March 4, 2021

reader, 

If you're new here, well howdy! Welcome to my weekly blog about Houston arts and culture, plus whatever else I wish to share from my brain. Scroll to the very bottom for more about it.

I'm having a blast doing two weekly Facebook Live chats on my Facebook page: MONDAY MEDITATION CHATS around 10am and THURSDAY NIGHT LIVE arts & culture chats around 9pm. Please tune in every week! And be sure to check out my MONDAY MEDITATION CHATS playlist on my YouTube channel -- you can easily pop onto them and watch. They're short chats about different ways to practice meditation -- I hope they'll encourage you to start or enhance your own quiet time.

For my readers looking for adult events, be sure to LIKE my GISH PICKS ADULTS Facebook page. And if you're a parent or caregiver: be sure to follow my GISH PICKS KIDS Facebook page for not only my KID PICKS but also my SUMMER CAMP PICKS.

As you read, please note that all the words in purple are linked to websites.
WHAT'S ON MY MIND THIS WEEK? The pandemic pandemonium continues as arts groups try to figure out what the heck to do. Governor Greg Abbott has irresponsibly opened up Texas without first consulting all 4 of his coronavirus experts -- I hope you will act responsibly by continuing to mask up/wash hands/stay distant/get vaccinated. It's not easy (believe me -- as an extreme extrovert, I know...) but we are all in this together and we will all rise from this together.

I am happy to report that there are many new places opening up each week, welcoming folks back safely. This is so great! As I've been wandering through this pandemic with you and with the arts organizations, it's been a rocky road of uncertainty and challenges while also being a time of extreme creativity. If you are heading out, be sure to check websites before you go. If you are hopping online, share what you're watching! And if you have some extra dollars, please support our local arts orgs. They need that now more than ever as they wrap up many cancelled or reorganized seasons this spring.

Some random fun things to check out -- Song Circle Houston is gathering from 1-4pm this Sunday, March 7 (details on their page); the Houston Ballet Drive-In is back with the San Francisco Dance Film Festival at the end of this month; Levy Park is busy with events, including showing the movie ALADDIN for families tomorrow night (Friday, 3/5); the Alley Theatre continues their fab-n-free virtual season with "The Man with the Flower in His Mouth" through March 21; you can get all kinds of museum passes here (thank you Visitor's Center!); and you can find many dance events on The Dance Card by Dance Source Houston. And lastly but not leastly, Monday (March 8) is International Women's Day and the ADL Southwest is hosting a their annual summit from noon-1pm CDT.

Sadly, the River Oaks Theatre's fate is precarious again (a group of us saved it in 2007), so if you'd like to help, please check out their Facebook page for details. And if you're having a tough time or have hit a wall with this pandemic, you are not alone, my friend. Read this article or that article and you'll see what I mean. Our grief is real. Hang in there.
LET'S CONNECT! If you are wondering wassup with me, my offerings are below. If you'd like to keep up with all my doings, please click here to get a sorta monthly newsletter from me full of info about my events and more, including my IGNITE YOUR LIFE! art project. Be sure to follow my Facebook pages too -- Gish Picks Kids and Gish Picks Adults. I'm always throwing words and pictures around somewhere!

⬆️CLICK ON IMAGE FOR MORE INFO⬆️
My ⭐️ARTS PICKS Spotlight⭐️ is an outdoor adventure -- Art Heist Experience -- that is being presented by the Society for the Performing Arts/SPA through March 28. The event is a a 90-minute, outdoor, family-friendly (and socially distanced) walking theater experience in downtown Houston where audience members play detective to try and solve history’s biggest art heist. You'll start at the Wings Over Water sculpture and will be walking short distances to find clues. Masks must be worn at all times and performances will be limited to no more than 30 attendees.


And now -- the two virtual events I am PICK-ing this week. Please note that even my VIRTUAL PICKS are always Houston-based because I am very committed to Houston arts & culture.
➡️ Virtual for ADULTS: Perfect for Women's History Month: take a virtual tour of the exhibition "Houston Women Cast their Ballots: Celebrating 100 Years of the Right to Vote" or see it in person at The Heritage Society through March 31. Be sure to check out their Monthly Lecture Series, which is also online. The next edition is today (Thursday, March 4) at noon; all the details are here.

➡️ Virtual for KIDS: the Houston Public Library locations are closed for safety, but they are doing HPL TO GO curbside pick-up. And...they have plenty of virtual options for your kiddos. Click here to see wassup and be sure to save your Tuesdays for their fun craft activities!



HIRE ME! If you want help getting centered -- or for focusing your life -- here's how I can help (I'm available for groups too):

  • I'll be hosting monthly virtual labyrinth walks on first Saturdays from 10-11:30am. The next one is this Saturday, March 6th. For more information and to register, click here. The walk is by donation, the suggested fee is $20. You'll learn the history of labyrinths, you'll get many labyrinth resources, you'll learn how to finger-walk a labyrinth, and we'll do a reflexive writing activity after the walk. It'll be a wonderful time of inner exploration!
  • Virtual Life Path Sessions; see more about those here. It's $100/one hour and $50/30 minutes.
  • One-on-one or small group labyrinth walks or nature mandala-making sessions (or both!), all done with masks and physical distancing. The fee varies based on what we are doing.
  • Virtual meditation lessons for individuals or groups. I've been doing weekly Monday Meditation Chats and was interviewed on Great Day Houston about fun ways to make sounds for meditation (see that here). The fee varies based on what we are doing, and all ages are welcome.

To book me for anything, please call me at 713.492.1173 or email me. I'd love to help you find PEACE in this crazy time.


UPDATES ON GISH PICKS:
In non-pandemic times, and since I started publishing my blog in 2004, it has been a space to promote my curated list of unique live Houston area cultural events (PICKS) on the weekend for adults and kids. Because of COVID-19, those haven't happened since mid-March 2020 so I originally re-worked the format to focus on 5 Houston-based arts & culture organizations in my (Almost) Daily Dose of ARTS PICKS blog each of the NINE weeks of quarantine. You can see each edition - and read about 45 arts groups! - here.
 
And now I'm bringing you an ⭐️ARTS PICKS Spotlight⭐️ each week -- featuring an arts & culture space that is open -- and you'll get info about all of their activities and sometimes a video to bring them to life. Alongside that, I'll also be PICK-ing one local virtual event each for ADULTS and KIDS. 

I'll keep doing all of that until public events start happening again on a larger scale and I can start curating live event PICKS again.

In the meantime: please enjoy my weekly Spotlights and VIRTUAL PICKS, and please stay healthy!


Sincerely,

Sarah Gish
713.492.1173


P.S. If you want to IGNITE YOUR LIFE now or anytime, check out my list of "12 Ways to Ignite Your Life Daily" -- and watch the 12 videos I made about each Way here. I'm very proud of that list and my work and I hope it will help you live a fully creative life. Meditation, taking care of yourself, enjoying life, and laughing -- plus more! -- is what will get us through this global pandemic. 
Gish Creative | www.GishCreative.com
Gish Creative Logo