Suprise Adventures

You know that cabin fever has gotten the best of you when you find yourself wistfully daydreaming about childbirth because it will get you out of the house for a few days. I'm coming to accept that small, frequent outings are the cost of mental health maintenance for an extroverted stay-at-home-mom and her extroverted children. It's something we are simply hardwired to need.

Last night we went on what our family likes to call a Surprise Adventure. Surprise Adventures are exercises in spontenaiety. Sometimes Zach and I plan them in advance, notifying the kids only at the last moment, and sometimes we just get up and go with no real idea ourselves of what the outing will bring. Some are big deals, some are a trip to the bakery or a drive in the country. The only rule is that there is no complaining. Adventure is about going with the flow, following where the trail leads you and appreciating the journey. It's not about getting exactly what you wanted or planned.

Last night kids had taken their baths and were ready to get dressed for bed when we told them that instead of putting on their pajamas, we wanted them to get dressed. They excitedly obliged, wondering out loud if they'd need socks or fancy dresses or outdoor gear in an effort to prise some kind of information out of us on where we might be headed.

We piled into the car, the kids guessing which direction it would go and how long it would take us to get there. We arrived at our originally intended destination, a kid-friendly coffee shop in St Paul, where we realized that Daddy had forgotten his wallet. Back in the car. Back to the house. We still had an hour and fifteen minutes before they closed, so we'd be fine. The kids stayed postive.

When we arrived back at the coffee shop we found, to our dismay, that it had inexplicably closed an hour early. Deep breaths. That is, after all, what Surprise Adventures are about, rolling with the punches.

We ended up at Perkins drinking cocoa and eating mozzarella sticks. There is no disappointment, in my experience, that cannot be soothed with deep fried cheese.

Their cocoa, laced with a bit of canned whipped cream, reminded me of a roadtrip I took with my grandparents as a kid from Phoenix to Disneyland and San Diego. It was the first time I ever had hot chocolate with whipped cream. I told them how we arrived in San Diego at night and my grandparents couldn't find our hotel.

I kept seeing the sign for the hotel exit, only to be sushed repeatedly because of course, the grown-ups were talking. After half an hour of searching and an accidental intrusion onto a military base, we ended up at a run down motel with a hole in the wall diner attached that served what to my memory is still the best hot chocolate I have ever tasted. My sister and I drank four cups of it while my grandparents and great-aunts griped about having to stay at this low rent motel. I told them I had seen the sign for the other hotel six times only to be scolded, "well why didn't you tell us?"

One story lead to another, from Zach's first taste of cocoa with whipped cream (in which an entire can of whipped cream was obliterated) to the kid's own memories about our travels with them and finally, on to plans of future travel and places we wanted to see. Physically our adventure took us about five miles from our house, but it had all the effect of a vacation to far flung places.

We got home two hours after their bedtime, both of the older kids asleep in the back seat, the baby, who is made of steel, still wide awake for the moment. And the coffee shop we originally intended to go to? That is now today's adventure.

Little Things

It is so completely and utterly February. Everyone I know feels it. I feel it, Zach feels it, the kids feel it. There's a heaviness in my brain and in my step and I find myself fighting hibernation, struggling to find the right balance between quiet and activity. I am not fooled by the predictions of a certain rodent in Pennsylvania (Punxatawny Phil, you know who you are), six more weeks of winter would be an early spring this far North. That these six weeks coincide with my last six weeks of pregnancy will likely make them move even slower. We won't be out of the woods for a while.

So I'm biding my time, looking for the little things in life that bring contentment. I woke up this morning thinking I had overslept. It was brighter outside than my circadian clock believed it should be at 7AM, but 7AM it was. The light is returning. The sky was streaked with pink and it was clearly morning.

Zach was out the door and I had a full cup of coffee before anyone spoke to me. Bliss.

Beauty

Beauty is a need, not a luxury. It took me a really long time to realize that and I'm not sure why. I think it's because like most modern day city dwellers, when I thought about "beauty" I associated it with something that could be purchased and owned. A beautiful dress or beautiful things for my house, even a bouquet of flowers from the Farmer's Market. When money is tight (which it perpetually is) it's hard for my practical side to justify purchases that don't have immediate and concrete value.

The problem is that when I am starved of beauty, I am starved in spirit. I get listless, restless and a little depressed. Then I rebel, and usually that involves thoughtless spending that doesn't actually make the problem any better. A cup of coffee while I'm out running errands or a dinner out because I'm cranky and don't want to cook. I'm impatient and occasionally, unkind.

The reason I have associated beauty with purchase and posession, I think, is a longing for permance, a reminder that my soul is made for an eternity this world just doesn't offer. Beauty is a source of hope, comfort and inspiration as I tread on the sometimes difficult journey towards home. It's a gift from God to sustain me on the path, and it doesn't come with a price tag if I am willing to accept it as it comes, in nature, in a gift from a friend or a in a new point of view. Seeking it and recognizing it instead of forcing it. Trusting that tomorrow will bring a different sort of beauty and new experiences that bring me ever closer to home.

Home as Sanctuary- Nourishment for Body and Soul

I've been meditating on what it means to create a sense of "sanctuary" in the home. As I said before, with a large family full of tiny children, it's not going to be a quiet, contemplative atmosphere. I don't even think I'd want that. I love the adventure and life that young children bring into a home, the unbridled creativity and humour.

No, if it's going to last, a sense of sanctuary has to be based in reality and it has to be durable. It has to leave room for people to be themselves. We need sanctuary the most when life is the most chaotic and difficult, when sanctuary is the most difficult to maintain.

