Thank God...

What We Are Thankful For...

I'm thankful for my family...my husband, my children, our parents and grandparents, siblings and in-laws, nieces and nephews, cousins and friends.

These three are my WHY...thankful every day for their health and happiness!

Oh - and I'm thankful that DUKE men's bball team is FUN TO WATCH this year :)

I'm thankful for our Lil' Turkey!

Carrine has made me smile every day for the past 20+ months.

I'm thankful for my hilarious husband who makes me laugh when I just want to shake my head and stomp my feet. He keeps life fun.

Happy MOVEMBER!!

Roslyn is thankful for her "Fimaly" and her "Skool."

Andray said he's thankful for the Farm and his sisters.

I'm also thankful for the school our kids attend.

SMHOC is incredible.

I'm thankful for my Gram, her health and her pure determination to continue to live on her farm at the young age of 87 years.

I'm thankful for my husband's support.

God has a plan and it truly is HIS PLAN!

I'm thankful that Christ is a part of our family's every day life.

Life has changed our family for the better the past 2 years and I am THANKFUL!

Hope you all have a blessed Thanksgiving weekend with your families.

Lots To Be Thankful For...

The "Luxury" of Being a Stay-at-Home Parent...

Being a Stay-at-Home Parent Is a Luxury … for Your Spouse

BY CHAUNIE BRUSIE | 

The other day, I read an article in the Washington Post about a stay-at-home mother who was having a rather hard time adjusting to answering the ever-popular question, “What do you do all day?” now that the kids were at school.

It’s a topic that has been on my mind lately as I watch in bewilderment as my children seem to insist on growing up at rates that surely I did not approve of when I signed my parental contract. I look at my youngest — my seven-week-old baby girl — and I swear my mind is already flashing to the day (tomorrow, probably) that I will be kissing her good-bye on her first morning of kindergarten.

But back to the task at hand. As I read the article, I scrolled through the comments, anticipating that there would be some doozies in a post about a stay-at-home mom basically proclaiming that she doesn’t feel guilty for doing absolutely nothing all day when I came across this truly remarkable comment:

“I work full time, and my husband is a stay at home dad. We have two kids in school full day (8 to 3). Don’t you realize how much easier it is to hold a full time job when you have someone home with the kids? I can work late and travel when I need to and not worry about the kids. Our weekends are spent relaxing, instead of racing around to get errands and chores done. I can go back to work on Mondays having actually recharged over the weekend. It feels like such a luxury to ME to have a stay at home spouse.”

I was flabbergasted.

Dumbfounded.

Perplexed that in all of my years as a stay-at-home/write-at-home mom, I’ve always been fighting the thoughts that I’m not doing enough or being enough. I’ve always felt I honestly owed the world some sort of explanation for being at home. That I’ve had to throw around the fact that since I stay at home we make sacrifices as a family — like not having cable! I’ve felt I had to bake pies so that the world would know I’m not a worthless member of society. And in the midst of all that mental clutter and guilt it had never, ever crossed my mind that staying at home wasn’t “just” a luxury to me …

But also a luxury for my husband.

And suddenly, when I read those words, it all made sense. Well, of course, it would be a luxury to the spouse who works out of the home to have a partner who stays at home with the children. Someone who is always there to take care of the inevitable days of sickness, arrange the doctor’s appointments, make sure the cupboards are stocked, and heck, to ensure that no one steals the FedEx package off of the porch. And then — goodness! — to have someone to save you the worry of sending your kids into the world, someone to always be there to kiss a scraped knee and take care of the potty training and maybe even have a hot meal waiting for you when you come home?

Imagine that.

I realized, in a rush of amazement, that I had spent all of our marriage feeling just a tad bit guilty for being the one who “gets” to stay home. I’ve pushed away the shame of staying snuggled up in my warm covers in the morning while my husband trudged off to work in the snow and I’ve felt the absurd need to pack a million and ten activities into my day so I could list them off to my husband when he came home in an attempt to convince (who really? Mostly myself …) that I was “productive.”

I realized, for the first time ever, that I didn’t have anything to prove. That I had been working so hard to work from home and always have it spotless and do all my educational activities with the kids because it was my job and I’d better darn do a good job of it if my husband had to work, that I never stopped to consider that my being home with our children could actually be a gift to my husband.

I’m actually writing this very article on a rare morning “off,” courtesy of my husband having the day off of his work. I’m sitting in a café, writing for the two hours between my daughter’s feedings. And, in fact, I just now called my husband, who had volunteered to be me for the day so I could work, to ask him what his thoughts were on the topic and to ask if he would give me a quote to include for the piece.

In the background, I heard my daughter crying, the two-year-old whining at his leg, and the four-year-old singing happily at the top of her lungs, having just returned home from preschool pick-up. I pictured the scene I had left this morning — four loads of laundry left undone from the weekend, the house a complete disaster, eggs still caked on the pan from breakfast. Sweetly, I asked him for a quote — did he ever consider me staying home a gift to him?

