When I first signed up to receive them a long time ago, I read the bio of the guy who runs the site.  I remember his story was inspiring, and that he was a really neat person.  But I have to be honest; since then I’ve quite happily and quite intentionally forgotten that these Notes come from anyone other than The Universe.  Every day when I sit down at my desk, The Universe gives me some little (or sometimes profound) snippet of love; and I prefer to think of it as truly divine.

Here’s today’s (which I loved):

Wow!! Your closest 10,000 angels, Debbie, have been writing up a storm on your WALL lately…”Nice job on the baby steps toward your vacation home!!! You should have asked for two!”

“Glad you’re finally visualizing! Thoughts become things!”

“Remember me? We took flying lessons together!”

Poke -
    The Universe

See?  How could I not love that?  The Universe thinks I am fabulous, so who am I (or anyone else for that matter) to argue?

And you know what?  You’re fabulous too!  So go get your Notes and start reveling in your fabulousness!

Sunday (my day 11) I was thankful for several things: 

     * Our favorite bagel shop for Sunday breakfast

     * Crunchy leaves to kick through on a long walk with my son and our dog

     * A mother- and father-in-law who have always treated me like a true member of their family (I’d say they treat me like daughter, but I actually have it better than their real daughters because I don’t get the ‘suggestions’ that parents give their children; I get all the good, but none of the not-so-good)

     * And a fabulous washer and dryer!   You may think it a weird thing to be thankful for a washer and dryer, but until you haven’t had one or the other, or you’ve had a pair that don’t work well, you may not be able to truly appreciate them.  I’ve experienced both scenarios at one time or another in my life, and trust me; if you have both appliances, and they work well, be thankful for them.  You have no idea how much easier your life is with those machines!   

Yesterday (my day 12) I was very thankful for my coach.  For part of the hour we spent together I shared a couple of insecurities that I have about playing bigger in the world.  You know, stuff like “I can’t do XYZ until ABC is in place.”  And, not only did she help me see that these feelings are normal, she shared some insights with me that energized and recharged me.  I left the session with renewed confidence in my abilities, intelligence and the value I bring to my client’s businesses.  I am fabulous!  I have to remember that and remind myself of it more often.  Thanks coach!

Today (my day 13) I’m thankful for something very material.  A new laptop!  It was just delivered about an hour ago via UPS, and I’ve opened it and plugged it in.  I haven’t turned it on yet because I have so many other things I need to get accomplished today before I play, but I’m dying to go and press that power button! 

I’ve never had a laptop before.  Every time I’ve needed a new PC since starting my business in 2004 I’ve looked at laptops, but have always ended up purchasing a PC.  I didn’t like the thought of a smaller keyboard and I absolutely detest those little touchpads that take the place of my trusty mice.  Of course I could have purchased a docking station to eliminate those obstacles, but if I did that, then wouldn’t I end up sitting at my desk like I had a desktop anyway?  For the portability factor, you say?  Ok, sure; there’s that.  But for the 2-3 times per year that it would come in handy to be able to grab my whole office (because as a VA, that’s what my computer is) and go, I didn’t think it was worth the extra expense (and quite possibly less oomph) that a laptop would entail.

So why the switch now?  Well, it’s not actually a switch, it’s a splurge.  My husband and I are going to share it.  He suggested the purchase and listed a few good reasons for it:  he needed a computer to use while at home; a laptop would be great to have around for when I travel to networking events; it would be useful for when we go on vacation; and we may even let our sons use it on occasion.  I’m keeping my desktop, and it will still be my primary computer,  but now I’ll have a laptop to try out to see if I like it better.  I’m looking forward to seeing if I like working in living room, or downstairs in the family room, or in bed.  Ooh!  Maybe Panera Bread for lunch someday!    Who knows?  Maybe I’ll be a convert.

I’m just glad that the Cub Scout Popcorn Pick Up day is done!  This is my fifth year coordinating the pickup and distribution of $15,000.00 of popcorn for our Pack, and just when I thought it was almost over, the unthinkable happened:  All of the final order sheets were wrong. 

What has to be done is that the Pack (Pack: all of the Scouts ages 6-11) order needs to be picked up from a warehouse and brought to our Sponsor’s gym.  Then we sort all of it into Den orders (groups of 5-15 boys) and the Den Leaders take their orders and distribute them to their Scouts, who then distribute the items to their customers.  It’s a lot of sorting and distributing!

So what I do is create Pick and Pack sheets for each Den, and volunteers help me sort them in preparation for the Dens to take home.  However, this year these sheets got messed up, and I didn’t know it until I had all of the popcorn waiting to be sorted and 15 people standing there in the gym waiting to help me sort it.  Talk about stressful!

