A New Record

Last week was crazy. Well, the last two weeks. Right in the middle of the chaos, we broke our record on number of hospital visits in one day...and number of children involved.

Recuperation

I was fortunate to be able to spend Thursday however I liked.  I napped the whole time Naomi was at preschool.  Then we played with her toys while I listened to PRI (always cool stuff on there).  Then we played outside, enjoying 65 degrees, fall leaves, and NO MOSQUITOS!!


I rarely stop and play with my kids.  But it was sooo nice to just immerse myself into my three-year-old's world.



Soothing.

Joyous!

Then, today, I re-read our posts from the first two years of this blog.  Hilarious!  I couldn't stop laughing at "Dinner Conversation" (March 2012, seriously, click on the link in the sidebar and find it- it's so crazy funny to remember my kids at that age!!)

Where to go from here- expanded version

Sooooooooooo ready for a third political party. Now is the time to get out of our comfort zones, push forward in both wisdom and charity, reach out to befriend those who are scared, speak out for compassion and common sense, and actually live the Christlike principles that have never been popular but have always been right.

We may be scared for the future but we should not be cowed.  It's tempting to hide under the covers today, but we have work to do!  Now it's time to heal our communities, human by human.  No more Us vs. Them.

I know I have friends/family on both sides of the aisle, but every single one of us agrees that people are more important than politics. I love you all for that.

I think I understand now why the I Was a Stranger initiative from the church was to focus on local needs. I was hoping for some global program headed by the church. But now I see so many people in shock, and I wonder how many will continue to grumble and hide behind their iphones watching Netflix to numb the frustration, and how many will instead say, "Forget the system, what can I personally do to fix things, even if it's just in my own neighborhood?"  The whole Us vs Them attitude is our biggest problem, and vegging to forget our woes is feeding that. If we give of ourselves and help our neighbors, our hearts heal. Our neighbors become less defensive. If enough people join in, our nation can move forward no matter what happens politically. And we can do a lot more good in the world if we can move forward with hope.

Sorry if i'm preachy today. It's just that everyone is afraid to talk!

If this election has left you feeling empowered, (i.e rural votes finally counted, or smaller states tipped the scale, or something like that, I do hear you there), then take that empowerment and use it to insist on better qualified leaders.  And in the meantime, identity one problem that sticks out for you as a big problem, -and then decide what you personally are going to do about it.

If this election has left you disgusted with our society in general, then stop waiting for top-down solutions. Instead, identity one problem that sticks out for you as a big problem, -and then decide what you personally are going to do about it.

For example, if you're worried about the education system, volunteer an hour a week instead of cruising facebook. It seems like that won't fix anything, but if you grade papers for an hour, the teacher can use thtat time to re-structure a lesson plan to address a discipline problem. Kids learn better, grades go up... all regardless of policy or funding. Think about the snowball affect, if every person just does one small thing...

No worries, my posts on politics are over. There are more important things to do!

Lucky

This is actually over a year old, but I thought it was fun and I'd share.  Hannah has found two four-leaf clovers in the last five years- one at school and one at home.