Communicating With Your Children, A Different Perspective

Like so many parents, I too sometimes have a hard time communicating with my children or dealing with their upsets. Can you relate to when your children go through different experiences with other children where one day their peers are nice, and the next day they are mean? For example, their so-called friends come to your house to hang out on one day, then don’t allow your child to sit with them at lunch the next day? It’s more often girls who suffer injustices of emotional torture by their peers. And that’s what we’re going to talk about.

Several months ago, something fun happened in our home. Our family went wireless. Now I can chat online from anywhere in the house.

One day while I was sitting on the couch, chatting with my friends online, I heard my daughter’s fingers typing away on the computer in the next room. So I sent her a message. She got all excited and started teasing me online and sharing her woes like girls do.

It was then that it hit me! I didn’t have to HEAR her whine and yet she could tell me everything over and over again without getting on my nerves. {{{Smile}}} Sometimes it’s so hard to listen because there isn’t much I can say or do to make her feel better.

But hey, if I’m online chatting with “my” friends, I’m actually available to my daughter too. She can type out all of her thoughts and send them to me in chat. This exercise alone helps her feel better. I can then send her responses that she ends up reading. When talking to her face to face, she tends to shut me out because she just wants to go on and on.

This way we both get to say what’s on our minds without mowing over each other and guess what, it works!!! This is definitely communicating with your children from a different perspective! Now that’s not to say that when she wants to talk I make her get online. But after talking to me several times in the day I get tired of the complaining. That doesn’t mean that that I don’t care. But nothing I say makes her feel better. So she gets online with her girlfriends. If I’m in the other room and hear her typing I get online and say something goofy. Then she opens up.

MY mom on the other hand is more patient (as I hear grandmas are) and can be calming. So when she’s available, I have my daughter call her. Today my mom was over and I reminded my little one that she wanted to talk with grandma. It was so heartwarming when I heard my mom be so grandma-ish. LOL

It really DOES take a village to raise a child. However, I want to choose who’s in our village. That way I know they have the same values as we do.

©2001 Susie Glennan

Do you ever feel like in order to clean the garage you’ll need a wrecking crew?

It was New Years Day 1999 and I’d just finished organizing an area in the garage for my shipping escapades. WOW, did it feel good! I’d gotten so much more done in one day than I’d expected! It had turned into a WHOLE garage organizing day.

I suggest that whoever needs to start a cleaning/organizing endeavor get some teens and pay them a couple of dollars. The money is worth their moral support. When certain personality types have moral support and a bit of help organizing, it makes it easier to accomplish the task that seems overwhelming when done alone. Not only that, but it genuinely helps teenagers feel like they are needed and important as well as gives them a role to follow when we ask for their help.

Before I started I looked around the garage and tried to picture how I wanted to store everything, whether that would be in plastic bins or boxes. K-Mart was having a sale on their Sterilite. So I went over and bought more than what I thought I’d need. Don’t you just hate when you get going on a good cleaning project and run out of storage bins?

When I got home we started by pulling 2 large trash cans into the garage and placing them strategically. I then told each of the girls where to stand so that I could hand or toss them things to put up or throw away. The stack of bins was near me with shipping labels and a sharpie marker.

It starts… I opened up a box, went through it, kept what I wanted and threw away what I didn’t. I sorted in the bins as I went along. When a bin filled up, I’d write what was in it on the label, stick it on and hand it to one of the girls to put up. If there was anything I didn’t want, I’d toss it over to be thrown away. This went on for about three hours before I could finally see the floor in the garage.

If or rather WHEN I have this to do over again, I am planning on going at it from a different angle. Next time I’m pulling everything out of the garage first. Then I’ll go through, sort and throw out. This will leave me with labeled bins and empty shelves. It will be much easier to then put bins on shelves according to who the bin belongs to or what type of items are inside, etc.

Oh, one more thing. Set aside a whole day for this. Get someone to come over and talk things through while you work. If this is not something YOUR personality needs or can handle, ask someone to watch your children for the day and offer to do the same for her in return. In a nutshell, plan, plan, plan ahead and make a list of what you would like to accomplish! Then, prioritize what needs to be done. If you don’t finish the whole project in one day, you will have at least gotten to a good start and finishing will be much easier.

Have you ever wanted to just throw your hands up in the air and scream because you just didn’t/couldn’t nag at the kids one more time to “do their chores?”

