children,

Your Not Listening!

2:42:00 PM Unknown 3 Comments

“A little girl came home from school with a drawing she’d made in class. She danced into the kitchen, where her mother was preparing dinner.


“Mom, guess what?’ she squealed, waving the drawing.

“Her mother never looked up.

“What?’ she said tending to the pots.

“‘Guess what?’ the child repeated, waving the drawing.

“’What?’ the mother said, tending to the plates.

“‘Mom you are not listening.’

“‘Sweetie, yes I am.’

“‘Mom, ‘the child said, ‘you’re not listening with your eyes.’ “

This passage is taken from the novel have a little faith by Mitch Albom, while I was reading this I realized this child’s words are so simple but so true. How many times in your life have you been so preoccupied with whatever your doing whether it was taking care of your children or rushing to get to work or simply shopping that you have missed a whole world around you, because you weren’t listening with your eyes. Only giving one sense like hearing to a person results in missing out on important information like the happiness on our child’s face when they reveal a masterpiece to you made be their own hands, or the pain in the strangers face when they respond to your generic question of “How are you?” Answer “Fine.” But in fact they are in desperate need of compassion. Maybe you missed the exhaustion in your husband’s face after a long day at work when you are nagging him about all the things he hasn’t done. I wonder how many times in life we have praised ourselves on being such devote listeners but in fact we were only listening with our ears and not our eyes. There is a whole world of people out there some close to us and some strangers but aren’t all these people worthy of your full attention when they are talking to you. God did not give us multiple senses that we can use simultaneously if he did not want us using them. When listen incompletely we don’t get the whole story and God places certain individuals in our lives for a reason, we are bound by conscience to do good by these people. We need to open our eyes and observe the world. take in the colors, catch sight of the happiness, notice the grief and destruction. We may not be able to repair everything around us but we can pay attention and show understanding or give encouragement or merely share in the joy of a job well done. Are we too busy to give others around us our consideration? And if we are that busy then we need to slow our lives down. Life is not a race to get everything done but in fact a slow meaningful journey that affects everything and everyone around us. And do you want that affect to be ignorance or thoughtfulness? Time is a wheel in constant motion always going forward never going back. Do want time to pass you by and never see anything around you? Is dishes and laundry more important than the smile on your child’s face? I believe if people stopped and took a breath and saw what was around them the world would be better place. We may hear everything is fine but by looking we would see that things are not good and at times just giving people comforting words when we see they are suffering helps to brighten their day. And sometimes by sharing in a child enthusiasm encourages them to continue their passions. We need to thank the worn out cashier for being so attentive. Tell the janitor that you appreciate what he does. Give you husband a hug and thank him for providing. Be amazed and the scribbles on a pieces of paper. By using our ears and our eyes enables us to be better people and do better by others. How many times has miscommunication happened because what we heard does not give us the entire picture? Starting today put down the dish cloth and open your eyes because you are missing out on a little thing called life!

