Wednesday, March 28, 2012

A few of my favorite things.....



This morning I visited my favorite little coffee shop, The Red Cup in Oklahoma City.  My eyes were awaken by a mural of my favorite children's book, "Where the Wild Things Are" by Maurice Sendak.  A full mural on the top cabinets of the storage wall.  I smiled both inwardly and outwardly for it brought back streams of memories of me in the classroom, acting out the book with young children.  Roaring our terrible roar, and stomping our feet as we marched away to play in the learning centers for the day.  When both the heart and mind are engaged, smiles appear.  This simple and beautiful mural, made me remember to cease each day and embrace it with both heart and mind and to smile.  So here are few of my favorite things that make me smile........

Coffee rituals
  • the smell of freshly brewing coffee
  • the sound of the coffee grinder
  • the sound of mindless chatter in the coffee shop
Home Life
  • my husband telling a story of our vacations in California, over and over, and hearing the sheer excitement in his voice for time spent with family
  • my children laughing with their dad
  • Jason talking out scenarios with his trains and cars, live scripts unfolding
  • Jeremiah asking for "Juice" in the morning
  • Jeremiah telling me how to make his bowl of cereal
    • banana
    • cut
    • cereal
    • milk
    • spoon
    • thank you
Teatime
  • the sight of teapots and tea kettles
  • a simple tray filled with delicacies for tea
    • hot buttered blueberry scones
    • freshly made lemon curd
    • devonshire cream
    • a pretty tea cup with matching saucer
    • a wee little tea spoon to stir
    • sugar cubes ( not splenda but real sugar)
What are your favorite things?  leave and comment and share yours too, and of course smile. :)

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

GROW....

One Little Word

This is my second year joining Ali Edwards  for the one little word project.  Last year, it was transforming as I used my phrase for the year, "Consider This".  I looked at consider others point of view rather than just my way of thinking and approaching life.  This resonants with doing unto others as you would have them do unto you. 

This year, my one little word is "GROW".  What does the word "GROW" mean, it is to expand from one place to another, to germinate, to cause increase.  My goal is to see how growth happens all around me and to write about my journey.  When I think of growing through transitions of life, it gives me hope that we can experience transformation through the process.  When something is growing, other things are dying off.  The death of a thing, causes life to spring forth in another.  The spring buds only appear, after the dead leaves of fall and winter are pushed off by the new bud.  It's a signaling  for new growth.  Come GROW with me.

Tuesday Thoughts

Today, is Tuesday and my mind is full of lots of thoughts, plans and ideas so I thought this would be a good place and time to download my computer (mind) and start to organize the work in my head.  Here we go:

People are unique and offer many opportunities for learning
  • Try observing how an infant interacts with their parent
  • The language and conversation on a morning ride to school with young children
  • The interactions between employees and employers
  • The failure to communicate
  • Communication without words
  • Focus on the person, their response, emotions, faces

How we use each day tells us about what's most important to us
  • Is our time spent with people we love
  • Is it a day of service to others
  • Is it alone time focused solely on you
  • Is it paying attention to the people that everyone walks by and ignores
  • Is it promoting propaganda, that is not mutually beneficial
  • Is it spent fighting for a cause
  • Is it as a witness of your beliefs and convictions, just lived, not spoken
Every decision I make today will determine my tomorrow
  • How did I begin my day?
  • How did it end?
  • Who did I interact with?
  • How was my true character revealed?
  • Did I like who I was?
  • Are there questionable decisions I made, that I would reconsider?
  • Was I honest? With myself? With others?
If everything was gone, what remains?
  • Me & God
  • My thoughts
  • My actions
  • Another chance to start over on tomorrow
What will you do with today?