Well, I have found a fabulous product that will help you in this area others. It’s called “Mom’s Family Preserves Grin ‘N’ Bear It Chores for Kids.” Inside this wonderful jar are about 120-plus cards. Choosing chores from Mom’s jar becomes a treat when the children know they may get lucky and choose one of Mom’s special fun and reward cards too!

Getting started is simple. Personalize your jar by selecting the cards that are appropriate for your child or children. Rubber band the ones that are left and put them aside. Then, personalize the blank cards that have been included.

Next, check the fun and reward cards to see what’s in there. Keep the ones you want in in the jar, take out the ones you don’t want. It’s that simple!

The final step is having the children choose their cards. You have to come up with what’s best for you though. Here are a few suggestions:

Have them choose one or more cards for the week, choose one card a day (you can have them add a card a day, or have them do the one chore they picked each day).

In our family, the kids have regular chores they are expected to do. These chores are written on a sheet that is taped to the back of their doors. When they get bored with the routine–usually their chores don’t seem to be getting done–I break from the mundane (about every third or fourth week) and tell them to go pick new cards from the chore jar. I usually have them pick four cards. The odds are pretty good they’ll get a reward or silly card (as I call them). As a matter of fact, quite often one or all three of them have picked more reward cards than chores. If one of them gets four chores and the other gets 1 or more reward cards with their chores, I ask the one who got the reward card/s to fan out his reward cards and let the other child pick one. Now the child who has 4 chore cards gets to fan his cards and have the other child pick one. They both usually are involved in the reward/silly cards.

There are other jars too! This is a great way to get conversation going between family, friends, relatives, or God.

NOTE: At this time, we have not been able to find Mom’s Family Preserves anywhere. BUT, you can certainly make your own jars. Just get creative! Sit with the children and go over the chores of the home. Write them down on a list. Cut out rectangles from card stock. Then write each one from the list on a different card. Put those cards in a decorative jar and voilà!

I found containers at K-Mart that fit between your washer and dryer or between the wall and either unit. Slim and clean looking, they will help keep things organized. Use them for those single socks that have lost their mates. Then, every week or two, take about five minutes to match up the pairs you thought were lost forever. It DOES work most of the time! Use the other drawer for laundry soaps and/or other laundry needs, however I use mine for a trash can. It’s right near me, doesn’t show and is very neat.

Also, if you have shelves that go all the way to the floor (you need this for shorter children), get some baskets, or buckets, like the ones that go on sale for a dollar at drug stores or K-Mart. Put one on each shelf and label each with a family member’s name. If you fold your laundry in the same room, this is a great organizer! Fold everyone’s clean wash but leave their socks in the baskets. Even a three year old can take his basket and dump the contents in his drawer. And, if you know who’s socks are NOT coming out in pairs, put the unmatched socks in the owner’s basket. For your little ones, keep the mismatched socks in the slim drawer until YOU find the match. With younger children, you may never see those socks again if you don’t.

Now go plan the time to map out what you need for “your” laundry room and simplify!

Shouldn’t we be able to give our children instructions on how to organize, and then, voilà, they would know how to do it?

Unfortunately, organization is not that easy. Organizing is something that has to be learned over time.

If children see their parents always organizing, they will begin to learn by seeing and helping. Then, when children also have one project to organize such as their own bedrooms, then over time they will really learn and understand the ways and means of doing.

For example, my parents never told me HOW TO. They did everything themselves. I was a terrible type B messy when I was a child, all the way up until I moved out. When I got into my own home, THAT turned me into a type A compulsive. This was now my own home that my friends were going to be coming in and out of, and I didn’t want them coming in and out of a mess. It would reflect poorly on me.

Encouraging participation is a very big deal in training our children. If they are not allowed or taught to participate and learn to organize when they are young, it will be hard to get them to do so later on.

Teach your children HOW TO access what they need. For example, start in a bedroom:

1. Put everything that is out of place in a pile on the floor.

2. Sit on the floor with them and show each child how to sort.If necessary, make little cards that say… .

* KEEP
* MAYBE
* THROW AWAY
* SELL AT GARAGE SALE

You get the picture. Now put each card in front of a large box. Also have ready a variety of empty containers, boxes, bins and so on in different sizes.

3. Encourage each child to sort through those items they know they are going to keep first. Then they will see the piles and clutter go down faster. For example, have them put all their Legos in this pile or Barbies in that pile. Then allow the children to choose storage containers for those items, fill the container,and put it away.

