APRIL 2017

Winter is over.  Mother Nature has rolled up her blanket of snow and put it away for a few months revealing what she has been hiding underneath.

1.  Mud:  Get outside and make a yummy mud pie.  Here’s the recipe.                                                                                       1 pail of mud                                                                            1 stick for stirring

      1 handful of rocks

       Pinch of sand for sprinkles

2.  Wildlife:  Look for worms, fly larvae, bird eggs and lots of baby  rabbits.

3.  Plant life:  Early blossoms will include colorful hellebores, crocus, dandelions, and mayflowers.  Pick a few and bring them inside to enjoy!

4.  Sticks:  Gather sticks of all sizes to use for mixing mud pies, building forts and making campfires.

5.  Rainbows:  What else can I say?  They are beautiful!

6.  Easter:  Yup, all of the above are a reminder of the New Life God promises all those who believe.  Jesus  experienced many difficult times in his life.  When we experience the “winter” of our life He is there to carry us through.  Then he lifts us up and we blossom into the person he planned for us to be!

Happy Easter!

Get Outside

In this day of digital media and virtual reality, I’m so thankful for my opportunity to grow up in the great outdoors.  My wish is that every child could find time to unplug and get outside every day like I did as a kid. 

I grew up just a few blocks from Salem on Heights Drive.  I built tree forts in what is now Kordiak Park.  In summer I fished for bullheads in Pecks lake and skated there in the winter.  Before the neighborhoods were  completed I collected rocks in the fields and in a gravel pit at the end of Upland Crest.  My best friend and I sorted the rocks, washed them, cracked them open to see the sparkling interior and sometimes painted the outside with clear fingernail polish to make them shine.  When I learned to ride my bike I thought the “hill” going west along Fairway Drive from Upland Crest to Heights Drive was the biggest hill ever!  Now I look at it and wonder if it could even be described as a hill at all.  The property Salem sits on was an abandon farm, as I recall.  There were lots of trees between Upland Crest and the farm field.  We picked May flowers in the woods there and put them in May baskets to hang on the neighbors’  doors.  There was rarely a day when all the neighborhood kids weren’t outside playing Kick the Can or pick-up baseball.  

Without Googling anything, we kids learned at lot about nature.  We learned what snakes like to eat.  One threw up frog parts on the neighbor’s picnic table!  Salamanders found their way into our window wells and we collected them and made homes for them in cardboard boxes.  We fed them bugs and worms.  If we didn’t keep them damp and in the shade they dried up and died.  We weren’t  proud of that.  In the fall our moms sent us out to collect bouquets of wild flowers and opened milkweed pods.  We ironed colorful sumac leaves between pages of waxed paper so we could keep them and decorate for fall.  

Meaningful times growing up outdoors prepared me for years of camping, skiing, hiking, gardening and many more activities.  There is so much to learn from nature!  We will never be without the internet and social media.  However, we are beginning to hear more and more voices reminding us that children are healthier physically, mentally and emotionally when they spend time in nature.  Time spent in a city park counts just as much as a weekend in the wilderness.  Unstructured time can be more valuable than organized time outside.  Start exploring your yard, neighborhood and parks.  Watch the seasons change in your area.  Compare this winter to last winter.  Make a chart of the weather every day for a month.  Help  you children explore.  Adults, too, are healthier when they get outside.  

From the east windows of my house I can see the St. Croix River.  It turns east briefly before heading north again.  Last summer I rose early to look at the sun rising behind the river.  It taught me one more thing.  

There is light at the end of the tunnel!  Never give up hope!

Get outside!  Have fun!

PAYING IT FORWARD

It’s February and our thoughts turn to love!  At school we read books such as “The Runaway Bunny” by Margaret Wise Brown, “I Love You So…” by Marianne Richmond and “I Love You Stinky Face” by Lisa McCourt.  We sing songs about love and mail ourselves Valentines.  We feel all warm and happy thinking about ways we will help around the house and around the community.  Caring for others takes thoughtfulness and planning.  We set goals and carry them out.  That’s a good start to loving our community!  

