Rediscovering the Inner Child is F.U.N.

Have you ever noticed when kids pretend to act like adults they lose their fun, childlike demeanor and become more serious? 

Ever since my daughter Alyssa was born, I've become acutely aware that I may have lost my connection with my inner child.

She showed me this when she was a baby, and I was changing her diaper. She would scoot her butt all over the changing table to keep me from getting a new diaper on. As a first-born, type-A personality, this would drive me nuts -- "work first, then play" was my belief.

But, I soon came to realize Alyssa was teaching me that we can work and play at the same time. And that we should work and play at the same time, because, if we keep trying to get all of our work done first, there will never be time for play.

I have worked to try to incorporate this new belief into my life for the past seven years of her life. I need a lot of reminding to reprogram my old ways. It's not easy. Some days I feel sorry for her being my teacher in this area -- it's a big task! But I am so grateful she is here to teach me!

My first-born, Tyler, has been getting in on the fun lately, too. He came home from school yesterday with a riddle from a friend. This sparked a string of riddles going through our house. Alyssa is even in on it now! A riddle is a great way to slow yourself down and think like a child. I have to admit -- at first, I felt busy, and I did not want to slow down long enough to solve the riddle, but I did, and it was fun!

I guess they got me going on a playful theme today, because later at yoga, our instructor said to "play around" with our poses -- to try new things. That sounded like a good idea, so, I gave the "crow" pose a try -- darn near got it! What fun that was! For two years I've been doing yoga and never gotten brave enough to try a difficult pose like that.

I was so excited I came home and showed the kids and started running around the house cawing like a crow! I know, now you think I'm crazy! But nope, just acting like a kid! And by the way, as of this moment, everyone in the house has tried crow pose! Even Paul! Awesome!

What will you do to be playful today?

Changing Schools Need Not be a Hair-Raising Experience

"By the way, your children are going to be just fine in their new school." These are the comforting words my doctor said to me as he looked me in the eye before leaving the exam room. It made me smile, because I knew he was right.

I "know" my children are going to be fine there. They will be fine almost anywhere, because they are very adaptable kids, but somehow this worry affected me so deeply that it has caused me to lose what feels like an enormous amount of my long locks (hence the visit to the doctor).

I've been through this before. Stress brings it on. Or shall I say, "makes it fall out."

But I thought I was dealing with the stress better, so it came as a surprise when the strands of hair just kept falling and falling and falling. My hair feels noticeably thinner now.

What happened to cause all of this shedding? We found out last April that none of the other four boys in my son's fourth grade class were planning on returning to the school for fifth grade. It's a smaller school -- his grade only had 16 students, five of whom were boys.

Although it was small, it worked with five boys. But, to think he might be the only boy or one of only two or three boys was unacceptable to my son, my husband and myself. Especially since he is at the height of his tween years -- he needs the influence and camaraderie of other boys.

After prayerful consideration and much research, we decided it was best to make a move. Luckily, we have many great schools in our area and found no problem with discovering a school with a larger population of boys that met all of our other criteria. That was the easy part. So, why the stress?

We had just changed schools when we moved across the country three years earlier, so I was worried that another school change so soon might be difficult for them.

• I worried if they would be OK in a larger school.
• I worried if they would get lost in the shuffle.
• I worried about them making new friends.
• I worried if the kids at the new school would be nice.
• I worried about the old school -- about the impact of five children leaving one grade.
• I worried about what other people were saying about our family's decision.
• I worried I was letting people down -- even thought I knew our decision was right for our children.

But now that school has started, and I have seen that the kids are doing just fine, I think what is happening with my tresses is the release of this worry.

I think my hair is giving me the signal to shed the worry -- like the trees shed their leaves in the fall. They die for the winter so they can live in the spring. It's time for me to put an end to the worry so I can live in the bountiful harvest of "now" ... which, by the way, is a really wonderful place!

Inspiration and Photos

I got a new camera for my birthday, so I've been taking lots of fun pictures! I have found I most love watching and capturing wildlife.

I've been having some fun lately pairing up my photography with inspirational quotes. I share them mostly on my Love of Life Coaching page on Facebook, but I thought I'd post a few here, too! Enjoy!

This little guy visits our back yard daily!