Another suggestion is to have your younger children follow you around the house while you clean, sort, and organize. I had six bins all the same size on the two lower shelves when my children were small and I ran a daycare center. At the end of the day, they each took a bin and filled it with like items.

Also, when my oldest daughter was little, I bought her a cute little outfit that included an apron, dust pan, broom, feather duster and bucket. The set was HER size and she loved it. When there were things that needed to go into another room, I put them in her bucket and told her which room to deposit them into. She also got to dust things on one side of the room while I cleaned on the other. I’d tell her what a good job she was doing and fight the urge to do it better.

Following me around for so many years while I cleaned did keep her from making other messes in other rooms, but most of all made her a participant instead of a bystander.

If you have a son, you can find or make more masculine cleaning tools for him to use, such as a regular small broom instead of a pink one. My son also followed me around for years while I fixed the sprinklers, mowed the lawn (I did this to keep in shape among other things) or did other things in the yard. I saw the rewards of my patience when my youngest, came to me and said, “Boy mom, Josh is really good at fixing things! He just fixed the sprinklers that were broken and stuck.”

Let your children live what you want them to learn! They will learn to organize much more easily by watching, helping, AND doing things themselves, than when you just talk at them or do the work for them.

There are endless ideas and methods to prioritize and maintain the chores in your home. The problem is fitting the method to your personality so you actually USE the method and get the work DONE.

I suggest that you write down on paper all the big jobs that need to be done each week, and then spread these chores over the week. Getting them done is another task….

* Put the chores in order of importance.
* Make a simple chart with the days of the week on top. If you have to, buy a one. There are tons of them out there.
* Put your daily tasks in order per day, including the days that you work away from home.
* Make several copies of your blank weekly chart or use a write-on/erase wall calendar. For some women, a week at a time makes everything look less overwhelming than seeing a whole month in front of you with tons of things to be done.
* See what works for you and if a task doesn’t fit on one day, put it on another day that might work better. It will take time to work out a schedule. But if you DO schedule in your weekly tasks like you also schedule your work days, doctors appointments and so on, then you will find that you have more time to schedule in FUN!
* There are chores that only need to be done every two weeks or so. Those can be alternated every other week.
* A HUGE chart on the wall certainly helps many type B personality woman, who is often flexible and thus easily sidetracked. I put chores and appointments on my wall chart that I can see from the kitchen.
* For the smaller weekly jobs, try setting a timer to 5 minutes so that you know there is a clock to beat. This is helpful to many people. In fact, we recently timed many of the family chores to see how long they took. Most took 5 minutes or less, even when our youngest child did them. It took 5 minutes to load the dishwasher and literally under 2 minutes to take out the trash. Unloading the dishwasher took about 6 minutes.

Here are some suggestions on prioritizing…

For example, the dreaded laundry is a big priority because it overflows if you don’t do it. That is a tough one. Laundry issues are different with every family. If you know you have a lot of laundry that needs to be done every day, then put up a load first thing in the morning and get it to the dryer before you walk out the door for work. When you get home, try to take it out of the dryer before you do anything else. Then when you finally get to sit in front of TV {yeah, right :::::chuckle:::::} or talk with your family, you can fold at the same time. The point here is that you can spread the laundry chores over the whole week, and also be doing many other things while you fold laundry.

As another example, most of the time in our house is spent in the kitchen doing school work, preparing meals, eating meals, or cleaning up after meals. If you don’t keep the kitchen free from dirty dishes, there could be residual smells or possibly ants. (It’s ant season out here in California.) So kitchen chores are way up there on our priority list.

Unfortunately I can’t determine for YOU what is most important. What I can tell you is that if you can put one cleaning job on the chart at least every other day, it will help get those undesirable tasks done with the least bit of anguish. To me, making beds is NOT a major priority, although it makes me FEEL good to have them made. What I consider a major priority is getting food in the house!

Monday
I wouldn’t put any chores on Monday if you are a type B. At work there is usually much to be taken care of as you start your new work week. I am married and have three children, so we delegate tasks even though it gets brutally overwhelming at times for everyone. That’s when it’s time for a short trip somewhere. Back to our topic…

Tuesday
Tuesday could be empty trash and load/wash dishes day. If you have more than two people living in your home like we do, then these two things become an everyday task.

Wednesday
Wednesday could be the day you vacuum. Since dirt does build up on the floors and carpets, this chore should probably be done at least once a week. Now here again, it all depends on your personalities and priorities. Sometimes we just don’t have time for it or it isn’t a priority in the scheme of things.

