The beautiful water!
Two new friends; Cara and Patti . We met some awesome people on the trip.
I hope we can all travel again together!
Showing posts with label shannon. Show all posts
Showing posts with label shannon. Show all posts
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Celebrating our 10th in Cozumel
Thursday, October 29, 2009
Nashville Trip
Friday, February 13, 2009
Blogging
Recently I've been peeking at many different blogs, and blogging "styles". It is very interesting to all the differing ways people use blogs, format them, and how they write on them.
I may be changing my style, maybe not....I will have to see.
I may be changing my style, maybe not....I will have to see.
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
They tried, AGAIN!
Dave and I went to the Vikings playoff game against the Eagles. We were really excited to be going. We had great seats, and invited some good friends. The first half of the game was pretty good, but the the 4th quarter we all saw the writing on the wall. It was the first and last game of the season that we went to. But, we had a really great time! (minus the fact it was SOOOO cold) The Sphagetti Factory before the game was yummy!
This was the super slow line (or herd) trying to get into the Dome. It was about O degrees on Sunday..Yikes!
Friday, April 25, 2008
Living & Loving Today
As I mentioned, I've had one of those weeks....
My friend Allisun had this on her blog, it SOO touched me, and I wanted to share it.
Anna Quindlen, Newsweek Columnist and Author:
All my babies are gone now. I say this not in sorrow but in disbelief. I take great satisfaction in what I have today: three almost-adults, two taller than I am, one closing in fast. Three people who read the same books I do and have learned not to be afraid of disagreeing with me in their opinion of them, who sometimes tell vulgar jokes that make me laugh until I choke and cry, who need razor blades and shower gel and privacy, who want to keep their doors closed more than I like. Who, miraculously, go to the bathroom, zip up their jackets and move food from plate to mouth all by themselves. Like the trick soap I bought for the bathroom with a rubber ducky at its center, the baby is buried deep within each, barely discernible except through the unreliable haze of the past.
Everything in all the books I once pored over is finished for me now. Penelope Leach., T. Berry Brazelton., Dr. Spock. The ones on sibling rivalry and sleeping through the night and early-childhood education, have all grown obsolete. Along with Goodnight Moon and Where the Wild Things Are, they are battered, spotted, well used. But I suspect that if you flipped the pages dust would rise like memories.
What those books taught me, finally, and what the women on the playground taught me, and the well-meaning relations --what they taught me, was that they couldn't really teach me very much at all.
Raising children is presented at first as a true-false test, then becomes multiple choice, until finally, far along, you realize that it is an endless essay. No one knows anything. One child responds well to positive reinforcement, another can be managed only with a stern voice and a timeout.
One child is toilet trained at 3, his sibling at 2. When my first child was born, parents were told to put baby to bed on his belly so that he would not choke on his own spit-up. By the time my last arrived, babies were put down on their backs because of research on sudden infant death syndrome. To a new parent this ever-shifting certainty is terrifying, and then soothing. Eventually you must learn to trust yourself. Eventually the research will follow.
I remember 15 years ago poring over one of Dr. Brazelton's wonderful books on child development, in which he describes three different sorts of infants: average, quiet, and active. I was looking for a sub-quiet codicil for an 18-month old who did not walk. Was there something wrong with his fat little legs? Was there something wrong with his tiny little mind? Was he developmentally delayed, physically challenged? Was I insane? Last year he went to China . Next year he goes to college. He can talk just fine. He can walk, too.
Every part of raising children is humbling, too.
Believe me, mistakes were made. They have all been enshrined in the, "Remember-When- Mom-Did" Hall of Fame. The outbursts, the temper tantrums, the bad language, mine, not theirs. The times the baby fell off the bed. The times I arrived late for preschool pickup. The nightmare sleepover. The horrible summer camp. The day when the youngest came barreling out of the classroom with a 98 on her geography test, and I responded, "What did you get wrong?". (She insisted I include that.) The time I ordered food at the McDonald's drive-through speaker and then drove away without picking it up from the window. (They all insisted I include that.) I did not allow them to watch the Simpsons for the first two seasons. What was I thinking?
