Clarity

Life.  A series of changes.

Are you ready for those changes?  Do you have the mental and physical capacity to let things go?

Its with time, hardship, tears, and understanding that I sit at this point in my Life.

Do I have the correct people around me to lift me up?  Do I have the support to get through the obstacles that the changes in Life present to me?

I'm thirty-six years old this year. I have learned that the one thing constant in Life is change.  I feel pretty lucky to understand this so young.  Some go all their lives and only find out in the end when there is such limited time to try and fix their point of view.

We try not to take anything for granted.  Nothing.

With that said, its still hard to embrace changes.  I find that is it the most difficult to love yourself through the changes.  I'm constantly judging myself.  Thinking I should have done that a different way, handled it more gently.

That stuff is easier to do when you have people around you that love and support you.  If  you don't have these two things, love for yourself and support.  Get them.  Work to have them.  Make them your first gifts to yourself.

I promise they will  help.

That is my clarity, bright and early this Saturday morning.

Happy Saturday.

Blessed Be.

Always Learning

  When was the last time you stood up for yourself?  Did you have a really hard time doing it?  Feeling that you were gonna make someone upset, disappointed, mad.  But, you knew, just knew that if you didn't make your stand you would regret it.  Yeah, I have had to do that at least once in the last two weeks.  I have lost sleep, talked myself in and out and in to it again.  Driven those around me crazy because I talk about it incessantly until I actually go through with it.
  But guess what...I do it.
  Too many times in my Life I  have followed orders, obeyed.  Done the right thing according to what others have wanted.  Not this time.
  What drives me?  What is so different about my Life now?


   Travis and Naenah.

  Seriously, that is it.  If anything takes away from my time as a Mom and Wife, it better be a pretty damn good reason.  If I feel like its not doing those two any justice, I'm not doing it.
   My business is ran this way.  Yup, you read it right.  I LOVE being a Massage Therapist.  BUT, my family comes first.  If you can understand that, then I will make every effort in my being to make sure that your therapy session holds all the benefits and more.
  How now does this go along with a Life of Gratitude?  Each thing holds a reason, to learn, to observe, to practice Gratitude.  I'm only human, and I do indeed have a temper and an attitude.  But I will never be beyond Gratitude.
   Standing up for myself teaches me so much.
   I learned this time through that I'm worth my time, and if others can't understand that, then I'm not the person for the job.

Thankful Thursday...Shayla Deppershimdt

As a Military Brat, its not a common thing to rely on others.  Your family unit gets most of the lean, then if they can't help, you suck it up and try to figure out how to shoulder the rest.
Growing a family around family makes a girl spoiled.  Probably one of the single things that has made me worry about moving to a place where there is no family is how we will get by and do it on our own.
That's where Shayla comes in.  Hayley too, but she'll get her own blog next week. :)
She has been one of the awesome, trustworthy people I have been able to lean on since her move here, next door at that.  So easy going, which is so healthy and welcomed changed to me being high strung most often.  She's a Mom to Kaylee (3) and Layton (1), a wife to Mark and Mommy to their fur baby Geesy (half pit, half Saint Bernard!!)
Always open to giving advice, and listening.  Most of all, taking my kiddo when Trav and I's schedules are not meeting up.
Shayla is my Thankful Thursday Blessing this week. I'm so lucky to have her as a neighbor and friend.  From bouncing budgeting ideas to creative craft ideas, she's a pretty open minded gal.  I am Blessed to have her in my life.  Thank You Shayla!!


In other thankful news...
Mom and Dad made it safely to the Philippines for a month long visit!  So awesome that they get the chance to soak up all that wonderful love from the Familia there.
Rita called to make me giggle in the middle of the week.
Naenah lost another tooth!!  Glitter money is in high demand around here!!
I have been wrangled into yard duty at the school in the mornings, its hilarious to watch all the young minds at play!!

I hope that this inspires you to look around and find the things that you are thankful for.

Bright Blessings!!
Norma

Thankful Thursday...

 This week was the first full week of school. We started last Thursday, but this week was really the test. So, I thought that I would post these pictures in celebration of our first full week.

As well as photos of the things I'm thankful for...

 How can I even look at this one and not be thankful to be her Momma?

 My Life is measured by the smiles and giggles from these two.  The sounds makes my heart swell, with Happiness, but the Gratitude is always the underlying emotion.

I'm beyond Lucky, and I will continue to try and live everyday as Grateful as possible.

Other things I'm Grateful for this week:

My FB family.  When I need to be up lifted, they were there.  A candle to light the dark.

I got to talk to much of my family this week, that I needed too.

I'm Thankful for Massage Therapy, through it, I can help.  

How about you?  What do you have to be Thankful for this Thursday?  

Go ahead, I dare you, post it in the comments.  

Sending you LOVE, LIGHT, and BRIGHT BLESSINGS

Norms

The end of her days of no school responsibility....