“What?!” he asked frantically, desperation creeping into his voice. “I don’t know, do I have to give you a quote right now? I mean, she’s crying and I’m trying to make mac and cheese and if I could just pick her up maybe she’d stop crying and …” he trailed off, seemingly too overwhelmed to finish his train of thought.

I smiled — a bit too smugly, I’ll admit. Because I think I had my answer. Being me for the day isn’t so easy. And having him there so that I could be elsewhere working … well, it really was a luxury. And a gift.

I'm so thankful I had the opportunity to be a full-time stay-at-home parent last year. It was the most challenging and yet most rewarding job I've ever had in my life - and it had nothing to do with monetary rewards. I miss this crew during the week days and God-willing I'll have another opportunity to be home full-time again. Until then - hats off to all stay-at-home parents - you are ROCK STARS!

10 Tips for Becoming a Happier Person - per the Pope!

The Pope Just Released A List of 10 Tips for Becoming a Happier Person and They Are Spot On

 July 31, 2014  Mbiyimoh Ghogomu  273 comments

In a recent interview with the Argentine publication Viva, Pope Francis issued a list of 10 tips to be a happier person, based on his own life experiences.

The Pope gives a thumbs up to an audience in St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican. (Photo: CSV)

The Pope encouraged people to be more positive and generous, to turn off the TV and find healthier forms of leisure, and even to stop trying to convert people to one’s own religion.

But his number one piece of advice came in the form of a somewhat cliche Italian phrase that means, “move forward and let others do the same.” It’s basically the Italian equivalent of, “live and let live.” You can check out the full list below.

The Pope’s 10 Tips for a Happier Life

1. “Live and let live.” Everyone should be guided by this principle, he said, which has a similar expression in Rome with the saying, “Move forward and let others do the same.”

2. “Be giving of yourself to others.” People need to be open and generous toward others, he said, because “if you withdraw into yourself, you run the risk of becoming egocentric. And stagnant water becomes putrid.”

3. “Proceed calmly” in life. The pope, who used to teach high school literature, used an image from an Argentine novel by Ricardo Guiraldes, in which the protagonist — gaucho Don Segundo Sombra — looks back on how he lived his life.

4. A healthy sense of leisure. The Pope said “consumerism has brought us anxiety”, and told parents to set aside time to play with their children and turn of the TV when they sit down to eat.

5. Sundays should be holidays. Workers should have Sundays off because “Sunday is for family,” he said.

6. Find innovative ways to create dignified jobs for young people. “We need to be creative with young people. If they have no opportunities they will get into drugs” and be more vulnerable to suicide, he said.

7. Respect and take care of nature. Environmental degradation “is one of the biggest challenges we have,” he said. “I think a question that we’re not asking ourselves is: ‘Isn’t humanity committing suicide with this indiscriminate and tyrannical use of nature?’”

8. Stop being negative. “Needing to talk badly about others indicates low self-esteem. That means, ‘I feel so low that instead of picking myself up I have to cut others down,’” the Pope said. “Letting go of negative things quickly is healthy.”

9. Don’t proselytise; respect others’ beliefs. “We can inspire others through witness so that one grows together in communicating. But the worst thing of all is religious proselytism, which paralyses: ‘I am talking with you in order to persuade you,’ No. Each person dialogues, starting with his and her own identity. The church grows by attraction, not proselytising,” the Pope said.

10. Work for peace. “We are living in a time of many wars,” he said, and “the call for peace must be shouted. Peace sometimes gives the impression of being quiet, but it is never quiet, peace is always proactive” and dynamic.

Courtesy of the Catholic News Service.

Winter is not the inconvenience...

Winter is not the inconvenience. Winter's temperatures and call for slowing down, going within and taking good care to tread with mindfulness upon ice and snow are only physical and spiritual calls for us to change our pace.

This is a pace we often cannot sustain within the frenzy of stress, work and family and so we turn with a vengeance on winter, who quietly keeps insisting that our internal chaos is a personal season of disengagement from self often magnified when the ease of movement and warmth of temperature slip away.

So, I challenge all of you to try to see this time less as an exhausting pilgrimage of wrangling toddlers in to snow suits, scraping car windows, lamenting horrible commutes- these are realities we have constructed. Winter only asks for space to be, to let the earth rest, to ask us to rest. Without winter, spring would not descend upon us with such vibrant and deeply sensory joy! We would not know the true brilliance of sunshine and birdsong and green growth.

When you breathe in the white quiet, watch the snow fall, play in the yard with children whose giggles tumble over each other to the point you are smiling, when you take one more breath for patience with those struggling to adjust due to differing abilities to be in this time or shovel the walkway of another's home- you are accessing the full beauty of this season. And, like all seasons, it and its memories pass.

Try to find the blessing winter brings. It's there, quiet and still, far away from the human-made madness. It is there in the snowbanks, young ones' delight, the hot soup and chocolate and the slowing down. It is there as we lend a hand to a young parent with no help and little ones to get somewhere or a stranded neighbor whose car skidded out and needs to be pushed back on the road. Find the beauty.

