Just a BlinkProof Time Flies

Picture our dinner table with the noisy din of a preschooler’s chatter and the constant drone of a toddler’s babbling whine mixed with a fair amount of sassy words, giddiness and general loudness.

Are you there? Add yogurt to just about every surface, food being chewed with open mouths and a sippy cup being used without hands.

Sometimes I laugh, sometimes I cry. This time I tried to teach.

I looked Ryan square in the eye and said,

God says the wise man uses his ears and the foolish man lets his tongue run

The phrase was met with a head back laugh!

What!? Are you kidding me! How do you even do that?

He continued to open his food filled mouth and “run” on his tongue with his pointer and middle fingers.

You mean like this? (running on his tongue) Hahahhaeee-hahaha!

Well, so I had to laugh. Here are some of the scriptures I was trying to recall at the ruckus albeit educational dinner table.

• Words from a wise man’s mouth are gracious, but a fool is consumed by his own lips. Ecclesiastes 10:12
• Wise men store up knowledge, but the mouth of a fool invites ruin. Proverbs 10:14
• The wise in heart accept commands, but a chattering fool comes to ruin. Proverbs 10:8

The cool air around here is unpredictable. One day is hot with rainy humidity and the next is crisp with forewarning wind. The season of autumn is in flux. As a Minnesota gal, I cling to the evenings of cool air and crickets out the windows like I’ll forever miss them come winter. My uniform: Jeans, tee shirt, sandals and a fleece. Yes, I love fall.

The kids are playing with warmer clothes too yet they always seem to get sweaty so fast from running, falling, jumping and chasing around the house and yard.

Molly can wear the pink Oshkosh bibs that I bought at a garage sale for my South Carolina gal pal Heather when she had her first baby over 5 years ago (pre- McWilliams babies). They cycled through her girls and now they can fit my daughter.

One blink! I swear it was just one blink and the bibs of a yesteryear garage sale purchased only to appease my baby fix are walking around my house, on my kid!

Sanctuary

Individuality

Motivating

Purposeful

Living

Imaginative

Connectivity

Intelligent

Teamwork

Yert (Yes well, yerts (hut-like structures) are simple anyway! What else was I going to type for Y?)

The Simplicity Project (TSP) is big. What I am finding is that TSP is not made up of one big idea or plan. It is, however, made up of a lot of little ideas, attitudes, and of course projects. I haven’t dumped out every toy in hopes of restructuring the whole house in one day…yet.

I did what every good perfectionist procrastinator does – crafts! I have so much do to it seems a bit daunting and the results so incredibly faraway. So, I gave myself permission to get a little thing done. It is only a teaspoon of completion in a lake full of life goals but the reward of completing a project that was over one year old is priceless.

I made the blue photo frame on the left at a Mother of Preschoolers (MOPS) meeting four years ago for my son Ryan. When Molly came along, I purchased a second blank frame from the MOPS leftover craft cupboard with intentions of making a similar frame for my darling daughter. Now she is already 15 months old!

Ryan as a newborn. Molly at 12 months.

Both frames are just paper mache-type cardboard and are cheaper than cheap, but I think they look pretty cute with the personalization.

3 Teaspoon Project Nuggets

1. Limits If it can be done in 1/2 hour – do it, but only once in a while. It is too easy for me to start digging out crafts and seasonal decorations and never stop! The goal is to simplify my life, not layer it so badly I can’t see where I am going.

2. Satisfaction This should be fun. Hey if organizing, planning, and simplifying get me tied up in knots of regret and dissatisfaction they are not working. It felt really good to get a little thing done. Insert pat on back here.

3. The Lily Effect There is a story of a crabby, messy hermit that one day receives a lily in a vase from a neighbor. The messy decides to clear off his table to set the lily on. He washes the table then stops to clean off the chairs so he can sit by the flower. Pretty soon he cleans the whole house and starts doing maintenance work. Somewhere along the way he changes his heart and opens his home to his neighborhood. Doing one small thing can change your outlook on the entirety of a project or idea.