Thursday
Thursday could be empty trash and load/wash dishes again day.

Friday
Friday might be a clean bathrooms day. If you aren’t home most of the week, then cleaning the bathrooms every two weeks might be fine. Or just do regular quickie wipe downs of the bathroom during the week when you get out of the shower. If you have children and are home most of the time, well, then you’ll need to take this into account. And that is all I have to say about THAT.

Saturday
Saturday could be grocery shopping day. Most people have Saturdays off so you wouldn’t need to rush. Ask your family for some dinner ideas.

I pick three different meals for the week and usually cook enough for 2 or 3 days. Sometimes I prepare chicken and vegetables in advance and freeze them in bags. This way I can quickly throw some fajitas together during the week.

Our lives are too filled with things to do. So now it’s up to YOU to decide how you are going to RUN those things and not let them run YOU.

Some things I try to do often: Get up and take care of ME in the morning, shower, dress, eat and pray… Get the kitchen cleaned… Take charge of my day!

The New Year is upon us and from the letters and phone calls I’m getting things aren’t any easier. So how do we get through yet another year that is faster paced and just as hectic as last year and the year before and the year before that?

STOP! Get fed up ENOUGH to take “at least” one weekend off to gather with your family and regroup. The more stress you endure and the longer you endure it will lessen not only your “quality of life,” but also your “life span.” If you don’t care enough about yourself to stop and smell the roses (or in my case the coffee), then care enough about those around you. There are many people whose life you have touched. There are probably many you don’t even know about!

I bet many of those people are tired, fed up, overworked, and moving through life too fast as well. Unfortunately folks, this is where our world is today. We either keep plowing through and die early or we devise a plan to organize our chaos.

I care about you! I’m just sad that I can’t get you as fired up and excited about taking control and lessening your chaos in a written article, as I could in person. But stick with me here and just maybe I can make even a tiny difference in your day.

Let’s talk about things we can do to gain some control and lessen the chaos.

1. Schedule less. I know, easier said than done. But when I personally look at my monthly calendar and see myself saying yes to too many things or when the kids have too many plans, I make everyone STOP and take the entire weekend off to clean house and spend time together. The laundry, dishes, vacuuming, etc… will be there tomorrow is a popular saying until enough is enough and everyone needs clean underwear. In essence, I schedule less. I couldn’t make my dental appointment in January when I originally planned it, so I planned it for February when my schedule is sparse.

Same thing goes for your emotional well being. When you neglect your body, mind and/or spirit for too long, coming back into sync is much harder. So I ask you, How Tired are you? How FED UP are you?

2. Re-Group. Sit down with a calendar. (My preference would be The Busy Woman’s Daily Planner [smile].) But even a wall calendar will do. Go over the entire family’s HAVE TO’s in one month. Once those are written down, plan FREE TIME as a family. For example, today the family scattered. But it was family free time and two of them wanted to go to the car show. Two of them wanted to go out with a friend who lives too far to see all the time. And I just wanted to work on this article and the website for my daughter’s school.

We all did what we wanted with our free time today. Tonight we’re going to watch a movie together. As many of my other articles say, Plan, Plan, and Plan! If you don’t plan at least some of your time, then you end up wasting a lot of your time.

Re-Grouping involves planning. You assess what is not getting accomplished and schedule those things into your month. Remember that if you are busy doing out of the house things, you’re not in the house cooking. So don’t forget to plan meals.

3. Spend Time with loved ones. Spending time isn’t just sitting in front of the TV, although it’s one of MY favorite things to do these days. It’s watching what your children do on the Internet, who they speak with on the phone, etc… If you have smaller children, listen to their noises or what’s being said when they play with others. Watch their facial expressions when they’re watching TV. If you don’t have children but find your laundry isn’t done, the dishes are still in the sink, you’re eating out more often, you’re finding yourself over booked and/or everything is falling apart around you, then you definitely need to re-group. (Refer back to #2)

4. Find Help. If you need help, find it; take it when offered by family and friends. Oh what people can accomplish with a little help from their friends. (One of my new mottos) Others feel good when they can do something that makes a difference in someone else’s life. So if you don’t allow someone to help a little, you’re robbing them of THEIR joy. Now that doesn’t mean to take advantage and ask for help all of the time. But when people have mutual needs that are met by one another, life can be so sweet.

I have friends who help me. Apparently they feel I help them just as much. I don’t feel like I do, but they say so and I decided not to argue with them. It’s the “old school” way of being.

