Meeting Ryan Chalmers of Push Across America

Our family has grown to be huge fans of wheel chair athletics. It started with noticing athletes training on Windsor Road with orange warning flags flying high.

When the Illinois Marathon began several years ago, we got especially excited to see them in action, even though it meant getting up extra early as they are the first to leave the starting line. We're so not early risers here, friends, so you know we love these guys.

Last summer we had the privilege of meeting several paralympians face to face and geting autographs, touching real medals, and trying out a real racing wheelchair!  One paralympian we got to meet was Ryan Chalmers. What a sweetheart! As with the rest of the team, he took time to chat the kids, answer their questions and listen to their encouragement about us watching on our computer and cheering from afar.

Yesterday we met Ryan for another huge event: his arrival to Champaign-Urbana on his trek across the country in his racing wheelchair called Push Across America. We waited about an hour at DRES, but Vinny's Pizza helped pass the time and as did running around on the shaded grassy area. Just about when I thought we might not be able to wait any longer, we heard and saw a campus police motorcycle leading Ryan and many other Illini wheelchair athletes down Oak St. We were thrilled. I couldn't contain my fist pumping. Even Mae was announcing "Ryan coming!"

The kids were eager to ask him questions and Ryan was super gracious again. Bean wondered if he crossed any bridges. Tey wondered if he got cold because it was breezy. Meanwhile, I was chatting with Ryan's coach Adam Bleakney, who is a friend from Bean's preschool days as both our sons attended the same school. WCIA caught this picture of us at the time. Yay, a pic of me with my old school glasses on! Allergy season sucks, but I digress.

Before we left, Ryan agreed to pose for a picture with Bean (the other kids were too shy). Bean really looks up to him and blogged about meeting him. When Ryan was on the radio today, Bean e-mailed in this additional questions. "What do you find difficult and what do you enjoy?" He loved that Ryan remembered him and answered his questions on the air!

Tomorrow Ryan pushes out again, and we plan to be up early to cheer him on as he leaves Urbana and heads east. This young man and all wheelchair athletes totally inspire me. They are great reminders to me about the importance of setting goals and not focusing on what you CAN'T do, but on what you CAN do when you set your heart on something. For myself and being a homeschool mom, I appreciate that message. Thanks, Ryan and best wishes!

Priceless Christmas 2012

Better late then never: Christmas post. So why and I posting this now? We just finished hosting our first Safe Families child and it brought to the forefront of my mind how nourishing to a child's development it is to be in an environment marked by peace and joy. And cuz I've been busy, aiight, and this was mostly written.
...

Bo and I challenged ourselves this year to have a priceless Christmas. We wanted it to be filled with happy family memories, but didn't think that needed to cost anything. It's not because we can't afford to, but because we didn't want to participate in a lot of the commercialism, consumerism and stress that can surround the holidays that are supposed to be characterized by peace and joy.

We are blessed to have extended family who give gifts to our children for Christmas. In fact, there generally is an abundance and outpouring of generosity throughout the year but especially for Christmas, birthdays and Chinese New Year. We truly appreciate this demonstration of love. It gives our children something tangible to enjoy while remembering a loved one who cares so much about them that they spent their hard-earned money on presents our children would like. So it's not like our children are lacking in what has become the traditional gifts of Christmas.

So how did we come to this practice of giving gifts at Christmas anyway? From a Christian perspective, I wrestled this past season with the tradition of gift giving at Christmas. Is it because the wisemen gave gifts to Jesus? But, they were scholars and from a distant land who did not know Jesus personally nor did they interact with him ever again. They gave him extravagant gifts mostly for symbolism of who he was. Is it because God gave us the gift of Jesus? That was the most perfect gift! There's no competing with that. This year, I was more reflective on what Mary's gift was to Jesus, as she was his mother. Mary is a rockstar. Her life gets completely turned upside down, and still she maintains her cool. Peaceful. Joyful. You can't buy that. You can't wrap that.

Being their mom and the #1 person around them the most, I'm in a very unique position to give my children the three priceless gifts that no one else can give as much as I can: attention, affection and appreciation (thanks, Facebook, for the inspiration). Isn't that what all kids want from their parents the most?

Starting in the month of December, I laid the attention, affection, and appreciation on thick for my kids and we experience more peace and joy in this house than ever before. People feel listened to, loved and like they have a special and unique contribution to our family and the world, so there's a whole lot more getting along and fun. It's like magic, but it does take a lot of intentionality and patience...at least for me. It was a change I wanted to make to our home life not just for Christmas, but for our lifetimes because I want my children to remember that kind of mom and that kind of home and not just what I put under the tree.

