Full Circle

My girls and I trekked out to the mall the other day with hopes of finding a tutu for our oldest one's Christmas program; we ended up finding a great deal more.
As we were all walking hand in hand (quite a scene for a thirty, five, and one year-old) amidst the sea of shoppers, the familiar ring of loose change dropping on tile floor stopped us in our tracks. We came face to face with a mom and her grown daughter obviously in a rush to finish up their holiday shopping. Always looking for a teachable moment, I asked M to please help the ladies pick up their change. At this they just glanced our way, walked on, and said something to the likes of, "that's alright, we need to go." Well, for our five year-old this was a Dollar Store treat in the making. Asking for my approval first, she went ahead and picked up the spare change, equaling 55 cents.
At bedtime that night M and I were talking about God's blessings for the day and we both remembered we hadn't shared the story with my husband. Calling him in, M told the story again and made D guess how much money she collected. After we finished, he looked at us and said, "That's weird because I noticed someone today at the store had dropped their change and gave it back to them, and M, guess how much it was?" Of course, 55 cents.
There really are no accidents in life. What you give (or in this case, give back) you will always see again, whether it be your love, your time, or even loose change.

Rain Queen

I have made it a habit to try and shop at the most inexpensive grocery stores. Much to my husband's dismay I don't have the time or energy to carouse through weekly fliers or to cut coupons (even if I did cut the coupons with shopping with a one year-old and a five year-old who are we kidding that I have time to study the product to make sure I have the right one to get my 25 cents off, or that that itsy bit of paper is going to make it to the check out in one piece).
Although we do save money on non-name brand products, I have often felt that customer service sometimes leaves something to be desired at these discount chains. Whether it be a store clerk starting to bag the next customer's groceries before I have had a chance to pack all of my bags into our cart to never being offered to have help with my groceries, these are just things I have come to learn go with the territory, that is until a couple of weeks ago.
It was a rainy day in our town and thankfully my mother-in-law was still visiting from the Thanksgiving holiday, so the plan was for me to run into the store for our Tuesday Taco Night essentials while she stayed in the car with the girls. I grabbed my umbrella and made a dash through the puddles. As I came upon the entrance, by all outwardly appearances the store looked the same. Massively big doors, carts lined up for miles, and everyone going about their business. However, what came next was more like something out of a dream as compared to my normal shopping experience. First a worker offered me a plastic rain bag for my umbrella. I think I turned around, assuming there was no way she was talking to me. Next, another worker offered me a dry shopping cart, along with a smile. What did I do to deserve the royal treatment?
In a book I read recently the author emphasized that we should remind ourselves we are children of the most high God, and that we do in fact have royal blood flowing through us (no matter where we shop). If we are to notice it and take pride in this fact ourselves, others can't help but notice too.
Maybe the staff at the grocery chain was just in a good mood, but maybe it was something more, I'm betting on the something more.

Spare Change

The night before Thanksgiving always has included a meal out for my family. There is too much cooking to be done the next day for me to even want to step foot in my kitchen, let alone prepare a meal.
Our choice this year was a local grill with typical American fare and even fish aquariums and a kid's game room (perfect for a family with parents in town and a five and one year-old in tow).
As we were waiting on our meals our oldest spotted the game room (and also one of her friend's from gymnastics class) and looked at me with pleading eyes. I dug in my purse and found only dollar bills, but was faithful that maybe the games would take dollar bills. Fortunately there was a dollar to quarter conversion machine in the game room, unfortunately it kept spitting back out my dollar no matter how many different ways I tried to make it wrinkle free.
Finally, giving up on the hope that the machine would want to work with me, M and I went to the cash register counter and asked if we could possibly have some change for a dollar. The waitresses all looked at me and said there was no way they could do that. Our five year-old heard the conversation and looked at me and shrugged.
Having given up on the idea of the game room we turned to go back to our table when one of the young waitresses who had been at the cash register counter pulled us aside and brought out her personal wallet and told us she had change. This was enough of a kindness moment that made me want to look for her angel wings, but as she refused to take the dollar bill I was trading in so my daughter could play an arcade game I knew in that moment I was witnessing an everyday miracle and could feel a prime example of how He wants us to treat each other.
M didn't win the the stuffed animal she was going for that night, but instead came away with a greater prize of witnessing a real life example of how to love one another.

Picture Day

I know it seems like I do a lot of blogs about my children, especially my oldest, but please do remember that this is how I fill my days. And although our younger daughter teaches me things daily about parenting, maybe b/c M is more verbal and older, and the struggles I am facing with her I have no experience in like I do with the baby, the mini miracles stick with me a bit more.
Case in point, this last week and a rescheduled picture day for soccer. Our oldest daughter has always been touch and go when it comes to pictures. Sometimes she is great, needs no coaxing, while other times I feel like I am asking her to go and pet the nearest pit bull. I know this is common in some younger children ( take a look at my toddler picture sitting in my parents basement where my lower lip is sticking out a good distance), but it doesn't make it any less frustrating when you are negotiating just to get your child to smile for what you consider a "silly picture."
Last Tuesday happened to be one of those coaxing days. Blame it on the not going to sleep on time the last few nights, the sugar bolting thru her veins from Halloween, whatever the case she didn't want to have her picture taken at soccer practice. As I was reasoning with her and attempting to use positive discipline I was also relying on the power of prayer. I have read you are to expect great things from prayer, don't just ask for the minimum, expect greatness, and I did. As I was verbally trying to have M realize it was one picture, no biggie, I was nonverbally thanking God that he was in control and his hand was upon our oldest daughter. There were moments of doubt as the younger one and I patiently waited in the car while the oldest still tried to say she wasn't coming, but at last we were on our way and as we pulled into the soccer field parking lot she was on board and ready to be a happy little athlete for the camera man.
As we approached the field, our daughter's coach came jogging over to inform us that there would in fact be no picture today. Some may think at this point our oldest was getting the easy way out, it was just lucky, but I knew at that moment I was experiencing a miracle. Our oldest's eyes lit up and she looked at me almost shocked. All I could say was, not how lucky she was, but does she know how much she is loved by God and how blessed she is?
I think it is so important for children to know that they are loved by the most high God and that there really are no accidents and that God puts his children first just as earthly parents do. He knows our limits and recognizes our stresses, all of our stresses, even the stress of a five year-old taking a "silly picture."