On the other hand, has your day ever changed for the better when a complete stranger did something that left you speechless?  In mid December I had an experience that did just that.  I had been shopping online and after using my credit card I left my wallet on the desk by the computer.  Then, rushing off to Michaels, I picked up some ribbon for a Preschool project and found myself at the register with no way to pay for the ribbon.  I needed it the next day.  While negotiating with the employee at the register about holding my purchases while I ran home to get money, a young woman behind me said, “ I’ll pay for that ribbon.  No problem.  It doesn’t cost much.”  I was stunned!  Of course, I objected.  I have my pride : )  The young woman smiled and said,  “Pay it forward to someone else some day. “   I will!

Earlier last fall one of our Preschool grandparents, who heard through the grapevine that one of our students might miss our school party because of lack of transportation, asked me to offered the family cab fare for the student so the party wouldn’t be missed.  Although that arrangement wasn’t needed in the end, I was again surprised by the generosity of others.

Then, recently, I was entering Cub Foods near suppertime.  It was the bewitching hour when parents were rushing in after work to pick up dinner.  An older gentleman was seated on a bench near the exit door whistling a beautiful tune.  The melody hung in the air like a professional performance.  I had to smile as I walked by knowing my evening would be  somehow better for having heard it.  Was it the same for others?

Loving our family, our grandchildren, and our best friends is easy.  Casting the net wider can seem more challenging.  After all, we don’t have many extra minutes in our days, weeks or months for additional projects.   I have told the three stories above to suggest that we my be helping others in our community without even knowing it.  The little things we do to “pay it forward” are brightening someone’s day.  They, in turn, respond to our act of kindness and accidentally brighten someone else’s day.  Happiness spreads like ripples on a lake!  A “thank you,”  a smile, returning someone’s shopping cart for them, providing transportation for someone, are all easy things to do and they start the ripples moving.  

Young people at our church used to wear  bracelets that said, “What would Jesus do?”  or WWJD.  Keeping that phrase in mind as we go about our daily tasks is all we need to do to change our world.  Paying it forward is what Jesus would do.  Can we, too?

I love

“How many lessons of faith and beauty we should lose, if there were no winter in our year!”

Thomas Wentworth Higginson

I found the above quote on the back page of GARDEN GATE magazine this fall and it caught my attention.  The garden photo accompanying the quote pictured pristine snow adorning an urn of greens and berries.   With our warm fall we Minnesotans were wishing for the beauty of a white Christmas,  frosted window panes, one horse open sleighs, sledding on hills of soft snow and digging forts into mounds of snow gathered from the yard……..and the neighbor’s yard and the other neighbor’s yard.  At least that’s what my grandsons, Soren and Kai, do.  Minnesota winters are gorgeous.  Their beauty restores our faith in a creator who fills our hearts with wonder and awe.  Bring winter on!

But wait.  Perhaps there is another message here.  When the temperatures dropped to the single digits this week and the winds whipped the snow in horizontal paths I wondered if Elsa was back using her powers to bring on a frozen Christmas as she did in Arendelle.  Minnesotans love beautiful snow and winter activities but there is also the discomfort, the shoveling, the danger of hyperthermia.  All is not well in Arendelle when the snow stays too long or the winter is too harsh.  Some Minnesotans pack up and leave for awhile.  Not a bad idea if you can do it.  Others tough it out.  We are descendants of the Vikings after all.  We have  invented tools to help us survive;  snow blowers, snowmobiles, snow plows, down outerwear, down comforters, and the list goes on.  Flu shots, kleenex, Vicks, and heating pads help manage our health concerns.  We build our strength so we can push our grocery carts through the Cub parking lot and walk the dog in the sub zero weather.  Maybe Thomas Wentworth Higginson was suggesting that when we have survived the tough times we realize how blessed we are to have God walking beside us through the deepest snow and the coldest winter.  With God by our side we can appreciate the beauty around us and know we are cared for. 

Bring on winter!  Should we feel sorry for those who lounge on the beaches, garden all year long and  never freeze their fingers?  No, but let’s be hardy Minnesotans and learn to love our mukluks, long underwear and jumper cables.  It helps us appreciate spring.  Thank you, God, for the seasons, even winter!

