Embrace Qi

01/20/2026

Save these dates!!

Embrace Qi is hosting two events the first week of February !!

🤩February 7th lymph drainage and breast health tips !!
1-3pm with Tandy Hewitt and Tina Franklin

https://www.facebook.com/share/1D2bePYEyv/?mibextid=wwXIfr

🥰February 8th
Galentine’s potluck and sound bath
12:30-2:30pm with Hiroko Hibbard
$30/pp venmo to -hado

https://www.facebook.com/share/17uiq9m7Ro/?mibextid=wwXIfr

Rsvp on the event pages 🙂

01/19/2026

❤

Come talk on the wind phone. Release a little bit of grief into the wind.

The Winter of Grief: What Lies Beneath

Grief feels like winter.
It arrives without warning,
a thinning of the light,
a chill that seeps into the bones.

The world grows muted,
stripped down to what is essential.
Laughter sounds distant.
Time slows.
Even breath feels heavier.

In winter, everything appears dormant.
The ground hardens.
What once bloomed with ease
now seems almost inconceivable.

Grief does this too.
It convinces us that life we once trusted
has disappeared,
that color has drained from our lives,
that what was lost
is gone forever.

But beneath the frozen surface,
something is still alive.
Hidden under the cold soil
is a seed, small and patient.

It carries the memory of what once was
and the quiet promise
of what might still be.

Grief, when allowed to exist
without being hurried or denied,
shelters this seed.

Every tear is moisture.
Every remembered laugh,
every ache of longing,
every time you say their name aloud
becomes an act of tending.

Nurturing this seed
does not mean forgetting the winter.
It means honoring it.

You return to the memories
not to reopen old wounds,
but to shield them from the cold.

You tell the stories again,
even when your voice shakes.
You let the love
that once had a place to go
move through you instead.

In doing so,
you keep the ground
from becoming barren.

Spring does not arrive all at once.
It never does.
It begins with the smallest signs:
a softening,
a brief moment of ease,
the realization
that pain no longer fills
every corner of the day.

One day you breathe
without bracing yourself.
Another day,
you smile without guilt.

These are not betrayals of loss;
they are proof
that love is still working
its way toward the light.

The seed does not replace
what was lost.
It grows because of it.
It carries memory in its roots
and tenderness in its leaves.

What emerges
is not the same life as before,
but a life shaped by remembrance,
deeper,
more fragile,
more honest.

Grief is like winter, yes.
But winter is not the end of the story.
Beneath the cold,
something waits.

And when you care for it,
when you allow yourself
to remember,
to ache,
to love still,
it will sprout,
because love
never truly disappears.

~ 'The Winter of Grief: What Lies Beneath' by Spirit of a Hippie

✍️ Mary Anne Byrne

~ Art by Lina Silina

01/12/2026

Look at this great article about us!!

A friend messaged me and said “your place is like my third place… after my home & work, your place is where i find community and openness and welcoming energy”

We will be expanding the wind phone, creating maker spaces, adding in a mural on the side of the pump house, planting flowers, creating a few sitting areas… and opening up sculpture and painting classes with David Eddy in Van Zandt studio!

Thanks for all your enthusiasm, encouragement and support!

WASHOUGAL — The first thing I saw as I drove into Rising Phoenix Farm is an 8-foot-tall woman gazing serenely toward the horizon. She’s seated in a meditative pose with her legs crossed and open hands

01/12/2026

Do you make a vision board every year? Do you fill up the whole page w words or images or mix it up?

We ripped out words and images to help our brains feel and see what’s coming our way in 2026…
No scissors because we want it not to be too perfect.
We went around and shared our “word for the year” or the feelings we want to feel this year!

Take a look at all the creativity here today!!

12/28/2025

this is a unique experience!
come join us as we release 2025 and make room for what's coming in for 2026!!

Decemeber 30th @ 7pm. registration is below. get your spot now because it will sell out!!!

https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1H9UiNc8ea/

Send a message to learn more

10/13/2025

Today is the day our dad took his last earthly breath in 2013

He had heard from our mom the night before that hospice was going to start and he could go “home”.

