Wordless Wednesday

Express Yourself

You're Not Thinking Hard Enough.

I spent the past couple of days doing some last minute scrambling to plan for a visit to a couple classrooms of kids. I have recently decided to join Storytellers Guild which places you into classrooms where you read to the children. I love kids. I love reading to kids. Makes sense to me.

Actually, I am taking over a position for another wonderful woman who has decided to do some other things and needed to let go of this volunteer activity. She asked me if I'd like to take over. Ooo, the pressure of following in someone's else's footsteps.

What's harder, walking in someone else's shoes or following someone else's shoes?

I am confident in my ability to work with children. No problem. I can gear up or gear down and I can fly by the seat of my pants in most situations with kids. Kids don't scare me. Adults do.

So, we met at the school for introductions and the passing of the torch. "Torch"ure, I should say. They LOVE her. "We'll miss you. Are you coming back? I might cry." Hey, I am sitting here.  What am I,  chopped liver?

And, I will say, Marianne is worthy of tears. She is an amazing person. She is peaceful and happy and creative (oh, sooo, delightfully creative). She would dress up for the kids and try to make them think it wasn't her. Beautiful. I might miss her and I never saw her do a reading.

So she says her goodbyes and there I am....chopped liver. Should have brought candy. phhfft.

It went well. Introductions, a lot about me, my family, my books and all that. A get to know me session. I read a couple of books. The kids were attentive and fun. But i felt a bit under scrutiny by the teachers. I hate that.

 I am not Marianne (though I'd love to adopt some of her qualities). As my Flip Side Story, A Day Without Ms. Hatting, teaches, "When Ms. Hatting is gone, it just can't be the same."  When Marianne is gone, it just can't be the same. It can be just as good.

Kids are resilient and open to most new situations. I didn't fear that. The adults, on the other hand, have a more difficult time with change. Change is ok. New things are ok if you don't compare them to the old too critically. As the old Brownie saying says, "Make new friends but keep the old."

Actually, it should say, make new friends but keep the current ones. Old isn't working for me these days.

Embrace new things but retain the old.

It is important to give people a chance. They may not live up to your expectations but be open to the unexpected.  Look for the good in people even if the bad is more prevalent.  You might find that you will learn something new about yourself through that person.

Do you see the cup half full or half empty? Do you see people half good or half bad?

One of my favorite saying is, "If you don't have anything nice to say, you aren't thinking hard enough."

Make it a habit to tell people thank you. To express your appreciation, sincerely and without the expectation of anything in return. Truly appreciate those around you, and you'll soon find many others around you. Truly appreciate life, and you'll find that you have more of it.
Ralph Marston 

Book Update

As hard as planning and waiting for an exciting upcoming vacation...

And we all lay around on vacation like that.

As hard as  waiting for your baby to be born...

As hard as getting to a bathroom in an emergency...

One of my FAVORITE books.

As hard as waiting for your kids to come home from college for a visit...

And they are bigger than you.

As hard as waiting to find out what happens in the end of a book or movie...

As hard as finding out if you got a job...

As hard as waiting to see if they accept your offer on a new house...

As hard as waiting for your kids to learn to pick up after themselves...

They never do, do they? Who am I kidding?

As hard as waiting to have a little free time after 8 years raising your beautiful babies...

It is just as hard to wait for my dream to come true. I feel as if I have been waiting forever for my book to be published. In fact, I suppose I have. I have dreamed of having one of my dozens of stories I've written put on a bookshelf for kids to read. Now, it is in the hands of a publisher and still I wait.

We've done the editing. We've done illustrating. We've done the layout. We've done the scanning. It is the scanning that is the setback now. The illustrator, the amazing Denise Clemmensen, has the images again for adjustments so the printing will be perfect. http://www.deniseclemmensen.com 

It is almost easier to have a baby. At least there is a deadline. And, worse case scenario, it comes earlier (which all my babes did). I feel like puking at times. I cry. I laugh. I get irritated. And, I just want to get this damn thing out!

I am still waiting patiently impatiently. As soon, as Denise is done, it will go back to scan, then to layout, then to pdf for endorsements, then layout again, then printer. 

