Simple Pleasures

I love the small things in life that bring great joy. There are so many events/objects/people in everyday life that we don't think about; these are the things that make me truly happy. Sure the big things like birthdays, trips, etc. bring happiness but these things do not happen as frequently. I wish that I was observant enough to make a long list of all the things that make me smile but most of the time I don't notice. I am sure I don't notice because I am so lucky; I am happy so often that I don't pay attention to the little things that bring joy. I am aware that there are many people who are in a place where they are never happy. I work with kids/people who are so depressed or anxious that they don't know how to feel happiness. This is just another reminder to be thankful.

Currently, the things making me happy are: getting in better shape, I just started a running program and I am excited every time I run further/longer.

My flowers. It seems like every weekend, Ben and I are out planting. Last weekend, Ben spray painted me a new pot. It is beautiful. We bought a Lilly to plant in it.

Summer Time

It is official, yesterday was the kids last day of school. Of course I am not done with work for the summer yet but everything changes. I have a week without students and then they come back for summer school. That is about the perfect amount of time without them....by the time they come back, I am ready to see them again.

Additionally, I am teaching a class at Missouri State this summer, I need to start spending some of my time prepping that class. I am pretty excited about it. I think I am going to teach it this fall as well. The class is Introduction to Special Education for people getting their masters in counseling, sped, or secondary/elementary education.

To kick off the summer perfectly, the weather is gorgeous. I am going to spend the weekend outside!

Mother's Day

The older I get the more days like Mother's Day and Father's Day mean to me. I have been reflective the last couple of days about why. Part of me says it is the aspect of being a mother myself. However, I think the real reason is because it takes some growing up before you realize how much of an impact your mother (or father) makes on your life. Additionally, I never realized how crazy my mom's life must have been until now. I get so stressed out just trying to work, manage commitments, and complete the work I need to do on the house. I can't imagine how I would feel if I was also running my kids around every evening to their commitments. It makes the fact that my parents were at every ball game, concert, etc. that much more impressive.

I have also came to realize how much like my mom that I am. When I was growing up, I "hated" the country, animals, plants, etc (well just about everything...I was a difficult teenager). All of that stuff makes me laugh now. I have a house with a big yard and lots of trees but I would like to be more secluded. I am embarrassed at how important my pets are to me, and I have a million plants...all just like my mom. Ben randomly brings up other things that make me similar to mom. For instance, I think I can fix any illness on my own (Mexican drugs work), I love kids, and I am really careless with things.

The thing is that I am so thankful for having such a wonderful mother. I can't imagine a person who I would rather be compared to. I hope and pray that one day I am as great of a mother as she was.

**I have lots of similarities to my dad as well, that is one of the very neat things about parenting and genetics. I will save the information about him for fathers day.

Friendship

I have always had a really close group of friends. For the most part, we have been friends since we were little kids. We have added people here and there and spouses have been inducted in but the core is the same. When I think back on undergrad I think that my experiences were different from most because I went to school around here and the group was still connected (although this is where several of them added in). Don't get my wrong. I loved college and would not pass up the memories made by our friends during that time. There were TONS of late nights at Potters House, Monday night football, parties at the apartment, camping trips, baseball games etc. However, I didn't really branch out. I stayed close only with our group.



When I moved to Oklahoma for grad school, I was scared to death....but our cohort was close and I quickly made some super great friends. I still consider many of those people great friends (even though I am really bad at keeping in touch..sorry!). We have some amazing memories of conferences, crazy road trips, and great parties. When I went to Fort Worth, the same thing happened. Awesome friendships. I can not imagine my life had I not moved to these places and made such great friends (if you were not included in the pictures, sorry, I pulled the ones that were easy for me to get to) :)





Now that I am back in Missouri, I find myself falling back into the old pattern of "I don't need any new friends, it is hard enough keeping up with the ones I have." However, today was a rough day for me. I was emotional and felt like everything was going wrong. I got an unexpected pick-me-up when I had lunch with some of my co-workers. We were just chatting about everyday things and I started thinking....these people are my friends, we share personal information with one another, have common beliefs, etc. Basically, this entire thought process boiled down to this: I need to do more to nurture my friendships both old ones that I know will last forever and may be taken for granted, and new ones that need more attention! This will be one of my new goals and we all know how I love goal setting...

Kentucky Derby Day

I have always loved horse races. I am not nearly the horse fanatic that everyone else in my family is but I would say that I love them more than average. I have always wanted to go to the Kentucky Derby. Most years, I enjoy the race from my sofa.

This year, Shelley and Roo hosted a Kentucky Derby Day party. It was tons of fun with organized lawn games (Boche Ball (spelling?) Ladder Golf, Washers, etc.). There was even a stick horse race. Everyone had tons of fun and we are hoping that there are many more of these to come (even better if we all went together in person!). The girls had to wear a hat and collared shirts were required for the guys. The following are some pictures from the event.