I ran home to reprint all of the order sheets, and (Murphy’s Law at work here) that’s precisely when my printer decided to run out of black toner!  All while these people waited in a gym full of popcorn on a Saturday morning when I’m sure they had many other things that they would have liked to have been doing.

Everyone was great though.  I didn’t hear one negative thing, or experience one cold shoulder.  And my husband was the most supportive.  He helped me not beat myself up over it, which is huge for me.

 So today’s thankful post is that (in addition to being happy it’s over) I’m thankful and feel fortunate that I get to work with such a wonderful, supportive and understanding group of leaders in Pack 103.

Thanks guys!!

But in all actuality, it’s a lovely house in a great family-friendly neighborhood that we’ve put a lot of money and elbow grease into in the thirteen years that we’ve lived here.  It’s small, but cute.  We just put on new dark green, board and batten shutters last weekend, and they’re darling; the perfect  final touch to all of the sweat equity me, my husband and two sons put into landscaping in the front yard the last two summers.

But of course, as Merri points out in her blog, the real blessing is that we have a place to call home.  God has blessed us with  a roof over our heads, warm beds, a functional kitchen, running water, clean bathrooms (and E would be upset if I didn’t mention video games!)  There are plenty of people who don’t have these things.  And plenty more who aren’t homeless, but nevertheless would love to own my house, regardless of how tiny it is. 

I’m reminded of an incident a few years ago that made me stop and appreciate my house:  About once a year, I hire a housekeeper to come in and help me get my house “visit-from-my-out-of-state-mom” clean.  I don’t have anyone in particular that I hire; I just Google House Cleaning and start dialing.  On this particular year the company I hired sent a lovely young Mexican woman.  She was pleasant to talk to while we cleaned together, and I learned that she and her husband had two very young children and worked opposite hours so they could care for them.  I don’t know where she lived, but I do know that they did not have their own home; they lived with relatives. 

More than once while she was here she said “your house is so pretty” with a longing that made me feel guilty for complaining so much about it, and grateful that I had it.  She was young, and my hope for her is that she and her husband are now, or soon will be, settled in a lovely home of their own that she has made pretty for them.  But if she hasn’t, and if I’m ever financially independent and don’t need this house anymore (hey, it could happen!) I will hire a PI to track her down so I can give it to her. 

In the meantime, I’m grateful to have a pretty little house to call home.

I wanted some green around the stepping stones we installed in our garden, but since they would be used daily, I didn’t want to plant anything that would grow so tall as to impede walking.  I did my research, and came up with Mondo Grass, purchased eight little containers of it at my local nursery, and planted them in summer 2008.  

I have to admit, I was a bit disappointed in their performance over the year.  None of them grew (they’re supposed to spread and fill in areas,) and they all got yellowish tips on their blades which made them look scrubby over the winter (they’re supposed to be evergreen.)  Patience is one of the requirements of being a gardener, so I decided to give my eight little lumps of grass one more year to see what they would do.  I thought maybe I hadn’t planted them deep enough and figured they’d either take root over the summer, or die. 

On Mother’s Day this year, I brought home from the nursery several bags of mulch to put around our foundation plantings in the front and both sides of our house (that’s my gift from my husband and sons—they help me garden on Mother’s Day.)  When my husband unloaded them from the car, he plopped a few bags right on top of one of my Mondo Grass lumps.  I don’t think I even noticed at the time, but if I had I probably wouldn’t have done anything about it since I wasn’t expecting them to do much.  We spread the mulch in the front garden but, because life is busy, never got around to doing it on the side of the house where the Mondo Grass was, so the bags of mulch stayed put.  It ended up being one of those I’ll get to it next weekend sort of projects that never did get done. 

Over the course of this summer, with the exception of the one lump that was under the bags of mulch, the Mondo Grass did take root and looked nice and healthy.  I was pleased, and figured I’d buy another lump to replace the one that the mulch bags had killed.  But I was in for a surprise.  When I finally got my husband to move the bags into the shed for use next summer, I was shocked to see that my poor, little, smothered lump of Mondo Grass was still alive!  It was white, and looked sort of like creepy roots, but had obviously spent the summer growing toward the edge of the bags so it could get some sunlight. 

I am amazed and humbled by this little plant.  I need to be that tenacious with my needs and, yes, my wants too.  I have to ask myself, when a big bag of mulch is dropped on me, crushes me and blocks me from the sunlight I need to live, will I persevere?  Will I push and push trying to get to the sunlight?  I can’t say that I’ve had anything truly crushing happen to me (that’s something to be thankful for!) but if anything ever does, I will try to remember my little Mondo Grass and persevere until I either reach the sunlight, or someone lifts the bag off of me so I can be free to live and grow again.