So yes, we did put gifts under the tree too, but they were few and from the heart. They had minimal cost, but lots of love went into making them.

You can kinda get an idea of the sparseness of the gifts under the three here. This includes our family gifts as well as what my side of the family gave to the children (more on that later).

Bean and I made dough for cinnamon rolls and Tey a I baked them for Christmas breakfast. He learned how to make orange icing. The secret is in the zest! 

I made Mae a button monogram. Look how cute she is saying "M."
I got the buttons cheap from  the I.D.E.A. store and some from a generous friend.

Bo drew a snowy owl for Tey. I love their expressions of awe. 

A couple months ago Bean asked me to draw him a tiger. I took 5 seconds and drew him a cartoon one in markers.  I didn't know until later that he also asked Jon to do one and the result for Christmas was this. My husband never ceases to amaze me with his talents and his dedication to our kids. 

Tey learned to read this year, so I made some  bookmarks of some of his favorite books with the scrap paper from their book jackets.  This will be a encouragement to me too to keep reading to him a bunch. 

For Bo, the younger two and I made carmel corn from Bean's Boy Scout popcorn that were just popping kernels. 

Jon helped the kids make me marshmallows

Mae is the official taste-tester. Yum...soft, pillowy, sweetness, and the marshmallows aren't bad either!!

I also made Bean a shadowbox that holds his Tae Kwon Do belts that he's earned so far (white, yellow, orange and green. I wanted him to know how proud of him I am of his hard work with that and before this they just laid in his closet. Bo made me the most delicious brownies in the world and though I've been sharing, I think I've eaten half the pan just myself. A chocolate treat is a great motivator during the day :) I think Bean spent the most money this Christmas. He bought got everyone but me used books from the Urbana Free Library Book sale.

Mae loved her new book, which was in the style of some others she has. Tey immediately started reading his book. For Bo he picked out an AWESOME vintage edition of all of John James Audobon's paintings. It was perfect because just last week as Bo was finishing his animal drawings for the kids he was contemplating what it was like for JJA to draw all those birds. 

...
Months later, looking back, I'm so glad we challenged ourselves to do this. We can see the HUGE positive results for our family dynamic, which has helped prepare us to be available to share our peace and joy with another child, if only for a couple weeks. Hosting a Safe Families child reminded me the importance of loving and secure relationships in the lives of children, regardless of amount of their possessions or toys. 

Becoming a Partner with Safe Families

It's so much easier to blog about the little new things going on in our lives that document the huge changes that are taking place.

Our newest biggest thing is that we just finished our application process, background check, interview, home inspection, reference check, and training to become a Safe Family. Safe Families for Children is a Christian ministry of Biblical hospitality that serves local families in crisis situations. We will be opening our home to children who need a temporary place to stay while their parents get back on their feet. The parents voluntarily place the children in our care while they work through illness, addiction, job loss, or any other number of struggles, and they do so with the help of Safe Families programs, staff and volunteers.

We first heard about Safe Familes about a year ago at church. At that point, we had only recently decided to homeschool, but after some thought, prayer, and conversation, it was clear that this was something that God was calling us to do too. It wasn't until this summer, however, that we got the ball rolling on the process. It was also right after that we decided to make an offer on our current home, so it was a little chaotic with packing and moving very quickly.

This new home offers many more opportunities for hosting children in need, but it also came with additional challenges that were non-issues in our former home. We also had a delay on getting internet here, and then we had an accident that broke my laptop, so our online training got postponed. After these few setbacks it is expected that our file will have its final review very soon and then we'll be contacted anytime after that when there is a child in need that is in our area.

So that's just a quick update on things, but I do hope to fill in some more thoughts and details as time allows. Right, like I expect to have more free time now! Well, in the meantime, your prayers and other support in this new endeavor are most appreciated. We're excited and nervous and everything in between, but are confident that overall and in the end this will be a benefit to all involved!

Animals + Reading + Music = Awesome

If you are on twitter and love science, you've got to follow @sciencegoddess. With over 30,000 followers she's about to the most popular person I know in real life (2nd only to @ahmir, an R&B group my cousin manages and I met at his wedding, yet I digress). I had the pleasure of meeting Joanne at a local tweet-up/girls night out and she was a darling. And smart. And beautiful. And encouraging and resourceful for my homeschooling endeavor. I might have a crush on her.

