Day 24 - The Alphabet Book

My RAKs are out of order, but during the school year, I worked on a mini-alphabet scrapbook for my daughter's room mom. It was a gift from the kids in our classroom, all of them telling me what a wonderful room mom she has been throughout the school year. All of the kids posed for one letter in the alphabet and many of them had a great time coming up with creative ways to pose for their letter. Let me tell you, posing for the letter Q was really challenging. The kids had a blast coming up with words for their letter to describe their room mom too...amazing, kind, beautiful, smile, dynamite and zebra. Well, we had a hard time thinking of something with the letter z, so we settled on zeal. It was a great little project and something I probably wouldn't have made for anyone this year. But it was worth it and the kids had me motivated to take on that one extra project. So, if you can manage it and can give from the heart, do something wonderful for someone today. Just do it...even if it's totally out of your comfort zone..because I would have probably just given our room mom a gift card if I wasn't inspired to give from the heart. Until tomorrow, have a great day!

Day 23 - Bitter or Better

I chose bitter. I tried to choose better, but somehow, each time I tried to be a better, I just ended up becoming even more bitter. I thought bitter would get me through my son's last year of elementary school, but it didn't. It just made me turn into the person I thought I could never be...an unhappy, complaining person, who lost faith in the system and lost herself along the way. My bitterness began when I found out my son was in the same classroom as his bully of 5 years. I could go into all the details of how things were not fair, how I fought for him to be removed from the classroom, how I made myself believe that he was in this classroom for a reason, how his bully ended up making him cry most of the school year (especially that time when he made physical contact with my son and I had to make a scene in order for the principal and teacher to know that I meant business about keeping him safe) or how my sweet son, ended up getting a teacher that was not the right fit for him. But I'm going to spare the details because I want to be better. I took that first step when I read this article from Ken Davis. http://www.kendavis.com/connect/an-everyday-choice-that-leads-toward-life-or-death/
I'm not sure if this counts as a RAK, but if you're ever in the same situation, I hope you'll choose to be better.

Day 22 - Fancy Tech Stuff

A couple of months ago, I was in my daughter's class, waiting for a classroom party to begin. I was seated next to another mom playing SUDOKO on her phone. I waited for her to complete her game so I could introduce myself and get to know her a little bit, but that opportunity never came up. By the time she put her phone away, the kids had already started coming into the classroom. So...I thought about all those other lost opportunities to get to know other parents at my child's school. All those times I brought my netbook to work on Girl Scout stuff or cruising the internet on my phone just because I thought it was so cool that I had figured out how to do that all that fancy tech stuff. And I came to the conclusion that just for one day..or two..or three or maybe more, my RAK would be to put all that fancy tech stuff away and look for opportunities to meet other people on campus. It was kind of weird at first, but once I put away my security blanket, I was amazed at all the conversations I had with people and how many things our children had in common. I double dog dare you to try and put away that security blanket of yours whether it's an ipad, iphone or iamholdingsomethinginmyhandssoIcanlookbusy and just talk to somebody. You can start with a hello or a whatz up and see where the conversation goes next. Now, if you have a bad cold or a flu...I would probably wait until you get better. No need to give your new friends a present they won't like. Until tomorrow, have a great day!

Day 21 - Bad Posture

Hard to believe that bad posture can be a RAK, huh. But I've been thinking about if for days and the fact that everybody always fixes their posture when they're around me..that's gotta be a good thing right, for them? So my RAK for the day...fix everybody's posture.