I have not written in quite a while, mainly because the summer has demanded that hot days be dealt with by a dip in the pool, a bike ride under some shady trees, travelling to see family, or watching grandchildren run through the sprinkler. I know that the days are short and another summer has nearly slipped past. My little ones are getting ready to return to school far too soon.

The heralding of school still puts me in mind of the future and change. Remember when that meant new school clothes, unsharpened pencils and that pink eraser in a little zippered pouch? Then the clean notebook paper, that would become a burden later to fill, but right now held only the pristine whiteness that said we would learn something new and would write things that we could not yet imagine?

I know the calendar has not yet even turned to August, but our two go back the 16th!

I need to learn to live in the moment. To realize that I should now be intentional about what last things I can eke out these passing summer days. I want to make a trip to the mountains, to see the streams and smell the pine. I want to get the kids to do a couple of new art projects (Devon won first place in our local art show this summer!)

What things are your children experiencing in these final summer days? Things do not need to cost money, so here is a list of low cost ways to make those days a little more festive:
A walk in the park, a free dog show, or petting zoo.
Our town has free movies in the parks, see if your town has a schedule of events
Lay on your back in the yard and imagine pictures in the clouds…then make up a story.
Read a story in the shade
take a ride in the wagon after dark and listen for crickets
we filled our hot tub with cool water and left the heater off, makes a nice pool!
Take some little cars out under the trees and make a town with roads in the dirt
Go to the farmers market and let the kids pick a vegetable they have never tried.

I hope the rest of your summer is full of great memories. The kids will remember the little things more than even the big things, don’t believe me? Do you remember the sound of the Popsicle truck? Check the rest of your childhood summer memories, I think you will be surprised!

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I am thinking of this today because of my own lack of silence and a need to turn off the noise and busyness, with not much knowledge about how to do that. I was thinking about summers when I was a kid.
There is an old saying about the lazy, hazy days of summer, and for all practical purposes those are gone. Now in their place are plans, lessons, travel, summer homework, television, video games, computer hours.

The fallout from all these options of things that capture the mind and attention, is the loss of something wonderful.
Maybe some of you are old enough to remember when adults were unconcerned about what we wanted to do, and had little or no guilt about just letting us be kids. no thoughts of enrichment, furthering our educational goals, and the outcome was creativity.

We got bored. Seriously bored. I would sit with neighbor kids under the shade of the willow tree in the backyard, just laying in the grass. “Whadda ya wanna do?”" I dunno, whadda you wanna do?”

Then would come the listing…we could, ride bikes “nah, too hot”, we could color, nah, wanna play army? ( this would mean the sandbox, getting out all the army men and some trucks, using pieces of wood to build walls and bricks to make a higher lookout point etc.. or getting broomsticks for rifles and chasing each other around.) Maybe we would then decide maybe we wanted to have ice cream, because the silence allowed us to hear the ice cream truck a few blocks away. After being refused money for ice cream by our parents, we thought maybe a lemonade stand would let us have ice cream tomorrow…yeah! “I’ll make the sign, you got crayons?” then we would go house to house to find the stuff we needed, a table, water, lemonade mix or real lemons…then we would not have the adults make the lemonade, we did it, we came up with a new recipe…sometimes sale-able , sometimes not.

Boredom + dreaming = creativity. This is true of children and adults. We go at breakneck speed thinking that we have to get this and that done…or we schedule every waking moment for our kids and then wonder why they don’t know how to play.

I have not been very creative lately, I’ve had too much to do. Can we stop and take some time to sit beneath a tree, dangle our toes in the water, hear the crickets at night, watch fireflies, listen to a robins song from her nest…and what if we get bored…will we think of something wonderful, or fill the time with pre-packaged games and lose that gift?

Maybe you could give a gift to yourself and your kids today. Tell them no Tv, or anything electronic. No lessons today, just a day to “be” . They will groan, and whine, but hold your ground. Just lay around and let it happen. I think if you give them several of these days this summer, they will find, and so will you, that the mind and heart become engaged in life again, and who knows what you will do!

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kids sing thank youMemorial Day for children: Thank You Soldiers song.

Check this out, click on the title above and listen to a beautiful song of thanks to our Military, sung by children. I know you will love it. Mommylife.net offers the music free to teachers and parents who want to teach this to your little ones for the celebration!

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Hi,
Last night I spent some time watching cartoons with my two grandchildren. It was not fun. I ended up turning off the TV and insisting that a bath was a better use of time, making me the unpopular grandma for the evening. I think that parents think cartoons are like they used to be, cute, funny and a pleasant distraction that allows the grownups to get a few chores done while the kids are fairly safe for a moment. Not so anymore.

The show we were watching was called Back at the Barnyard, on Nickelodeon. I will pick on this one, but believe me, it is not alone. Many cartoons I have found are dark, with adult innuendos and blatant disrespect. Don’t try telling me that the kids don’t understand these innuendos. You would have been right years ago, but no more, our little ones are exposed to so much, that some are nearly adults before they learn to walk.