I think the building blocks of sanctuary are these; nourishment for the soul, nourishment for the body, and of course, a strong connection to God, the sustaining hand that holds us through all of life's ups and downs. Healthy, delicious food shared with people we love, fresh air, rest, prayer, affection, creativity, beauty, selflessness, rhythm, routine and tradition are just a few good things that come to mind. Some of them, many of them, actually, are good for both body and soul.

With this in mind I have decided to start simply by working on cultivating beauty, nourishing my family with good healthy foods, getting outdoors for some fresh air every day, rain or shine, giving real time and attention to our creative endeavours and spending more time in prayer both for myself and with my family.

Year of Hospitality

Last Saturday was the beginning of a new year for me, my 32nd (or is it my 33rd? Yes, I suppose it is.) and with it the beginning of a new intention. This year is to be my Year of Hospitality.

I've been praying and meditating on this theme for a month or so now. It's a departure from my usual pattern, which is to choose a virtue I struggle with and spend a year cultivating it. Hospitality is actually something of a spiritual gift for me, but it's something I feel called to make better use of. This year, instead of just focusing on personal growth I am embarking on a larger project, to sow the seeds of hospitality in my home and community and watch it grow.

I've settled on a four part plan for this year, each part of which I will elaborate on further in future posts.

1. Create a sense of sanctuary for my family. This includes myself. In order to have something to give to the world, we first need a space where we can be renewed and uplifted. I'm not naive enough to think that with three adults, three kids and another baby on the way I'm going to create some kind of quiet, contemplative environment where we can all meditate on the mysteries of life. Four kids under seven years old and under is nothing if not a recipe for a busy house. What I do want is a space that feeds us, physically, emotionally and spiritually.

2. Invite others into that space. I want this to be a place where friends and family, especially the kids' friends, feel welcome and comfortable. As a friend pointed out to me, all kids really need a neighborhood of moms and dads. That is something I grew up with and the benefits of it have been huge in my life. I want to pay that forward.

3. Spread that sense of "home" into the larger community. I talked last winter about my plans for strengthening my community and since then a lot of progress has been made. I think as this process unfolds some really amazing things are going to happen.

4. Expanding that neighborhood good will and kindness to the world at large. Maybe we can "adopt" soldiers to send care packages to, or raise money to build wells in third world countries. I want my family and community to see everyone on earth as "neighbors". In this digital age, that is more true than ever before.

I have an excellent feeling about the coming year.

Now We Are Six

"Can you believe I'm six?!" I've heard that sentance at least a hundred times today and no, I cannot believe she is six. In honour of her sixth birthday Miss Cheyenne wanted to make a chocolate layer cake with purple frosting. Yes, there is purple frosting under all of that. She and Bella spent the whole morning decorating it themselves. Not fans of the minimalist school of cake decorating, obviously, but I think it's a job well done. It makes me happy, anyway.

Stephanie Saves the World Part One

Image courtesy of http://www.flickr.com/photos/wwworks/ / CC BY 2.0
'>Nasa Space Center

Thanks to my recent foray into local (micro?) politics I'm doing a lot of daydreaming about what the world would be like if I were Queen. Wouldn't it be fun if we could take this broken economy and turn it into something cool?

Not that anyone necessarily cares, but here are a few thoughts I've been having.

First, after reading Shannon Hayes' article in the Simple Living Newsletter I am really enamored of the concept of Radical Homemaking. It's a concept I have practiced for years, but never had a name for. Essentially the idea is that radical homemakers (and these are both men and women) see the family as the central unit of life instead of the workplace. In many cases both parents work at home and the home is, in a sense, a microbusiness, not just a place where consumer goods come to die. There is cooperation and interdependence as all members of the family use their extensive domestic skills to keep costs for the family's needs low and, in some cases, to produce goods and services to support the family. My favourite quote from the article, "she who doesn't need the gold can change the rules" succunctly encapsulates my feelings about Simple Living.

While the article seems to focus largely on farming families (my friends the Dervaes' of Path to Freedom urban homestead are an excellent example of this, it seems to me that there are a wide variety of jobs that can be done from home.

It has always baffled me that there isn't more talk of telecommuting in "green" circles. Even more than public transportation (which I love beyond reason as I hate driving) telecommuting has the potential to not only reduce the number of vehicles on the road, but to change the the communities we live in for the better. Telecommuting, in effect, reduces a vast redundancy of resources.

From the business side, telecommuting greatly reduces overhead, eliminating the need for huge office buildings that need to be lighted, heated, cooled and plumbed.

From a government standpoint, it lessens the need for ever larger roadways, since a large number of vehicles are off the road and rush hour bottlenecks are no longer an issue.

From a worker standpoint, telecommuting, at the very least, eliminates driving expenses, reduces wardrobe expenses, shaves the nearly four hours per week of commute time the average worker spends in transit and allows greater flexibility in the home.

The communities in which people live benefit because people are home more and have more ability to invest in the place in which they live, and people have greater flexibility in choosing where they live when they are not tied down to a specific location for work. I think this has the potential to really revitalize neighborhoods and smaller communities, possibly creating smaller, more connected walkable and bikeable communities and making public transportation within a community a much easier and less expensive to implement. Community services and small businesses would likely have much more support in this model of community too.

Anyway, that is Step One of my daydream and from my vantage point, my community is getting ready to take hold of that vision, or one similar to it, and run with it.