Good things come to those who wait. Though gray hair isn't good. 

Just Because by Amber J Housey  Illustrated by Denise Clemmensen 

Coming Soon in a season near or far from you!

No-Fly Zone- Post 911

My husband is a diehard Michigan State fan.  He informed me of this when we started dating. I told him I would go to the games with him. I'm not a sports fan but it is fun to go to the games. Even more fun when a little tailgating goes on beforehand.

After recovering from the horrendous events of 911, feeling quite insecure in our country and wondering if something else could happen, my fiance tells me we are going to the Michigan vs Michigan State game on November 3rd, 2011. Excuse my shorthand french...WTF!

Are you kidding me? One of the biggest games of the year. A stadium of 100,000 or more is a perfect target. No f-ing way am I going to that.

He gives me the "you can't live in fear" speech and convinces me it will be ok. I was SERIOUSLY nervous about going. I did NOT like the idea. At least we'd be together. We went.

We had bad tickets in the nose bleed section on the East side of the field. I felt a little more secure knowing that it was restricted airspace over all stadiums in the country. A No-Fly Zone. Every so often, though, I scanned the skyline. Honestly! Paranoia or what?

It was early in the game, the sky was blue and clear, when I (and many others) noticed a plane miles away in the distance heading East. I joked and I am sure others thought it or joked as well, "what if that plane came close to here?" I couldn't take my eyes off of it.

My breathing got a little heavier as it made it's way East just south of the stadium. How weird is that? I questioned Paul. I thought you said this was a no fly zone. He watched with me reassuring me that it is no big deal.

Closer and closer. Everyone seemed to get fidgety. I could hear others questioning what the plane was doing.

A couple miles from the stadium it veered North East right toward our seats. Remember, we were in the nose bleed seats. My heart was racing, the stands were silent where we sat. It was headed directly toward our seats. My nose got tingly with oncoming tears of fear.

Honey....honey! HONEY! What is he doing? There was no sound coming from the upper deck stands. Everyone held their breath.

At that moment in time, an image flashed in my mind. I always wondered what a horrible feeling it would have been to be sitting your office one morning  and look out the window to see a plane coming at you.  Do you run? Do you just sit there in shock?

I had a glimpse into what that felt like. We had NO where to go. We couldn't run. We couldn't hide. We almost had to accept what was happening and hold our breath.  Deer in headlights.

Just as we thought we had met our fate, the Northwest airplane veered North and flew down the middle of the field and then veered West back where it came.

Literally we could see people in the windows of the plane. It was the most frightening moment of my life. Really. I wasn't the only one. People started crying. Grown men left the stadium quite shaken. 1/4 of the people in the stands left. Believe me, I wanted to leave. My ride didn't.

I was unsettled, obviously, the rest of the game. Later my husband told me that he was afraid too but didn't want to scare me more.

The biggest impact it had on me that day, was being able to see through the eyes of the thousands of people who lost their lives on that fateful day.

I searched high and low for an article online about this event. I couldn't find anything. I was beginning to wonder if anyone saw what we saw. Finally after variations of wording in the Google search, I found this article about the event which verifies what happened and that we weren't the only ones who were startled (to say the least) by the plane. It sums it up well.

Northwest Airlines Plane buzzes Spartan Stadium

Chapter 41: Redefining Amber (Again)

Now that all of my three beautiful children are in school all day, it is just me, all day, every day. Who am I now? Lots of time to figure that out.

I have reinvented and redefined myself many times in my life. I have embraced every change and decided what each chapter of my life is about.

God knows my chapters have had their villains and their struggles that make me who I am today. Even the bad ones helped me grow and learn. It took some soul searching sometimes but, like peeling an onion, I had to find the core to know why I needed to go through what I have gone through. Like peeling an onion, I cried a lot too.

 But I've also had many glorious, fun, exciting and captivating chapters, too. Ones with laughter and adventure, ones with love and romance and ones with giggles and little toes.

Now I am going to decide what this chapter is about. It is about Amber the mom (always important), Amber the wife (always important), Amber the author, Amber the speaker (never thought I'd be that), Amber being healthy (40 and fabulous comes with a price....a gym membership) and Amber philanthropist.