But the biggest mistake I made is the one that most of us make while doing this. I did not live in the moment enough. This is particularly clear now that the moment is gone, captured only in photographs. There is one picture of the three of them, sitting in the grass on a quilt in the shadow of the swing set on a summer day, ages 6, 4 and 1. And I wish I could remember what we ate, and what we talked about, and how they sounded, and how they looked when they slept that night.
I wish I had not been in such a hurry to get on to the next thing: dinner, bath, book, bed. I wish I had treasured the doing a little more and the getting it done a little less.
Even today I'm not sure what worked and what didn't, what was me and what was simply life. When they were very small, I suppose I thought someday they would become who they were because of what I'd done. Now I suspect they simply grew into their true selves because they demanded in a thousand ways that I back off and let them be. The books said to be relaxed and I was often tense, matter-of-fact and I was sometimes over the top. And look how it all turned out. I wound up with the three people I like best in the world, who have done more than anyone to excavate my essential humanity. That's what the books never told me. I was bound and determined to learn from the experts. It just took me a while to figure out who the experts were.
My friend Allisun had this on her blog, it SOO touched me, and I wanted to share it.
Anna Quindlen, Newsweek Columnist and Author:
All my babies are gone now. I say this not in sorrow but in disbelief. I take great satisfaction in what I have today: three almost-adults, two taller than I am, one closing in fast. Three people who read the same books I do and have learned not to be afraid of disagreeing with me in their opinion of them, who sometimes tell vulgar jokes that make me laugh until I choke and cry, who need razor blades and shower gel and privacy, who want to keep their doors closed more than I like. Who, miraculously, go to the bathroom, zip up their jackets and move food from plate to mouth all by themselves. Like the trick soap I bought for the bathroom with a rubber ducky at its center, the baby is buried deep within each, barely discernible except through the unreliable haze of the past.
Everything in all the books I once pored over is finished for me now. Penelope Leach., T. Berry Brazelton., Dr. Spock. The ones on sibling rivalry and sleeping through the night and early-childhood education, have all grown obsolete. Along with Goodnight Moon and Where the Wild Things Are, they are battered, spotted, well used. But I suspect that if you flipped the pages dust would rise like memories.
What those books taught me, finally, and what the women on the playground taught me, and the well-meaning relations --what they taught me, was that they couldn't really teach me very much at all.
Raising children is presented at first as a true-false test, then becomes multiple choice, until finally, far along, you realize that it is an endless essay. No one knows anything. One child responds well to positive reinforcement, another can be managed only with a stern voice and a timeout.
One child is toilet trained at 3, his sibling at 2. When my first child was born, parents were told to put baby to bed on his belly so that he would not choke on his own spit-up. By the time my last arrived, babies were put down on their backs because of research on sudden infant death syndrome. To a new parent this ever-shifting certainty is terrifying, and then soothing. Eventually you must learn to trust yourself. Eventually the research will follow.
I remember 15 years ago poring over one of Dr. Brazelton's wonderful books on child development, in which he describes three different sorts of infants: average, quiet, and active. I was looking for a sub-quiet codicil for an 18-month old who did not walk. Was there something wrong with his fat little legs? Was there something wrong with his tiny little mind? Was he developmentally delayed, physically challenged? Was I insane? Last year he went to China . Next year he goes to college. He can talk just fine. He can walk, too.
Every part of raising children is humbling, too.
Believe me, mistakes were made. They have all been enshrined in the, "Remember-When- Mom-Did" Hall of Fame. The outbursts, the temper tantrums, the bad language, mine, not theirs. The times the baby fell off the bed. The times I arrived late for preschool pickup. The nightmare sleepover. The horrible summer camp. The day when the youngest came barreling out of the classroom with a 98 on her geography test, and I responded, "What did you get wrong?". (She insisted I include that.) The time I ordered food at the McDonald's drive-through speaker and then drove away without picking it up from the window. (They all insisted I include that.) I did not allow them to watch the Simpsons for the first two seasons. What was I thinking?
