they are out and about.

Meow is a lone ranger, but always appears by the chair where I sit sometimes to watch the World go by and he rubs himself on my pants legs seeking attention.

I am more a dog person and not particularly a cat person but strangely, this would be the third encounter where different neighbourhood felines come up to say hello.

Since I don’t know much about felines, maybe those who do can tell me what this indicates.

I am grateful for little meaningless moments like this. They end up meaning a lot when we appreciate them and each moment that I spend in a state of gratitude, the phrase that the best things in life are for free couldn’t be more true than it is.

There is so much to be thankful for. Just look around and you will see.

You can join Colline’s or Maria Jansson‘s gratitude challenge platforms

Regards and blessings

Life · Love · Personal story · The Daily Post

All My Crushes…

January 11, 2016January 11, 2016 jacquelineobyikocha31 Comments

The eclectic taste that I have in things stretches to the domain of music as well and I have my late dad to thank for nurturing my mind with the plethora of sounds of music from different artists that floated through our home and seeped into my young veins.

I like music from all the artists enumerated below including the legend, David Bowie, may he rest in peace.

However, my young heart was completely enamoured by the Jackson 5’s and a little later just Michael Jackson. Me and my siblings danced to their beats and attempted all manners of moves that I cannot dare try now, for want of not breaking my legs.

As I got older, Boyz II Men became a teenage crush, though MJ still retained a special place.

Though there is an artist whose songs haunt my life a lot of times and that is the legendary Mama Africa ‘Miriam Makeba.’ There is something in some of her renditions that simply has me curling up and in bitter-sweet tears.

Till today, dancing ‘just because‘ still remains one of my biggest ways of relaxing, of laughing and I am known to lapse into singing – more like warbling tunes, when I am upset too.

It has a way of calming me down and I think my husband recognizes this as well. Once he annoys me and I start singing, he knows that I am deeply pained and my way of riding through it, is either to write it out, sing away the pain or dance to the beats.

You cannot sing or dance and remain angry because Music is simply laughter for the Soul as long as it is not filled with hate and abusive words.

The Daily Post prompt Teen Age Idol.

Who did you idolize as a teenager? Did you go crazy for the Beatles? Ga-ga over Duran Duran? In love with Justin Bieber? Did you think Elvis was the livin’ end?

Creative Writing · Fiction · Love · Short Stories Series

At Long Last! A Husband Found…

January 10, 2016 jacquelineobyikocha36 Comments

It’s a beautiful Spring morning. Everything shines and conspires in accord with the warmth that flows around.

Staring into the mirror in the dressing room, Tess’s joy overflows. She barely slept more than two winks.

The anticipation of her new life has her lips wreathed in smiles and her brown eyes glow in the bright light.

So does her mothers; who is busy blowing her nose and dabbing away tears of joy yet again. Mother dear, is proud of herself and her baby. She always believed that she knew what is best for her girl and she is taking some part of the good wishes for playing a major role in the matchmaking from the onset.

It’s been a year and three months of intense courtship with Humphrey and today is their wedding day. It had taken several unsuccessful, blind online efforts and an accidental date to find her man.

Who knew that her Prince was the proverbial boy next door or as the case may be, the boy in the Church.

She recalls the near times that she almost blew him off. The time that she was sure she had caught him cheating on her, but it turned out that the glimpse of tenderness that she saw through the jewelry windows was actually not what it seemed.

Her plan to confront him and get to the bottom of the cheating matter went askew when she arrived his birthday party only to see her supposed rival in a close clinch with Humphrey’s mother. She knew the Vicar’s wife did not cotton up to any nonsense and wouldn’t be in support of Humphrey’s dilly-dallying ways.

It was an immense relief to sidle up in the pretext of greeting her boyfriend’s mother and she got introduced to the exquisite beautiful lady of the jewelry store, who turned out to be an out-of-state favourite niece. The necklace that Humphrey was clasping around her neck was a belated birthday gift.

Her surprise was complete when the birthday party turned out to be an engagement party of sorts.

The young man bit the bullet, went down on his knees in front of family and friends and proposed so sweetly that she was saying yes and crying all at the same time.

She admires the gorgeous gleaming single cut diamond stone on her finger for the millionth time, while her ladies -in-waiting fuss around her. It’s almost time to go to the chapel.

We are getting married.

The End.

The the entire series you can follow these links: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7.

The past couple of days has found me with several new readers and follows and I would like to introduce some of them to you.

Pavanneh: Because I can.

Jerry: 80 Insights.

Mark: Fonzandcancer.

The Bikini Book Worm.

True George.

Bookyglover.

Its all buki, relationship and lifestyle.