"Our Lives are the sum
Of each moment and interaction.
Each day we work, eat, laugh, teach, play, read, remember...
And work at it all again the next day.
Within the seemingly small moments we find the opportunity
To build relationships, develop character, find joy
For the price of our time.
Life's most essential possibilities are realized at home.
Where we share, teach, grow, learn, serve, give
Our best without praise or fanfare.
Because every effort, every moment matters
In the development of a person.
Nothing is really routine.
To all who see the everyday."
Seeing The Everyday
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I have blogged about the wonderful magazine, Seeing The Everyday before but I wanted to write their beautiful poem they have as their "purpose" again because our beautiful, lazy summer is ending and the school year is about to begin and I find it poignant.
I am not a runner, a rusher, a crazed mother of 8 (although that does not mean I am not crazy, I am just boring). That is not how I choose to live my life. However, I can feel the stress of the change of seasons and I want to sit down on this rainy day and remind myself that things can and will remain as calm as I keep them. I cannot control everything but I can control how I react. I can control how much I allow into our world and I how much importance I put onto things that do not last.
Seeing The Everyday points out beautifully the things that last. I invite you to go back up and read the poem again. If you are a Christian this is particularly important because eternity is ...well...eternal. Life is not going to be especially pleasant rushing around to the next thing. Not for us anyway. Each day in our family full of medical can be the last. I will not live in a way where I have to regret anything, so I am not going to be out of breath, angrily going here and there for nothing more than making others happy for things that do not last.
This magazine grounds me back where I know I should be. Where I have always been. Where I want to end up. Where I was raised to be. Where eternity will be.
Goodness
Generosity
Sacrifice
Calm
Quiet
Peace
Acceptance
Suffering
Happiness
Hard Work
Togetherness
Etc.
Fall is a time to get back to the daily duty of school, work, more chores, getting things under control for winter and our extensive medical mumbo jumbo. Fall is just the BEST time of year. I dearly love Fall.
We had a spectacular summer here in the Pacific Northwest. That doesn't happen all that often here. It was just so beautiful. The kids got to swim almost daily and we had little in the way of medical disasters for them. We spent many days visiting, playing games in the sun and having Popsicles! It just doesn't get any better than that in this life.
Having a big age range of kids means we have a huge social network right here at all times....day and night! It's crazy and it's fun. We never lack for company or anything to talk about that's for sure! Even with that our home is a pretty calm place as we try and live out the poem above.
Ed and are pretty boring people. The daily little things are what is important to us and always have been. We take walks, play board games, tell jokes around the room as the kids roll their eyes and groan. On sunny Sundays we sit outside around a plastic table covered with a lovely table cloth, eating Popsicles, visiting for hours. This is what our family does for fun. It requires no money because after our medical monstrosity there is none.
And you know what? Our children think this is totally fun. They never say they feel they're missing out on big weekends that require big price tags at far away places. We are so thankful.
When we make cut out sugar cookies in the Fall and Christmas and Easter....even the adult kids come home to do it. When we make candy houses at Christmas....even the adult kids come home to do that.
We have many traditions like not until Oct. 1 can "It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown" come out and be watched, no matter how many times the kids ask. It's an anticipated event. You should see the 20 something-year-old kids sit down when that thing comes on....cracks me up every time! I have to admit Big Ed and I sit down too and totally enjoy it. Then they watch it 50 times....geez.
It's a Wonderful Life is watched the evening of Thanksgiving.
We have a tradition of The 24 Days Before Christmas with something special we do each of the days of December.
The list goes on and on and on.
Because I grew up an only child in a broken home (a lovely home in which my Mom did her best and did a wonderful job) it was important to me to create a million and one traditions. It seems silly but one tradition meant so much to me it invaded my drug clouded mind... I arrived home from my first brain/spine/spinal cord surgery on 14 medications. Three major pain meds more powerful than morphine had me just a little goofy. I had 3 major surgeries together so I didn't have to have them separately. It was my choice so I wasn't out of commission 3 times and away from my children. I am tough as nails and knew I could do it but boy I had no idea what I was in for ! I was in the hospital in NYC for 2 weeks and gone from my children for a month. Anyway, when I got home it was super important for me to make my homemade pancakes for the kids like I do every single Saturday morning....go figure. Here I am, bald and goofy mixing up pancake batter.
I can't tell you why this was so ridiculously important to me but it was. I can only surmise it was something familiar in an unfamiliar, hard time for me. It was a foundation, it was security, it was HOME. It made me feel things were okay when I didn't feel okay. Traditions are like that.
These traditions mean a great deal to my kids and their girlfriends/fiances now. It's amazing to me how much they mean and it warms my heart.
We seem to live in a world where traditions are not quite as important as they used to be. I think it might be why we have so many kids running amok trying to find love and security in all the wrong things and places.
Everyone is in a hurry. Everything is fast.
We need things that are special, things that remain the same, that come around again and again, that remind us things are okay, there is some security in a crazy world, there is a foundation to come home to, there is a God, there is an eternity.
I believe traditions say this.
If you are looking for a magazine to have a cup of tea with, Seeing the Everyday is the one. It warms your heart and your soul. It isn't mushy, it is real. It isn't expensive and it will give you some ideas about how to slow your life down enough to see what is real and lasting.
~Blessings~
Lisa
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