Friendship Fridays

10:32:00 PM Unknown 6 Comments

breathing,

Tears and Prayers

7:41:00 PM Unknown 4 Comments

A typical weekend was planned this weekend some family time combined with couple time. A little grocery shopping, a little relaxing that was the plan. But plans don’t always work out and my weekend was a little bit of stress mixed with crisis and topped with snow. Here’s the story...the weekend started with a colossal snow storm on Friday that prevented the grocery shopping and our biweekly visit to the Wok Box. Then on Saturday Big Sis woke up sick she felt warm and as luck would have it my thermometer broke so I couldn’t tell her exact temperature. Also, her breathing was also laboured and she laid on the couch all day watching movies, and if you know this two year old this is highly unlike her. So a snow day and a sick day, not to bad but this day took a turn for the worse and drove straight into tears, prayers and sleepless nights. It started with Big Sis wanted to see Bumpa so we drove over there and had a little visit I noticed her breathing had got worse it was more laboured and slightly wheezy but I thought she had croup so I thought I would keep an eye on her, and then as we were driving home I heard a gasp and look in the back seat and Big Sis was completely blue, gasping for breath and trying to claw her way out of her car seat it a panic. I quickly unbuckled her and pulled her into my arms her skin felt like it was burning my lips. I rushed her into a steamy bathroom and gave her Advil and thankfully she did improve a little but I still brought her to the ER. As we were driving to the hospital Big Sis’s Hyper ventilating and wheezing were a strange comfort, but when she became quite that is when I started to get uneasy and I would feel her pulse and recite CPR techniques in my head cursing myself that I didn’t pay more attention in class, then I would pray to God and I told him determinedly “you are not taking her today”! We made it to the hospital which was a blessing because the road were white out conditions and the Doctor gave her medicine and diagnose her with Bronicolitis and sent us home. That night she would wake up gasping and crying asking me to help and I would lie holding her counting her breaths and then the sun came up, the wind died down and I hoped the storm was over. And it appeared I was right on Sunday morning she was feeling better, still wheezing but in general she had improved, but then in the afternoon her temperature soared and her lips and fingers were blue and through laboured, wheezing breath she said “mommy help” so I took my lethargic baby back to the hospital and again I said to God “Not today either!” In the end the Doctor gave her antibiotics and more puffers and today she seems better, I do believe the worse is over. She has been bossy and she ate a little and she has been playing... sweet relief. It is amazing at how you can love someone so much and your world freezes when they need you, without thought you rush to their side and nothing matters but their comfort.

12:54:00 PM Unknown 0 Comments

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different,

An Extraordinary Idea

12:34:00 PM Unknown 2 Comments

William Shakespeare wrote: “And this above all unto thine own self be true and it shall follow as the day the night - thou can'st not then be false to any man.” He certainly hit the nail on the head with that one, what wonderful advice. So simple yet poetic, basically be true to you. But no us humans can’t be that way we try day after day to mold ourselves into what society wants us to be. You see it all around you: the teenage girl who much rather be playing in the mud, but does she do this no she conforms to what she believes a girl should be doing; she works hard to fit in and this patterns continues throughout her life, you will see it again when she’s dating, or try to pick a college and again when she is a mother and she is constantly plagued with guilt because she feels she is inferior to all the other mothers and so what does she do. She works relentlessly trying to be what she thinks the world around her wants her to be ignoring who she is and what she wants and believes. You don’t see this kind of insanity with animals a dog is a dog he sleeps because he is tried, he eats when he is hungry, plays when he is playful; he is happy being his cute doggy self he doesn’t look at the dog next door and think ‘I better start acting like a better dog’. But in the human world throughout our life we work very hard on being “normal” and doing what we believe other people think we should be doing. I wonder what it would be like to act extraordinarily uncommon would it be a breath of fresh air, I think it would be freeing. I am unsure as to why we all want to be alike, God created us as individuals we are his finest creation and really did he intend on having a band of identical instruments strumming the same tune, I certainly hope not how incredibly boring. We are all unique instruments playing our own tune in the musical called life. But so often we do not like our music and the neighbors sounds so much better so we stay up at night working and pondering try to ‘Keep up with the Jones’ so to speak. We put pressure on our kids, husband and everyone around us to be “normal” because we don’t want to be embarrassed by our husbands acting goofy or our kids being different or our slow mother talking to complete strangers about her breakfast. So instead of letting our husbands act absurdly foolish and laughing with him, or letting your kids wear mix matched shoes or enjoying the slow pace of your mom we criticize and force the people around us to act appropriate and in the end we are not happy and well adjusted all we have achieved is stress and resentful feeling. So instead of trying to fit in we should embrace the eccentricities around us, we should let our hair down put on a feather boa or floppy hat and stop try to be ordinary because acting like a normal person is exhausting let’s try to be true to ourselves and play our unique instrument loudly exclaiming to world that I am wonderfully extraordinary!!!