He finally heard the words he had been saying to her for months “joanie i just want to go home” and he would look at the sky or ceiling.
Mom heard “i need to eat, walk, get up by myself and i will be back in our apartment”

Carol Yeh-Garner and I knew what he meant- we work with geriatric clients. He was tired of all the doctor appointments, the multitude of pills and surgeries to “try” helping him live longer (or prolong his death as he used to say).
He prepared mom for his death: “go buy a new car that you like to drive.” “Go home and be with your friends and i will be taken care of by the nurses here at the care home. Come visit me once in a while- not all day and all night”, “go find good restaurants to try with the grandkids”, “make a way to organize all the financial statements we get every month”….& the list goes on. And so she did and somehow he knew it was time.

Oct 13, 2013: a nurse called me and said “you better come say bye to your dad”
my mom, her sister Nora who said “augie’s angels told my angels to fly out here from Virginia today to see him”, Austin Gee, and our cousin Jack were all in the room talking to dad and telling him to wait til Carol could get there as she hopped on a plane after we finally reached her (the one day she had turned off their phone ringers bc of their daughter’s sleep over party!)

Pandora played in the background. Michael Buble’s song “home” came on and mom held his hand and told him “im going to be fine. You should go if you want to” and then she went to the window with everyone else…

I sat next to dad as the lyrics to the song played:

Let me go home
I've had my run and baby, I'm done
I gotta go home
Let me go home

He raised both hands into the air like he was welcoming someone (that was his signature move), grinned a ginormous smile, let his arms down and took a deep breath in and that was it.
His spirit went home.
To be with his mom who he never saw after escaping the communists in china as a young man.
To be with his dad who worked so hard to help dad and his brothers pay for a way to leave China for a “better life”.
To be with so many friends and family who were waiting for him with open arms.

So today is a slow day.
Watching the sun rise thru the fog.
Making ghee and aloo gobi to share with friends.
Picking tomatoes and making sauce and fermented tomatoes for salsa.
Calling mom, carol and the boys to say H❤️la!
Eating a bacon peanut butter sandwich with a side of cottage cheese (dad’s favorites but he would have mixed them all together!!)
I’ll find some Michael Buble, nat king cole, andy williams and Elvis songs to put in a playlist - all the songs will be what he listened to and sang along to for his karaoke sessions with his friends!

Ill also go talk to him on the wind phone.

Carrying Our Loved Ones Within

We carry our loved ones
in the quiet corners of our days,
in the echo of a laugh,
the warmth of a touch,
the gentle guidance they once offered.

We honor them in the life we live,
in acts of kindness,
in passions pursued,
in values held close.

Grief and love intertwine,
and in that weaving,
their spirit becomes part of us,
a steady light,
a quiet, steadfast strength.

Even in our choices,
their wisdom guides us,
a subtle compass pointing the way.

To carry our loved ones within is to honor them,
to let their essence move through us,
shaping the rhythm of our days,
reminding us that love endures,
even beyond presence.

~ 'Carrying Our Loved Ones Within' by Spirit of a Hippie

✍️ Mary Anne Byrne

~ Art by Serin Alar Serin Alar

07/15/2025

Beautiful!
I would love to have this poem be a part of the wind phone dial up a poem project!!!!

07/01/2025

Some photos from our summer solstice celebration!!

Come visit the labyrinth!
Come weave on the nature loom!!

06/14/2025

A maze is for your brain. A labyrinth is for your soul

A labyrinth invites you to slow down, breathe, and go inward

🌀 What’s a Labyrinth?

A labyrinth is a single path that winds and turns, often in a spiral-like pattern, but it always leads you to the center. No tricks. No dead ends. No getting lost (unless you’re deep in thought or really good at walking in circles). Labyrinths are used for:
• Meditation or prayer
• Grief processing or emotional grounding
• Walking meditation or reflection
• Symbolic journeys (hello, rites of passage!)

Think of it like a soul-soothing walking meditation trail with a clear beginning, middle, and end.

🔁 You enter, follow the path, arrive at the center, pause, then follow the same path back out. That’s it.

Today we made the pattern for the labyrinth in the field with a glorious view of Mt Hood!

Have you ever walked a labyrinth?

06/02/2025

Clark County has arts, culture and heritage!!

Check out this new podcast!!!

And subscribe, follow and listen to find your next local adventure spot!

Imintothisplace.com

And yes, the Washougal wind phone is featured in an episode coming up in November 🙂

Clark County is the 4th largest county in Washington and the fastest growing! Our arts commission is hard at work connecting the communities to the artists, art spaces and artwork!!

What other off the beaten path spot, restaurants and people should be on the radar to highlight what Clark County has to offer!??