I can’t wait to see what that lump does next year!  Will it thrive?  Will it limp along?  I suppose it could die, but whatever it does, ugly or beautiful, it will stay in my garden to remind me to be tenacious– always.

The thing is, I have so very much to be thankful for but, because I’m a driven person, I’ve long felt that I look forward too much and don’t take the time to appreciate the accomplishments that I’ve already achieved. 

One accomplishment that I forget to pat myself on the back for is that I’m a business owner!  I can remember many days driving back and forth to my JOB and thinking that the HVAC guy driving by, or the guy driving the Joe the Plumber truck had it right.  They set their own hours, named their price, worked hard and made a life for themselves.  I wanted that too, but I didn’t see how that could happen.  I wasn’t a craftsman; I was an administrator.  What could an administrator do besides be an employee in a company? 

Fast forward ten years, and here I am; managing other people’s businesses from the vantage point of being a business owner myself!  (and from home, no less – goodbye commute!)  Thankful for that, I am. J

Today I’m thankful for Growth; specifically, my own.  I’m thankful that I have grown enough in the last few years that I didn’t beat myself up for not posting yesterday. I’m usually relentless with myself about fulfilling commitments; if I said it, I’m going to do it– come hell or high water.

For a lot of areas in life, I think that taking commitments seriously is a very good thing. My clients know that if I said I’d do it, it will be done. My kids know that they can depend on me, and my husband does too. But in the past few years, I’ve learned to relax a little bit and have come to terms with the fact that setting goals for myself is great, but I can also give myself a break too if I want (or need) to.

I remember when my husband and I were newly married and trying to save for a house. I hadn’t been good with my money before getting married and had decided that that was something I didn’t want to carry over into my marriage. So I sat down and figured out how much money we needed to pay our bills each month and earmarked the rest for saving for a down payment on a house.

Unfortunately, being inexperienced with money, I had left absolutely no wiggle-room in our budget, nor did I plan on any ’surprises’ like needing car repairs, replacing a refrigerator or paying for Christmas(!). Of course, these things are unavoidable, so when anything like this happened I reluctantly took the money from our savings, vowed never to let it happen again and worked more overtime to replace the missing funds. (Just thinking about that now exhausts me. It’s a good thing I was young and had lots of drive!) I never gave myself a break.

Now I realize that life happens, so in addition to my planning my finances with some flexibility I have also built some wiggle room into my “work first/play later” attitude about time. Yesterday I wanted to stay away from my computer and office, so I did. Growth is good!

(Today’s post is short and sweet because I have a house to clean!)

Have a great Saturday, everyone.

Today I’m thankful that L & E (just) turned down my offer to take them into NYC to see the Yankees’ Ticker Tape Parade. 

I offered because: they have no school today; they’re Yankee Fans (by proxy if the truth be told; Grandpa’s a huge fan, but we only watch when they’re in the World Series;) they’re at the age where they can appreciate it; and there’s no telling when the opportunity will be available again. 

I know I would have enjoyed the trip if they had chosen to go, so the offer was genuine. And in fact if they had taken me up on my offer, this post would be going the other way.  I’d be writing that I’m thankful I’m in a profession that allows me to be flexible with my time (which I am,) and a few other things.  But today I’m thankful that I can stay in my nice, warm house on a blustery day and tackle my To Do list.   I’m thankful I don’t have to fight the crowds in NYC, and I’m thankful that L & E are comfortable with their decision and are enjoying some time together in the next room while I write this post.

Congratulations to the Yankees, but I think I’ll watch the parade on TV. 

I still can’t believe that I forgot; first, because I’m very schedule-oriented and keep a tight calendar with everyone in the family’s agenda accounted for.  Every year in August, I enter all of the “No School” days into my Outlook calendar and plan my schedule around them.  Which leads me to the other reason I can’t believe I forgot: I was on the phone call during which Ali Brown announced Shine and offered the early-bird pricing but I didn’t register because, knowing the kids would be off from school the same two days, we had decided to go somewhere fabulous for the long weekend.  Other events changed those plans, so we’re actually home, but of course Shine is all over FB and Twitter this week, so I can’t believe that I didn’t connect the two events:  I’m not going to Shine because my children don’t have school.  Duh!

So I’m thankful today that, in spite of all of the planning and scheduling I do, I can still be surprised with the gift of spending extra time with my sons.  Today there was no finding shoes, packing lunches, making sure hair is combed and teeth are brushed and rushing out the door.  Today I was gifted with a quiet morning with my coffee and The Early Show, then E deciding to join me for a walk with the dog and coming back to the smell of pancakes that L decided to make.  Now they’re off doing their own things, but later today I’ll eat lunch with them, and then maybe (just maybe) I’ll be able to convince them to do their Saturday morning chores early this week so we can all do something fun together on Saturday.  Wouldn’t that be a nice surprise?!