I love how beautiful these bright flowers look next to the rustic shed.

This is my son jumping into the pool at his Grandma and Grandpa's house.

Don't Cry Over Spilled Freeze Pops

Oh how I love perfection! In everything I think, say and do, I am always shooting for it, but sometimes, too many times, I fall way short.

I was given some experiences to practice the other day that were just hilarious in retrospect, so I wanted to share.

Alyssa asked if she could open the box of Freeze-Pops I bought that day. She has been bugging me to buy them all summer, and, I have been trying to let her do more things on her own, so I handed her a pair of scissors to open the box.

I supervised, of course, but before I could stop her, she stabbed the top of the box with the scissors. She didn't know any better, and has probably seen me open boxes this way before ... but that is not the tactic I would use with a box of 100 tubes of spill-able, sticky, staining liquid!

So, I showed her the right way to open the box, which did not really need scissors, by the way (my bad). Then we peeked inside to assess the damage. Luckily, there was only one pop that was leaking. No biggie, so I took that one to the sink and asked her to put the rest in the freezer.

For some reason, she thought she needed to separate the pops before putting them in the freezer, and as she pulled them apart, one ripped right in the middle. Spill-able, sticky, staining, red liquid shot everywhere as I carried the carnage over to the sink to dispose of it! And that is when I lost it. I yelled out her name in a frustrated, blaming tone, as if it was her fault.

It was not her fault. I'm the one who decided it would be wise to carry the darn thing over to the sink, not her. She didn't do anything wrong by tearing them apart, that's what she thought she was supposed to do. She ran up to her room crying. Who could blame her.

After I cleaned up the mess, I went up to her room, knocked on her door, got down on my knees to her level and said, "I am so sorry for yelling at you. That was not your fault. You did nothing wrong. Can you forgive me?" Thankfully, she did!

This story would be finished if that was the end of the excitement for that day, but alas, it was not. The next mess occurred just two hours later as we were leaving for a potluck dinner at church. We had baked some really cool cupcakes with filling in the middle.

As we were leaving, Alyssa volunteered to put them in the car. I was happy to let her help. She took the container from me, but could not fit it between the seats, so she tipped it sideways to make it fit! Logical, right? Well, not if what is in the container is frosted cupcakes!!!

"Nooooooo," I yelled out! At that moment, I remembered the lesson I learned earlier, so I asked her to hand me the container, and I brought it back inside to the kitchen table to survey the damage.

My first reaction, was, "Great. They're toast." But after a deep breath and a second look, I realized I could salvage the cupcakes if I re-frosted the tops and pulled the paper wrappers off the bottoms (because they were now covered in frosting).

Nobody followed me inside the house to see what was happening (they were probably afraid of my reaction), so I went back out to the car and told them to come back in while I repaired the damage, because it was a scorching 94 degrees outside.

Alyssa stood next to me while I doctored them up. I could tell she was waiting to see if I was going to get angry, so I said, "Boy are we having a wacky day, or what?" She laughed and started making jokes of her own.

As an added bonus, my dad was there, so he helped me clean up the mess and we were back on our way out the door in no time.

For the record, the cupcakes turned out fabulous! And hopefully I'm well on my way to learning not to cry (or yell) over spilled things!

Fake on Facebook?

This topic has been on my mind for a little while, so I just wanted to take a quick moment to address it.

Since Facebook has become popular, there have been many accusations of people being "fake" and only posting good news on their status updates. I even saw a t-shirt at Walt Disney World making reference to this. While I'm certain there are people out there who do that, I would like to offer another possibility.

Maybe some people just prefer to be positive. Personally, I am intentional about posting positive information and thoughts on Facebook. Not to be fake, but because I believe in the Law of Attraction, which says, "what you think about is what you bring about."

That means, if your mind is negative and full of complaints, then you are going to receive more of that. But if your mindset is positive and full of gratitude, you will receive more of that. 

I don't want to go on Facebook and spread negativity around. And that is not what I want to read on Facebook. I don't want to be dragged down by negative energy. 

I'm not saying it's never OK to complain on Facebook. But if we find that most of our posts are complaints, we might want to take a look at that. Yes, there are always challenges in life, but what really matters is how you choose to look at them. I choose to see the glass half-full. I choose to see the silver lining. How about you?