Written by Heather Kamia

Happy Veterans' Day...

Happy Veteran's Day to all the men and women who have served, currently are serving or will serve to protect our country.

Especially to my Dad...my Hero.  THANK YOU for all the sacrifices you've made for our country and family - wish we could be with you today.

The big kids made Dad some patriotic stars to hang in his office.

God Bless the USA

Way to go Ashtin!

Last night Jake and I drove down to the Xcel Energy Center to watch our flowergirl, Ashtin, play volleyball for the Marshall Tigers in the State Tournament!

So proud of her - she has her mom's verticle and soft hands on the right side. Starting varsity as a sophomore and playing in the State Tourney - pretty awesome.

They got the big win in three straight sets and are just 2 wins away from a State Title.

I would've given anything to make it to the State Tournament with a team sport in high school.

So pumped we got to watch Ashtin play last night and see the entire Hmielewski family.

Bonus - Jake's alma mater ROCORI was also playing the state vball tourney. So we got to see his sister and our other flower girl (and niece) Skyler before heading back home.

Despite the loss last night, good luck to the Spartans in the rest of the tourney.

A huge THANK YOU to my parents who made the trip up to St. Cloud to watch the kids. Dad was missing the kids and last-minute they decided to head up to town.

Was a perfect excuse for a date night for Jake and I.

Andray made my parent's night by making them this sign. Love how he's sounding out words.

Have a great weekend everyone! More volleyball to cheer on!

Strong Words from a Strong Man...

Fitting to read during election week in the U.S.

Wish we had more leaders like Abraham Lincoln in our world today!

Proud of Our Little Man...

Last week Andray read the "Introduction" for the 1st graders' mass...he had the entire introduction memorized. We were very proud of him. No doubt, St. Mary's school is the best place for our kids. Very thankful. 

Always in need of Prayers...

Be thankful for every day we get here on earth with our children!

It's Time for Husky Hot Shots Again...

The big kids were excited for Husky Hot Shots to start again last weekend!

Fun to watch how they've grown and improved in the last 3 years.

They have a lot more confidence.

Roslyn (aka - our social butterfly) loves talking to the women's basketball players. 

Carrine of course wants to be on the court with the big kids.

She's got a couple more years to wait.

He's got my form ;)

Love that basketball season is among us...T minus 130 days until MARCH MADNESS :)

Halloween Highlights...

Another Halloween is in the Books!

Batman, Tigger and Elsa ruled the neighborhood Friday night.

In all honesty, Friday night was a lot of fun until Carrine had her meltdown near 8 pm clear on the opposite side of the neighborhood.

I think the entire neighborhood could hear her screaming on the stroller ride home ;)

The big kids were so excited to Trick-or-Treat!

Frank-ly Speaking...I love Halloween!

Bought this shirt the fall before I had Andray - mainly because it had "Frank" in the title.

Glad all 3 kiddos got to wear it.

Mama Bear and Honey Bear

Was pretty comical dressing up as the Berenstain Bear Family.

Carrine just before heading out to Trick-or-Treating...so far so good as Tigger!

Nearly impossible to get a good picture of our trio.

Oh well - can you tell Carrine was ready to go outside?

Absolutely love the way Roslyn's costume turned out!

Beautiful Elsa with her hair braided to the side and train to complete the dress.

This was one excited 5-year-old little girl on Friday night!

All ready for Trick-or-Treating!

Was a beautiful, yet brisk, evening.

Walking behind Roslyn all evening couldn't help but make me think of her future wedding day.

At least I have 20 years to prepare for that :)

Our awesome neighbor kids...Anna, Elsa and Ninja :)

Carrine had had ENOUGH by 8 pm! I don't blame her one bit, it got cold by the end of the evening.

(This picture just cracks me up!)

She did great Trick-or-Treating for her first time though.

Her pink pumpkin bucket was glued to her left hand and she figured out very quickly how to get candy and say Thank You for it - was a fun experience. 

Bummed we didn't get to see the Frank cousins for Halloween.

Hard to believe our beautiful niece Isabel will turn 8 years old in a few weeks!

Baby Louis had a blast on his 1st Halloween :)

Seriously...can any baby get cuter than him?!

And our gorgeous Goddaughter Miss Amelia Mae - Halloween is by far her favorite holiday!

On Sunday the Stang cousins got together for their annual Halloween picture!

Nine is Fine!

Andray with his only boy cousin on the Stang side...Easton James (aka Teenage Mutan Ninja Turtle!)

Love these boys!

Carrine didn't last long in the cousin photo shoot :)

Miss Marvelous Mya  - so pretty and so grown up!

And beautiful lil' Emery the Angel - so sweet.

Had a great Halloween - lots of daycare/school/family parties. The kids are at a "perfect" age for Halloween!

Roslyn's costume was by far my most favorite costume that our kids have had. My mom used left-over material from our wedding to make Roslyn's train. I bought felt snow flakes and glued them on the bottom of the train.

Roz was "one in a million" Elsa's for Halloween this year...literally :)