Memories

I like to think that I have a pretty good memory and to tell you the truth I love replaying memories in my head, reading old journal entries, even reliving the time that my husband of over seven years and I were just beginning to know each other. I will sometimes lay in bed on a seemingly sleepless night and try to remember each of the houses I lived in growing up, what my childhood room was like, etc., for my sake and to be able to answer questions that always come up from my five year-old concerning when I was her age. However, for how good I think my memory is it doesn't hold a candle to one of my friends. Jack's memory is almost infamous in our circle of friends. She was looking at pictures from my family's vacation and pointed out that I had had one of those beach towels since high school. How does she fit such a minute fact in her brain? Because of her memory she does an excellent job of remembering names of your relatives, friends from college that she has maybe met once, and it always has this incredibly endearing affect on any conversation you are having with her. I love this trait (along with about a million other things) about her and have really tried to follow her lead of attempting to remember and learn more about my friend's friends and their family.

P.S. I think this is my last blog on the topic of relationships for a bit. I had my minister say something to the point that God must be thinking "how many miracles must I perform before you will see and believe?" and this quote has stuck in my head on a daily basis while seeing miracles around me. My blog will now turn in that direction and it can because it is my blog, how wonderful. Here's to hoping through my blog others will start to see the everyday miracles around them.

Friends are the Family we Choose

So this week is off to a much better start than last week. The car is o.k. (just some corrosion from the battery cables for all of those who were intensely awaiting to hear what was wrong with our car) and we made it to and from our happy place a.k.a. gymnastics with no problems. As I sat and watched our oldest doing her tricks today I had a moment to reflect on last weeks debacles of the car trouble and another incident at gymnastics where the owner of the gym was kind when she didn't have to be and went out of her way to make sure our time at her facility was nothing less than enjoyable even in the midst undesirable events. As I found out today, last week for her was swirling with an irate costumer which almost lead to the cancellation of a much deserved trip for herself this past weekend. I found this all out today and would have never guessed it last week.

The owner of this facility is the kind of owner you want of any operation you or your child is a part of. When my car was broken down, she was literally walking up and down the lanes in the parking lot to see what I needed. As I mentioned in the last blog she invited my oldest into another class while we awaited help. And the list goes on. Two days after the car fiasco, was my mommy/me gymnastics class at the same place with my youngest. My husband couldn't get out of work he had to do, so I ended up toting along my oldest to the baby class. When she was told (by me) it was not her time to do tricks, etc. she was left in tears. I was not prepared and didn't have a back up plan of how to keep her entertained while giving my youngest her deserved attention. Again, the owner, lovingly, patiently, took my oldest aside, and offered her crayons and some activities to do, and, all the while the owner never missed a beat of teaching our mommy/me class. She is just this good.

At this point, I must interject the fact that she really has no reason to go out of her way for me. I am not from this town, and we don't "go way back," by any means. This is by far the best thing about this owner and this gymnastics place; she would have done the same for anyone in a heartbeat.

When I approached her and thanked her again and again for her kindness she simply stated that there wasn't enough kindness going around these days. What an amazing everyday example she is setting for myself and my children.

Pursuit of Happyness

What an afternoon! It was yet another Little Gym afternoon (always a good thing). We got to the car on this hot first day of September to realize not only did my keyless remote not work, but the entire SUV was D-E-A-D (not good). At this point I could have taken one of two paths: stress out, sweat more, or, follow the lead from a great movie I watched again on TV the other evening.
"The Pursuit of Happyness" is honestly more sad than happy and I told my husband this was probably be the last time I would watch it for awhile because of the amount of swelling my eyes do after crying through the duration of the movie. But the lessons on positive thinking and keeping yourself in positive attitude stick with you and can't be missed. There is a scene where the father and son (Will Smith and real-life son) are homeless and in a train station. Will Smith's character convinces his son that an item he is trying to sell is actually a time machine. At this most dire moment, the father puts on a happy face, puts his son's happiness first and makes even the most unbearable of situations not only bearable but fun; amazing.
I pulled upon Will Smith's character traits today for the hour we sat waiting for my husband to show up with the jumper cables and in that hour got the girls a treat of Smoothie King, and our oldest even got to participate in the older kid's advanced gymnastics class (she was grinning from ear to ear as the instructor let her try some of the "big kid tricks.") The day could have ended with a migraine and tears (from myself or the girls), but thanks to this re-run of a great movie on TV my mind was in the right place and my children were a bit happier because of it.
*Side note* The jumper cables still didn't help to revitalize the car, BUT, I'm staying in a positive state of mind and know tomorrow will bring better things :)