 Ahhhh or Awe?

I love Christmas!  As soon as the smell of turkey is out of the house I’m ready to move on to Christmas.  It is such a sensuous time of year.  The smell of almond and ginger, the tinkle of bells, the warmth of the fire and the sight of twinkly tree lights and glowing candles bring ohhhhs and ahhhhs to my lips!  I enlist my older grandsons to help arrange my Dicken’s Village.  We plug in the lights and scatter the polyester to mimic the snow that must come before Christmas.  In recent years I have put up a faux tree in the family room.  Although it doesn’t smell like pine and it’s branches don’t bounce with life when the cat paws at the bottom it allows me to have a beautiful tree the entire season without the mess of needles on the floor.  At school, children giggle as they talk about Santa and secret wishes.  Ohhhh………Ahhhhh!

These are manmade ahhhhs which are fun but temporary.  When the decorations are taken down in January they disappear.  There is another kind of awe.  It is defined by psychologist Dacher Keltner as “the feeling of being in the presence of something vast or beyond human scale, that transcends our current understanding of things.”  This is the awe that we feel when we see the birth of our own child or the rainbow after a devastating storm.  True awe brings us together, refocusing our attention from me  to us as we experience a common phenomenon.   We stop to fully take it in.  It can change our way of thinking.  We can smile with others who share this same moment.  Being out in nature, whether in the wilderness or in an urban setting, searching for the unusual and amazing, can change our day.  The wonder of a spring flower pushing up through frozen ground, the vast number of stars in the Milky Way or the intricate work of a spider web can fill us with awe.  Doctors believe this same feeling can lower our blood pressure and make us healthier and happier people.

In Luke 2 we read Luke’s account of the Christmas story.  Read through the story and look for moments of awe.  We meet the shepherds watching over their flocks of sheep.  In verse 11 an angel appears to them and says, “for to you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord….(vs. 13) And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, ‘Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace among men with whom he is pleased!’ ”  Surely that was an awesome sight, one which still moves us today as we read the story and imagine the angels.  The angel told the shepherds to go to Bethlehem to find the child.  They “went  with haste, and found Mary and Joseph, and the babe lying in the manger.”  (vs. 16)  How amazing that must have seemed to them!  The babe was there just as the angel said it would be.  Likewise, the wisemen followed the star from the east.  They arrived in Bethlehem and saw the star shining over the stable. Matthew 2:10 tells us, “When they saw the star, they rejoiced exceedingly with great joy; and going into the house they saw the child with Mary his mother and they fell down and worshiped him.”  These are some of the moments that fill all of us with awe, bringing us together with one focus on Jesus, the Gift of God’s love.  This is the gift of Christmas that slows us down, makes us think, and allows us to live happier lives because of this awesome gift of love.  

Enjoy your Christmas oohs and ahhhs this December but focus on the AWESOME story of Jesus’ birth.  It is the awe that doesn’t go away when the tree comes down in January. This is the story that can calm our anxious thoughts and bring us together as Christians to focus on Christ not us.

DOES GOD LIKE PEAS?

We have a favorite snack time prayer at Preschool.  It goes like this.

A-B-C-D-E-F-G

Thank you God for feeding me. 

When I have lunch every week with my grandsons, Henrik and Karl,  we say the same prayer before lunch and Karl, the two year old, immediately asks, “Does God love peas?”

“I think so, Karl,”  I say.  “God made peas.  I’m sure he likes them.”  And off we go eating our lunch, thankful that God loves peas.  It’s good to be thankful for something every day!

I recall a time a year or so ago when there was a Face Book challenge going around asking face bookers  to list three things each day for a week they were thankful for.  Twice I took the challenge and I finished the week feeling blessed to have so much good happening in my life.  In a day full of negative and discouraging news about hurricanes battering our coast line, political candidates bantering each other with accusations of dishonesty, shootings in neighborhoods close to our homes and hunger on our streets as so many of us prepare to over- eat at our Thanksgiving tables, listing three positive things a day helped keep my perspective on life in balance.  Yes, there is still good happening in the world!  