Maybe it wouldn’t hurt to bring some of those slower time mentalities back to the future. What do you say?

Someone recently brought it to my attention that this would be the LAST New Year I get to celebrate under the age of 40. Wasn’t that nice? LOL She then added what I interpreted to be the fact that I never follow through with consistent exercise. Now mind you she was talking about herself. But alas, I’m in a similar boat. While she spoke of needing to lose weight, my issue is that I need to get into better physical shape. I’m very petite, but have no strength throughout my body due to an injury from a car accident years ago. So the advice I gave her:

Life change! LOL What happens to most of us is that we continue on a ritual of losing weight (or changing anything we deem necessary) with an end result in mind. We shouldn’t be focusing on an end result, but rather a better life. And we can’t have that better life if we’re bobbing up and down on the weight scale (or in our other undesirable habits).

Instead we should be thinking, “Life Change!” If you change the way you live your life in the area that bothers you, it then becomes a habit. Then the yearning for the moment you’ll allow yourself to have the Ben and Jerry’s ice cream will change from a moment to an occasional bite from the tub because your daily habit is healthy eating. So of course it won’t hurt to nibble from the tub now and again.

Does this make sense? We have expectations that have almost been learned behavior from the beginning of our lives. One is; Diet, lose the weight we want, “EAT CAKE!” or in my case, “EAT ICE CREAM!”

Follow me for a moment as I go back in time when a woman came to my house for our children’s play date. When it was time to pick up the toys, I did what I usually did and said, “Clean up time. Everyone find the bin your toys go into and put them away.” The visiting child started to throw “things” as well as a fit! He didn’t want to leave and he certainly didn’t want to clean up.

So I said, “Billy, did you have fun playing at our house?”
He said, “Yes.”
I said, “Would you like to come back and play again some time?”
He whined, “yes” as if he knew what I was going to say.
So I finished with, “If you’d like to come back, then you have to help clean up before you leave. That is how we do things in our home.”

He threw a temper tantrum again which lead his mom to say, “I can’t handle it here. You’re a militant mom! You run your house like the Gestapo!”

I gently responded, “Does your child enjoy coming to our home?”
The mom said, “Yes.”
I added, “Does my child behave nicely at your home? Does she clean up her mess when it’s time to leave?”
The mom said, “Why yes, you’re daughter is a delight to have in our home. She’s welcome over any time!”

I said, “Thank you, then I must be doing something right.”

HABIT is the key. I trained my children into a habit that lasted a lifetime. To this day my children can’t leave a mess at someone’s house before actually leaving their house.

Training ourselves into habits that last a lifetime is the life change I’m talking about.
Scheduling is one of the keys.
Writing things down that we wish to accomplish.
Following through with that schedule.
Having an accountability buddy helps to keep us on track. (Make sure she’s not weak either. LOL Otherwise, she won’t do any better helping you than if you didn’t have her to keep you on track. Smile)

If you get a little off track, revamp the schedule to allow for your mood. After all, we women don’t need a menstrual cycle to have a mood change. All someone has to do is upset me and my mood changes.

Many people can’t handle the regiment of a schedule.
They feel that if they have a schedule they will be slaves to their schedule. It all depends on what TYPE of schedule they have. LOL

My schedule includes hours a week of free time.
A Mocha Frappuccino on the way to Toastmasters on Thursdays.
Movies on Friday nights.
Sundays family time.
Twice per month business/women’s meetings. (They’re FUN for me and have great food too!)

Make your exercise your fun time. Yes, I’m serious. Drag a friend along. Make it a regular same time, same place event. But the key is writing it down on your schedule.

I schedule my days the night before. If I try to do it in advance, say a week ahead of time, things come up that change my plans and my schedule ends up in ruins. Then I don’t get what I scheduled accomplished and give up. When you schedule the night before, you’re less likely to have something over ride the plans you made.

When was the last time you took a vacation and didn’t take your business or kids with you? That’s not meant to be derogatory. After all, 98% of my trips have been with my husband and children. I love those trips! But let’s face it, those don’t usually allow for much parent rest.

It’s been a long time since my husband and I went on a vacation. And what we “thought” were vacations were really just little 2 – 3 day jaunts away that didn’t give us much mind rest or down time. We spent quite a bit of time driving or walking around which was nice, but I’ll say it again not enough mind rest. By the time you get to where you’re going and settle in or get into any type of routine, it’s time to leave for home.