This last weekend was the very last weekend that Naenah, Travis and I will ever have with school-less responsibility.  It didn't even dawn on me really until yesterday morning.  Trav and Nae went outside while he was grilling to give me a few minutes of quiet myself.  I was gonna sit inside with my Nook, but realized that this was her last weekend before school.
I went outside to sit and be near my family pod.  I found Him pulling her around in her red wagon, all over the yard.  I think he realized it too.  I made mention to him of my thoughts and he nodded his head in approval, sadness in his eyes.  I sat and just listened to the sounds of their giggling.
As Naenah ages, I see why so many family have more than one child.  To give them siblings, to teach them about positions in the family, to fill a home.  I think the one that stands out the most at the moment is to keep this pending sadness at bay.  This is the stuff that is rough on a parent.  As the time nears for her first day of school, I find myself getting more and more emotional.
I always thought that growing up and becoming responsible sucked as a kid.  This?  This is worse!!!  LOL
I know that we will all move forward, that everything we deal with is part of her Life's path, as well as ours.  Its the end of an era in our household, one my family and Trav's have marked with Joy.  Again, I'm so grateful to be a part of her Life.  To have a hand in what sort of a person she will stand up and be.  Its no little feat, nor is it something to take so seriously we forget to teach her to be Happy.
She is beyond excited, I will do all I can to keep her in that mind frame.

I am Blessed.

Thankful Thursday...

Have you ever been in a situation where you didn't agree with the way someone was treating you?  What did you do?  Did you just lay down and let them do it?  Did you stand up for yourself and give it your all to fight back?
I have been guilty of both.  I have let one too many people take advantage of my good nature, letting them do and say whatever they please, and I took it.  I have also on some occasions fought back, both physically and verbally.  I can really, seriously think of a few accounts of both.
The reason I say guilty, is that in this last situation, I stood up for myself.  Twice.  Now, in its the aftermath, I am being shunned.  I'm the one being ignored.  By the very person who attacked me.  That person came at me verbally.  I assume they thought I should just sit there and listen, not say a word.  Just take in what ill-mannered things they said about me as a person.  But, in my true spirit, I didn't.  I fought back.  I argued.  I made my point clear.
Life is a matter of perspective, I understand that.  What is really killing me in all this is, in order to live your Life as a decent human being, you have to be able to get off your High Horse and see the way others see things.
I can't win.  I'm done trying.  It is what it is.
Its a good lesson for me in retrospect.  What really in this can I be grateful for?
Well, not a day goes by that I'm not grateful for something.  I've learned enough in Life to know that.  This situation is no different.
I'm grateful for my support team.  My hubby most of all.  I get the strength and confidence to be who I really should because he loves me regardless.
I'm grateful that I stood up for myself, even if it takes away the one person who should be looking out for me and mine in a new and challenging home.
Right or wrong doesn't seem to matter so much to me any more.  Its the principle of the situation, the human aspect.  Being humble enough to just lay it all out and say that you were human.
I would be able to say it, I'm grateful I haven't lost sight of that.

Thankful Thursdays...A minute to reflect.

For those of you who actually take the time out to follow me here on this little blog, I have been out of my mind busy with my new business venture!!  It has been at the very least, six weeks since I have had any free time to sit and write.  

Hayley (my awesome business partner) and I couldn't really take an other day.  We have been pounded with  at least 12 days of 100 degree temperatures, with the promise of another 10 days of it to come.  Between the heat, juggling our kids, working long days at the shop getting it ready to open...We Were Exhausted.

Tuesday I stood up from bed, just in time to spend a few minutes (still half sleeping) with hubby before he went off to work.  I think I drank my coffee sitting up asleep, I don't remember half of the cup!!

Naenah and I struggled through her schoolwork for forty-five minutes, then I needed a nap.  So, I text Hayley, asked her what she was doing.  

Me:  What are you up to?

H: Nothing, on the couch.  Sleeping.

Me: Good, stay there.  I'm gonna take a nap!!

I crawled up into my hubby's wonderful recliner and tuned in to the second season of Downton Abbey.  I didn't move much all day.  Nae didn't either.

Suffice to say, I think we needed to take a day off.  It felt good.

The day gave me some time to step back and think about what needed to be done at the Salon.  Its Hayley's salon, I call it the Shop.  Clear my head, get my barrings back.

I have had so many things to do, I haven't had a chance to just sit and let my mind wander.  

I got that time this morning.  Thinking of all the things that have happened, are happening, are going to happen.  Immediately I start to feel Grateful.  Its floods my heart.

I lost a great uncle a week ago.  He is an amazing man, and I so Grateful to have heard his wonderful laugh one last time.

My Aunt's birthday was yesterday, Nae made her smile with A recorded birthday song.

My dad's birthday is tomorrow, posted a day early on FB, so all the world knows!  

My daughter starts school in 21 days.  A kindergartner.  She was just born, or so I thought.  Now, its five years in the making.

I got to chat with my dad, all three sisters, my mom and Grin this week.

I have amazing support from my new community here.

I'm just Thankful.  I truly am.  My life is no where near perfection, and I like it just the same, even better than.

Travis and Naenah make it all worth while.

Your turn.  If your reading this, leave me a note.  Tell me one thing your Grateful for this week.

Bright Blessings!!

Norms