The little details of our daily lives go unnoticed most days but they are the very details that are God’s miracles, sent as evidence of God’s presence with us.  As I was working in the Preschool garden, gathering the last of the produce and pulling the dying plants, I noticed the earth worms and the richness of the soil that sustained our garden.  What a blessing that dirt is to our preschoolers and the hungry who benefit from the veggies grown here.  I was thankful for the many Preschool families who helped care for our garden over the summer and our church who encouraged us to create this garden dream of ours!  As teachers, our school staff delights in watching so many of the children  laughing and playing with toys, many of which were donated from church members who once watched their own beloved children play with these very toys.  They wanted to pass the love along.  At school, we take our Preschool classes outside to walk among the trees behind Salem to reach the park.  The trees are changing from green to yellow, orange and red.  The children’s eyes fill with wonder.  Leaves float gently down, twirling in the wind and landing on their heads and jackets.  It makes them giggle and twirl in mimicked excitement.  I’m thankful to be there witnessing this delight!  

These little details of my day help me escape the negatives around me.  God is good and so are the people and things he has created, even peas.  Out of curiosity, one day, after our A-B-C Prayer and the usual question, I decided to ask Karl to say the prayer for me.  He did.

A-B-C-D-E-F-G

Thank you God for making peas!

Now I understand the question.  Yes, Karl and I are thankful for peas and for feeding “me,”  and all the little details of our lives that make God’s presents known to us.  I challenge  you to join Henrik, Karl and the your preschooler thanking God for little details of your day that make you smile or wonder about things.  It will make you and your Thanksgiving happy!

A LOVE SECRET

        The first days of school are both stressful and exciting for young children and parents.  There are lots of emotional ups and downs as we try to figure out how we will survive without  each other for portions of our day.  As a mom I wanted to be brave and smiley as I sent my children off to kindergarten, thus being a positive role model, giving them confidence in their ability to start this new adventure in independence.  I didn’t have to do this for preschool.  I just took them to work with me.  I was lucky that way.  However, with each child I recall wiping a tear and wondering who I would talk to during my lonely lunch hour.  I wondered if they missed me during the day…….or even thought of me at all.  Did they have a secret plan for connecting with me when they were lonely? 

My two and a half year old grandson said something recently that made me think maybe kids have their own way of staying connected when we are away.  Over Labor Day weekend, my daughter had to work at the State Fair in the Eco Experience building.  She works for the Polution Control Agency and that is just part of her responsibility.  She also had a wedding to attend on Saturday night.  My son-in-law and the two boys were coming to the cabin with the rest of the family.  On Friday night Britt was explaining to Karl that she was not going to the cabin with him but she would see him on Monday when they got home.  Karl got especially snuggly then, rubbing his face against hers over and over and touching her face and neck, which he often does when he is falling asleep.  Then he said, “Now I will smell like you, Mommy.”  Was this Karl’s way of taking a little of Mommy with him to the cabin when she wasn’t there?  My “mommy heart” wants to think so.  

Karl’s actions remind me of one of my favorite books, “The Kissing Hand” by Audrey Penn.   In this story, Chester Raccoon is reluctant to leave his mom and head off for his first day of school.  But Mommy says she has a secret which she will share with him.  She takes Chester’s hand in hers and kisses the center of his hand.  Chester feels a special warm feeling go up his arm into his heart.  Now, whenever he feels lonely he can press his hand to his cheek and think, “Mommy loves me.  Mommy loves me.”  Chester loved his “kissing hand.”  It made him feel safe.  The next day when Chester was saying good bye to Mommy before going to school, Chester said he had a surprise for her.  He took Mommy’s hand, spread open her fingers and kissed the middle of her hand.  Now she, too, had a kissing hand!  Love goes both ways in a connected family!   

Parents, you are so important to your children!  There is no one who can take your place.  God gave them to you and He gave you to them.  What a blessed gift.  Thank you for sharing your children with us this year!