OK, here is what I saw last night. A cow that has pickup lines and tries to seduce another barnyard animal. A cow explaining that she has a date not because she wants to, but because the person buys her stuff (nice thing to teach) . Later on this date, with a nasty acting boy who is overweight with braces (talk about stereotype and encouraging kids to be mean ) she says she is feigning interest in her date and asks him about his parents. Then, the kid begins venomously spouting , that he hates his Dad (another nice moral value) the reason? because he is a clown (that is his job)…off went the TV . I have noticed that several cartoons that are pretty popular, have the theme that parents are stupid, and kids barely tolerate them.

I hope this little commentary will send you to the TV with your kids for an evaluation of your own. Kids are learning disrespect, lying, fabricating stories to get their own way, complaining, self centerdness, rudeness, partying, and unkind behaviors, all while we are doing the dishes, thinking they are safe and happy for the moment.

Are there good cartoons? Of course, but be careful, they are mainly the older ones reflecting a time when it was considered important to extend values and morals to kids. It seems the prevailing idea now is to give kids what their little hearts desire including plenty of gags that have to do with bathroom humor ( and yes all kids like that, and always have). The difference between then and now is, that kids were taught that those things are not best, and they were taught not only by parents but by the culture. The culture has switched gears in the opposite direction. Now it is up to parents to teach what they believe is right.

I can hear you saying, come on Kathleen, it is just cartoons, besides you are an old fashioned grandma. Maybe, but I bet if you really take a look at what the kids are looking at, you might not find it so funny.

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Operation We Are Here http://www.operationwearehere.com/BratTownBugle.html has come up with a wonderful free download to make connecting fun for kids and their military parents!

At home, you can choose from many different pages, print and let the kids get creative! A garden page can tell all about what you are planting this spring. The sports page lets kids tell all about the soccer game or skating lesson. You can choose to make the front page news that your child got a good report card, helped the neighbors or sang in church.

There are endless possibilities for both parent and child to work together, and since it is a bit more structured, you eliminate the “I don’t know what to say” dilemma.
Created by a Military wife and mother, brat town is an inspired idea. Hope you take advantage of a fun project for your family!

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I found this poster on the web, and don’t know who to attribute it to, but it looks like sound advice, so I am passing it along. It is hard to teach children the value of money and our society, does not help us. We are used to more money than I think we will have in the future, and we are also used to giving our kids too much of the material things, not enough of good old fashioned human interaction and spiritual direction. . Take a look at this and see where you may be giving, but not teaching.

Please know I am not preaching, I wish I had done these things for my kids! I may even be ale to start some of it with our youngest who is 18, but if you have little ones, you have a great opportunity to set them on the path to wise spending!

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You know there are so many ways to help kids stay connected. The problem is that as adults, we have to take time at the end of a tiring day and then find more energy to apply some creative connections for our kids and our deployed loved ones.
How do we get the energy, the drive and the ideas to all come together and be more than good intentions? Doing things as part of a normal day may help.

As you make those cookies for the FRG group, or the church potluck, let the kids make a few extra batches to send to Dad. While you are busy doing bills, give the kids crayons and markers to make creations worthy of decorating a barracks.

Get others onboard. If the kids see grandma once a week, maybe she would not mind helping the kids write a letter, even the teacher may be persuaded that a letter writing session to Dad is a valuable learning time, and once a week could be swapped for another similar homework assignment.

Video the karate lesson, swimming lesson, or other activity to share with the parent deployed…you have to sit there anyhow!

Need some relief from being the only parent in the house? Ask your deployed spouse to read a story on tape or before deployment make a small library of videos of him reading a story to the kids. Pop these in when you just have to get a quiet moment.
The kids will love you for it.

Make a list of everyday things you do and see if you can pair them up with some ways to connect the kids with the one who they are missing. It will make it a little easier for all of you!

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I am actively in the mode to pull off this German Christamas before our son leaves for his three years in Germany. I think that his children (Devon age 7 and Landen age 5) will learn where Daddy is going ,and make a few memories while he is home. Today I found a recipe for a gingerbread train! I’m sure it will be lots of work on my part. The kids are too young to go in for all the cooking, but I plan to let them help make the dough, help roll it out. I will cut the shapes and get them in the oven. I think I will have to assemble the train, then they can do the decorating! I am hoping that I can accomplish this, and that it won’t be like so many things are…you know…you have a great vision in your mind, then it looks absolutely nothing like you thought it would.

This brings me to the topic of expectations. How many times do expectations ruin the joy of something? Like when you look at a travel brochure and the beach looks endless and the pool huge , then you get there and the beach is 8 feet wide and the pool has skimmers floating on it? Well, if you just say “whatever we see I will enjoy”, you hardly notice the skimmers!

In military life, the lesson is:have few if any, expectations. This is a lesson the rest of the world needs to heed as well. To be truthful, letting expectations slide by the wayside, equals a happier and more adventous life!