So today she tweeted about her most recent blog post on Scientific American. Though at the time I just saw the tweet and didn't realize that she had written the article. Later on Pinterest, I saw a homeschooling group pin the same article. Then I knew I had to investigate and I was so glad I did.

Unusual creatures is definitely something our kids love. With Tey at my in-laws, I could only show it to Bean. He was willing to hop out of the bathtub so I could show him the video of the aye-aye on my phone. Of course, then he went right back in but we were able to talk about what we saw, which is recorded on his blog. He's excited to see more videos. I'm requesting that the library buy this book and I'm trying to decide if I should download the music to my phone. I generally like free things, but THIS IS AMAZING. 

I mean, check out this video and his crazy instruments!

Hearst ties together my kids' love of animals, reading and music in a way I've never seen before. Thank you!

Jumping Fun

I heard through the grapevine that some of our friends think my husband and I are so laid back, that in a stressful situation, they ask each other, "What would Mr. and Mrs. Eaglet Trio do?" 

That made my day, because I'm actually a pretty high-strung, impatient, control freak, who often takes life to seriously...but, at least I'm self-aware. 

I'm trying to be more fun. Today I nailed it with the kids and all it took was a blanket,  a camera and their jumpiness. The blanket is to contain them to a certain spot and keep the others away so they don't get hurt. Then I just snapped pictures while they jumped the highest they could or posed their bodies in funny ways. 

Tey is so little and fast, it was hard to capture him in mid-air.

His cheesy smile shows how much fun he had.

I have no idea how he got his body like this and still landed without hurting himself.

Bean was like a little Spiderman. 

If I had a penny for every time I remind him to keep his tongue in his mouth when he jumps...
I told you I'm  high strung. I worry that he will bite his tongue off. 

BINGO! This was the pose he wanted me to capture.  It only look like 50 tries. PE for the day? Check! 

Christmas Eve 2012

This year, we did Christmas Eve at my in-laws. It was slightly chaotic because Bo was playing the band for church and we were trying to meet up with his grandarents and his brothers who were all arriving at different times.

Mae quickly made herself cozy on Great Grandpa's lap while the rest of the food was cooking.

 The food was awesome as usual. My mother-in-law's ham was especially amazing. I made challah bread, and it was ok, it needed more yeast. After we had some Christmas cookies!

  


Our family went off to church for a great service. Tey even sang on stage (usually he either doesn't go, or just stands and doesn't sing). Bean, I think feels too old for this already. Please! He's 6. Actually he's been coming with us to "big church" where he gets to sing each week, which he likes, and he surprisingly get a lot out of the messages. We talk about it a lot more during the week than we did when he used to go to kids' church. After church we returned back to my in-laws for dinner and opening presents.

Bean got a lego set from Grandpa and Grandma, which he built immediately when he got home (right). From Bo's older brother he got a Batman car, which shoots out Batman. He opened that once he as done unwrapping presents and was playing with it. He also got some fun animal gifts from Bo's younger brother: a grow-a-frog, and an ant pod (ant farm type thing pictured left). We are going to send away for the frog next week and the ants we have to wait until warmer weather to collect them from our yard. We'll be doing some studies of the animals too for homeschool.

Tey asked for Domino Rally from his grandparents and he's been playing it with Mae at home in the evenings. His older uncle got him a spy set (right) and he and Bean have been enjoying way too much. It's so cute seeing him in all his spy gear. His younger uncle got him a magnetic drawing thing (left). We're all addicted to that. It's an awesome thing to bring to a restaurant or in the car, and Tey has made good use of it at quiet time too.

Mae has been cooking up a storm for us with a new tea set she got from her grandparents. Bo, in particular plays with her a lot. It's a sight to behold! We haven't had a chance to play with the gifts Bo's older brother gave her. I think she's going to most love the stickers. She's been liking those recently. Bo's younger brother got her a game, which is awesome, because it's easy and fun enough for toddlers to play and it's hard to find something that ALL my kids can play. It's basically like a Simon Says game but it teaches colors, numbers, emotions, animals and other fun stuff. She LOVES the phone she got from her great-grandparents and I love the antique chair they got her. She mostly just tries to stand on it to reach things that we try to keep away from her :/

It was great to see family that we normally don't get to see and most special of all was finally meeting my new nephew! Omigosh, he is so adorable and really smart and fun. Bo and I agreed that that was the best part of Christmas.

Pics of Me

I am never in pictures. That's on purpose. But in going through the last couple weeks of pics on my camera, I found some that I'm be willing to share. These loved ones of mine make me so happy, no wonder I'm smiling so big in all of them!