We recently went on a “real” vacation with no business plans; only rest and relaxation were on our minds. We made the plans on a Wednesday and flew out on Sunday. It was our first flight over the ocean too. We didn’t think too hard and long or contemplate not spending the money. We just did it! And during that week in Maui, I realized I finally let down. My mind and body had been able to calm down and rest. I challenged myself by doing things I feared. Can you say Scuba Diving? After coming home I realized that I took my first true blue “vacation”! I had mind rest! It was truly amazing and such a “freeing” experience!

Now that my husband and I have had our vacation, it’s time to plan with the kids. While in Maui, we kept thinking of the things that we thought the kids would like to do. One thing lead to another and I started daydreaming back to the phone calls I receive from women all over the world with the same issues. One of the common themes was the rushing and no time for building memories. Oh there are some nice trips here and there or some family gatherings. But most of the time those are exhausting because of the work involved.

I have a friend with many children and a huge extended family. She really has it down for vacations and short trips with the family. Everyone starts packing as a family on one Saturday so they are ready to leave either the next Friday after school or early the next Saturday morning. Her extended family members all have tasks to do ahead of time. Some bring craft items, some bring extra snacks, some bring the supplies for crafts and such, like extra trash bags, boxes to put the crafts in, etc. When they all arrive, they have a reunion time of chatting and eating. Next the women do their thing and organize the games, crafts, and other activities for the rest of the trip. This way each woman only has one thing they are in charge of and they get to enjoy the rest of the activities. Also, the dads take the kids out for one of the days and at night the moms get to have time alone together as well. By planning ahead of time, they assure their down time and mind rest.

Remember the daydreaming you used to do as a child? I was a real daydreamer. I was able to melt into a book and not hear another soul talking or moving around me. When did I lose that? How many of you can still daydream? It was such a different feeling to have this down time that when I came home and went back to work, I was able to think clearly and finish some tasks I could not finish before. My husband and I felt like we went on a second honeymoon. And I daydreamed.

Realizations came from this. Allowing finances, the kid’ s school and sports, business, or other people to keep us from doing what was best for us is not how we want to live our lives. So we made some plans for our next getaway with our teenagers. Maui is definitely a place for the older kids to have a great time. Now it’s time to budget for it.

Building memories that last a lifetime is important. How you go about building those memories is also important. We need to teach our children “now” to set up a life of living! Teach them about setting up a vacation fund and planning ahead. As you get ready for a vacation, talk to your children about the importance of mind rest and down time. After all, kids learn by example. If we deprive ourselves of vacations as they grow up and they see us come home exhausted, they will learn by example and not learn how to relax and enjoy. A study was done years ago about what kids want most from their parents. The top answer was for their parents to be less stressed. Make your vacation list and plan ahead.

So do you need mind rest? I say, “YES, most definitely!” What will it do for you? It will allow you to be the person you were meant to be. It will allow you to try new things and clear your head so you function better at home and work. And most of all, it will give you memories to last a lifetime.

Does anyone enjoy the act of moving? I keep thinking we’ll do it better next time. Next time unfortunately comes at an inopportune moment and once again it does not go as planned. In a perfect world we have all the time we need to pack properly, label boxes, put things in order and move in an organized fashion. Well God has been teaching me that this is not a perfect world and I can’t have things my way.

I’m taking this as a good lesson in bending. How many times do we fuss and get upset because things don’t go our way? It’s my opinion that if we can’t change it, we need to learn to roll with the flow. It doesn’t mean we don’t get upset. It just means that we manage through it until it works out because, everything always works out in the end.

We’re moving our business again and it came at a very inopportune time. So instead of having everything in order as a good time management expert would, I had to graciously accept the help of my wonderful, pack-mule husband, and his sidekick, my son. Time was of the essence so we’re not offline and closed down for very long. They packed and moved and packed and moved until their bodies wore out. But the perfectionist in me went into the new office and felt flustered at how everything was placed. I had to really keep from being ungrateful.

Sometimes it feels like the chips are stacked against you and you can’t rebound. But I’m here to tell you that God is greater than our little problems. A couple of days after they moved “most” of the business, I was blessed to have wireless going in on the same day, a professional organizer coming two days later to set up and install racks and bins. And I pray by the weekend we’ll be set up and ready to go!

It took me standing back and telling myself that I couldn’t change things so move forward, press on, and thank those who helped. And I did.

What areas of your life are in chaos? Can you change them? If not, take a moment to breathe, then press on knowing that it all works out in the end. I’m living proof.