Here are some questions to ask yourself . What am I expecting, and how will I feel if things turn out to be different ? Am I living in a constant state of dissapointment? Do I feel that no one around me cares much about how I want things to be? Do you ever hear yourself say things (to yourself or others) like,…when I get a better job….when I lose 10 pounds…when my husband gets back from deployment… when my kids are older…when I  move to a bigger house…. then things will be better!? (yep, I’m raising my hand too!)

If you hear these in your self talk, you are living in the expectations, not in the life you have. Teaching ourselves to have thankful hearts , teaches our kids to have them as well. Things are never perfect this side of Glory, but there is still much to enjoy! Children pick up the attitudes of the adults around them. Husbands and wives feel tension from each other even when it is not spoken. It is tiresome to be around someone who is chronically unhappy. As I tell my kids…happiness is a choice. Circumstances are not always easy, but we either choose to have unrealistic expectations, or to let go , and find the good in what is.

Realistic expectations will go a long way in keeping relationships functioning well. As a good friend of mine once said: ” It would be futile and foolish to expect an elephant to fly. We might be able to teach him to flap his big ears but we will be disappointed when he can’t lift off”.

Sure hope this Christmas thing turns out well… but if not, we will have been together!
Here is the link for the gingerbread train…in case you want to join the fun! http://familyfun.go.com/recipes/gingerbread-train-715184/

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Paula and I had the privilege of doing a book signing at a friends farm, as they sponsored Military Family Day at their pumpkin patch. A beautiful fall day, with the blue October sky that we here in Colorado enjoy so much! Kids and parents together picking out pumpkins, produce ,and generally enjoying the simple country life.

Up to our table  came a woman, who read through our first book. The daughter of a military father she told of the suffering that she went thorough as a child. It came out differently than perhaps many have thought. The suffering , she explained was not that she was without her father, though that was tough, it was her mothers response that damaged her heart so deeply. Her mother she said, was constantly depressed and unable to cope with her husbands absence. She would sleep and cry, and the children at a young age had to get their own breakfast.

The thing she remembered was her fathers homecomings, which were short and infrequent. He came with all the honor , salutes, flags waving, sun glinting off white uniforms as his ship pulled in. She felt proud in those moments.

As I listened, I thought about the way a parent responds to the difficulties of life. Does it tell the children that they are on their own? That’s a frightening thought for a little one. Does it tell the child that life is only good, when we have what we want and when those we love are close by? Maybe it tells a child that they can make the best of it. With faith , an attitude of adventure, along with the conscious choice for “happy” they can make it. We Serve Too! is an attitude, as well as their story!

I am certainly not suggesting that deployments never bring tears, or the reality that some days are  just downright difficult. If a parent can be real with their emotions, and at the same time teach children that happiness is indeed a choice that can be made, children are better equipped for life.

Some military kids grow up to find they have difficulty keeping relationships intact, perhaps coming from so many goodbyes.  Leaving people every year or so can become an unconscious pattern that interferes with long term choices.  I don’t know the answer, but I wonder if parents who work to stay connected, those who are practicing the principle of resiliency as the hallmark of Military Life, have stronger children?

I want you to see these young ladies that the National Guard honored by making a video of thier song. They are singing about the family, and it is obvious things are not easy. That said,  they are thriving and moving forward.Perhaps the attitudes of their adults have fostered that?  check this out:

The Price of Peace

I do not believe that Military Kids are destined to have these patterns and struggles. They can come through as healthy and well adjusted as any child if the parents attitude is one of honor and purpose in the waiting.

Our attitudes now,  as the adults, can set a child’s life on a course to resiliency or  suffering . There is more choice in it than we know.

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Today is the last day our son Justin is home on leave. So many want to see him, and the time goes by so fast, we are left feeling like the time that is about to end has hardly begun. Our son Ryan will also head home to Kansas, the two of them making it way too quiet here! I think that all of us experience this in life. Our humanity always wants more, and we forget to soak up the sun!

Today I am fighting this, because the natural tendency is to begin the disconnect to help the pain diminish. We start this a few days ahead, and to not do it takes some work.

I used to tell my daughter (who is adopted and had abandonment issues) that when people actually leave, then we can cry, but until it happens we will be happy and enjoy each moment.

I try and look at the grandchildren today and enjoy the fun that are having with Daddy, not think of the days ahead when we wish we could tell him something or share something together. This is Military life, and life in general actually. I remember many long days with my husband in the restaurant business when I longed for family time.

So..remember to enjoy the day. The sun will set and another day will come around. Being happy is honestly a choice made, not a thing that happens to you. Happy comes with the knowledge that things will never be perfect in this world, but with a grateful heart we enjoy what is offered. We know that  life is sadness and joy, all in the same day. Today the sun is still shining . Tomorrow the goodbyes will be hard, but the warmth of today will still be felt.

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