So, I will figure out what all that means, embrace it and show my kids that life has chapters that make us interesting. If your chapter isn't a happy one,  try to rewrite it or make it a short chapter and start a new one.

Life is like a box of chocolates. Some are creamy and chewy and dreamy and some are, well, filled with scary fruit or nougaty stuff (though that may be your happy chocolate). I just take a bite, spit it out if i don't like it and try again.

Life is like a box of chocolates - you never know what you're going to get. Forrest Gump in "Forrest Gump" (1994)

A Labor (Day) of Love

I have the greatest husband and father to my children. He takes the brunt of the wild child attacks. He risks serious injury child tossing (not a mommy-approved game) and this weekend (like many before), he spent hours upon hours in the waters of Lake Erie being the anchor and life saver on a huge island raft with our three children.

As I sat on an Adirondack chair, taking in the fresh air, listening to the waves and thanking the good Lord it wasn't me on the raft, I felt a little left out. It was my fault. I have a slight phobia of the water, especially lake water or big water.

It makes me nervous.

It feels dirty to me (I am not a germaphobe). It's sandy and seaweedy and the bottom feels weird.

There are creatures in there I can't see.

I'm a wimp.

I did go out on it the first day, gameface and all. My husband dragged us waaaay out. It wasn't deep but it still made me very uncomfortable. It sounds weird. I felt like I couldn't just go in if i wanted to without a long trek through God knows what.

I fell in once and made a forced laughing and panicky scramble back on. That was the moment my husband realized how I really felt about it. He doesn't get it but he was sweet about it.

I've always had fears of water. I can swim. I don't like anyone attacking me in the water. Some people do like it. I've seen it....from the shore because I scramble out of the water as fast as I can when the shananagins begin.

Most of the time, I watched from the shore and waited for the warm towel signal. That's an important job. I am the end of the party hero, right?

So the last full day of our trip was chilly. Not cold. I still had a jacket on and light sweatpants. The kids ran around half naked. After dinner, the kids begged my husband to take them out one more time. He agreed. He's the hero. I'm the towel girl. Phhfft.

He grabbed the kids and the raft, took a deep breath as he began the final trek into the sea of frolicking chilly fun whilst I grabbed my book, A Place of Yes by Bethenny Frankel, which I am purposefully reading sooo slowly because I like it so much and I don't want to finish it. I plopped down on my plastic orange Adirondack chair (which is the smartest kind of chair- you don't have to paint it) and chose to read and watch the fun. With giggles and laughter they headed out to the deep (not so deep).

I began to read about Bethenny's motherhood experiences and advice, most of which I know but sometimes need to be reminded.  As if she were sitting in the chair next to me, she told me that we need to be present in our kids lives. Have fun with them. They know when we aren't paying attention or aren't interested.

I looked around as if someone was watching what I was doing. I looked out at the water. It looked cold. I was so warm. It looked seaweedy and dirty. I was clean.  It looked like they didn't care if I was out there. They probably do care.

I hummed and hawed about how much I didn't want to go in. They wouldn't take notice. I should go in. For them. They want me to go in. But I don't like it. But they do. They would laugh and love it if I did. Go in. Go in! GO IN!

I slipped out of the chair, ran up to the house, tried to change my mind before I changed my clothes. I covered up my suit to surprise them....or so I could change my mind. I ran down. Then I turned around and ran back up because I forgot my water shoes. Ucky-muck on the bottom (its actually really sandy and nice).

I ran down, disrobed and ran for my life into the water like Bethenny was chasing me in. In a "place of yes". Yes, yes....cold water, no, no....YES!  Would Bethenny go in? I'd make her.

There was laughing and screaming as I ran in toward them. "Mama is coming! Yaay!" They were happy I was coming. I knew they would be. We all laughed and splashed and had a great time. They all thanked me for coming out.

I saw the flip side of not wanting to do something because I'd be uncomfortable.  I saw joy and memories. It was worth fifteen minutes of cold and discomfort (thank God Matthew got cold and needed mama to take him in). I sucked it up. Houseys don't wimp out.