But the biggest mistake I made is the one that most of us make while doing this. I did not live in the moment enough. This is particularly clear now that the moment is gone, captured only in photographs. There is one picture of the three of them, sitting in the grass on a quilt in the shadow of the swing set on a summer day, ages 6, 4 and 1. And I wish I could remember what we ate, and what we talked about, and how they sounded, and how they looked when they slept that night.
I wish I had not been in such a hurry to get on to the next thing: dinner, bath, book, bed. I wish I had treasured the doing a little more and the getting it done a little less.
Even today I'm not sure what worked and what didn't, what was me and what was simply life. When they were very small, I suppose I thought someday they would become who they were because of what I'd done. Now I suspect they simply grew into their true selves because they demanded in a thousand ways that I back off and let them be. The books said to be relaxed and I was often tense, matter-of-fact and I was sometimes over the top. And look how it all turned out. I wound up with the three people I like best in the world, who have done more than anyone to excavate my essential humanity. That's what the books never told me. I was bound and determined to learn from the experts. It just took me a while to figure out who the experts were.
Wednesday, March 5, 2008
Boring Hair
I learned a few months back from my color guy that with each pregnancy your "natural" color gets darker. I have no idea if this is a proven and actual fact, but I believe it. My roots have never looked darker than they do now. When I went to see him in December, he actually foiled my hair TWICE because it wasn't "lightening" up as usual. (and it still didn't get to the shade of blonde I prefer)
Anyways, I need my hair done badly....and I am thinking of trying out a new style. My hair has looked the exact same for WAY too long.
So, as I ponder this hair change, please email me pictures if you see a cute "do" that screams my name.
Anyways, I need my hair done badly....and I am thinking of trying out a new style. My hair has looked the exact same for WAY too long.
So, as I ponder this hair change, please email me pictures if you see a cute "do" that screams my name.
Saturday, December 22, 2007
Cancer....
It has always been one of my greatest fears in life. I think mostly because it took my mom at the young age of 39, leaving my dad to raise 4 little girls. I was only 8 years old, 3 when she was diagnosed. In some ways that seems like a really long time ago, and in other ways not so long.
Recently two friends that are my age have been diagnosed with cancer. It just seems crazy. Both of their prognosis are very good, thankfully.
For the past decade I have been very into health and nutrition. More recently I've been very interested in "eastern" medicine and more holistic type treatments. I personally have found some to be very effective.
I started reading a book tonight called "Avoiding Cancer One Day at a Time" that so far has been very good and informative on things all of us can do to protect our bodies from harmful toxins and other things from assaulting our health and life, that can produce cancer. Cancer is ruthless. I want to educate myself and those close to me of the things that people can do proactively to reduce the probability. This book has been very interesting so far, I'll probably post tidbits as I read along.
Avoiding Cancer One Day At A Time: Practical Advice For Preventing Cancer (Paperback)by Lynne Eldridge (Author), David Borgeson (Author)
Friday, December 7, 2007
Gray Hair
Yah! Lots of them. I am not sure when this happened, but suddenly I have a lot of little gray hairs lurking under my top layer of hair on my head. Maybe its all whining that I've be living through lately.
**Note to self...schedule highlight ASAP!!
I've never forget the day I spotted my first gray hair, at the young age of 26. I was working at Target downtown Mpls, and I was washing my hands in the Ladies Room. I looked up, under the florescent lights, and their IT was...I promptly yanked it out.
Oh Well....
**Note to self...schedule highlight ASAP!!
I've never forget the day I spotted my first gray hair, at the young age of 26. I was working at Target downtown Mpls, and I was washing my hands in the Ladies Room. I looked up, under the florescent lights, and their IT was...I promptly yanked it out.
Oh Well....
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