Tag: love

children, humor, kids, motherhood, parenting

The Teachable Moments

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ry=400-7I love to watch movies with the boys.  However, it is often difficult to agree on one that we all are willing to watch.  Recently, Mad Dog persuaded me to allow the boys to watch a crazy tornado movie called Into the Storm.  My boys usually do well watching movies geared slightly above their age range.  We use a lot of humor to lighten the drama and it winds up being more comical than scary.

One of the reasons I love to watch movies with them is because they haven’t seen enough to understand obvious plot points.  When I accurately ‘predict’ what is going to happen next, they are amazed.

For instance, Into the Storm had a scene where I correctly predicted that both the characters would live, even though all evidence pointed to the contrary.  To see if Mad Dog was paying attention I said, “You know the hot girl lives.  They always do.”  He said an absentminded, “Yeah.”

Well, at this point, he was totally busted.  I teased him and said, “What?  So you admit she’s hot?”

He was backed into a corner.

As the movie progressed and this girl was in more and more peril, every time she survived, Mad Dog used it as a teaching tool.  “See boys?  See how the hot girl survives everything?  That’s why I married your Mom.  It’s the law of hotness.  I will never die in a storm as long as I’m married to your Mom.”

My prediction?  Mad Dog is safe for a long, long time.

children, family, gratitude, kids, motherhood, parenting

Change Your Mind, Not Yourself (Happy Mother’s Day)

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I recently was scrolling through a woman’s magazine on my iPad.  I quickly became discouraged as page after page advertised or extolled all the ways I needed to improve my external appearance.   It seems I have too many spots, wrinkles and imperfections to be considered truly beautiful by this magazine’s stringent and impossible standards.  I started to get really mad.  Mad at myself for all my flaws and mad at this magazine for pressuring me to be perfect.  Eventually I realized that I couldn’t really be mad at the magazine.  It is only perpetuating the insane ideals we as a whole have bought into.  What really, can any of us do about it?  We are helpless to the passage of time and the changes our faces and bodies will inevitably go through.  No amount of cream, lotion or potion will stop this.

Since I can’t change society or the external pressures we face, all I can do is change my mind about my own standard of beauty.  I started to think about the people in my life that were and are beautiful to me.  First and foremost, there was my Mom.  While she was living, she was one of the most beautiful people I’ve ever had the honor of knowing.  She had the lightest blue eyes that always hinted at the wry humor hidden within them and she had this megawatt smile that could light up a room.  Hmmm,… she wasn’t a supermodel and she still did age through the years yet she was gorgeous to me.

My Beautiful Mom
My Beautiful Mom

On this Mother’s Day, I would like us all to entertain the possibility that maybe how we look on the outside has nothing to do with real beauty.  Let’s try to honor ourselves by how we love instead of how we look.

My wish for today is that when my boys look back at this time in our lives, they will recall a Mom who loved as much as she was loved and above all else, was perfectly beautiful just as she was.

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children, family, humor, kids, motherhood, parenting

Merry Christmas Eve

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ry=400-3This Christmas is extra special for our whole family.  We welcomed a brother-in-law and his son to our clan.  Each year we seem to grow in love and blessings.  When all the young cousins get together on Mad Dog’s side (all boys!) there is a lot of spirit, Christmas and otherwise to be had.  I imagine at some point they will manage to get together and it will be calm and mannerly.  Or, I’ll be so advanced in years at some point, I’ll politely put my hearing aids on mute to deafen the roar.

If you join in this family, you have to participate in our now annual family soccer classic.  Naturally, playing against Mad Dog is not for the faint-hearted.  He always wins.  It’s as simple and annoying as that.  Thankfully, for the health of our marriage we were on the same team this year.  At one point Mad Dog executed a perfect defensive slide to deny our opposition a goal.  He almost took me out in the process.  If that had happened, this post would have had a much darker theme to it.

Even though Mad Dog is one of the most competitive people on the planet, I wouldn’t trade him for anything.  Sure, his offspring are a little rough to manage at times but obviously, they have amazing potential to be anything they want to be.

I hope that you all are surrounded by people you care about and who care about you.  Winning isn’t everything (ignore Mad Dog), but the love you have in your life is.

Merry Christmas Eve to all!

children, gratitude, loss of parent, motherhood, parenting

Fill the Bucket

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My Mom and me. I owe her all the beauty, humor and light in my life. The rest doesn’t matter because she showed me what love means. Even if you make a mistake or don’t succeed, if you have love in your life, you have everything you need.

Moms don’t really get the credit they deserve.  There isn’t actually any quantifiable way to say we are successfully raising our kids.  How much are we, as Moms, responsible for the successes and the failures of our kids?  At what point do we stop shaping our children’s outcomes and allow them to take personal responsibility for themselves and their own actions?  Even into adulthood, are Moms responsible when a grown child isn’t reaching their full potential?

I don’t have the answers.  I do know that motherhood can be extremely rewarding but mostly on an intrinsic level.  Sure, we have Mother’s Day but in general, our hard work and dedication is rarely recognized on an external level.  This really isn’t such a bad thing.  I believe life is about being your personal best and if the world sees it, great, and if it doesn’t, that’s okay, too.  All that really matters is how you, and you alone feel about the way you are living your life.  It also helps if on occasion, your kid says or does something that warms your heart.

Full Speed explained to me that he learned about ‘filling other people’s buckets’ at school.  Essentially, by acknowledging others, you ‘fill their bucket’ with kindness and appreciation.  He took these words to heart.  He told me as he walked over to meet me, that he shared with the crossing guard that he was a ‘really good crossing guard’.  Full Speed also plans to tell the lunch ladies on Monday that they are doing ‘a really great job.’

I may not get trophies or a big paycheck honoring the work I do as a mother, but after I listened to Full Speed I thought, “Wow, maybe I had a little something to do with the making of this remarkable kid.”

My bucket is full.

children, gratitude, happiness, humor, kids, mommyhood, motherhood, parenting

Birthday with a Bite

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A lady doesn’t share her that it’s her birthday unless she’s shopping at a shoe store that offers a birthday discount.  Then she will shout it from the highest mountain top if needed.

So, my birthday was the thirteenth.  As you can tell I was pretty psyched for my $5 off birthday coupon at the shoe store.  Before I went shopping I had a lovely breakfast with my boys.  I told them that some of the best presents I had were their Dad and the two of them.  I said that I was very lucky to have two of the best sons in the whole world. 

“I love you no matter what,” I said.

“Even if we bite somebody?” asked T.Puzzle.

T.Puzzle has an unfortunate history of biting.  I would like to say it’s a phase but if something last three years and has yet to stop, that’s more likely a life habit (life sentence?) than a phase. 

I didn’t hesitate to reply to him yet it pained me ever so.

“Yes, T.Puzzle.   I love you even if you bite somebody.”

Unless you bite me! 

 Did I say that out loud?