Sometimes it just takes a tweak

My friends,

I am a simple person. As a simple person I am easily overwhelmed. When I see someone who raises their own worms, composts their own dirt, grows their own garden, cans their own tomatoes and brews their own pasta sauce from scratch I get nauseous. I mean jealous. 

I mean overwhelmed. 

It feels like a recipe for failure to me. Just too much. So a long time ago I made a deal with myself. 

Baby steps.

Small trades.

A tweak.

If I can't do everything I can do a little something. I add olive oil and fresh garlic to my pasta sauce. I can totally do that.

So today, a quick tweak that might help you out.

I realized that my kitchen is like a snare set for children.

They look up and see this:

High above them, precarious stacks of glass sitting above big sharp knives. 

Yeah, way to go, Tapper.  

And I hate opening a cabinet and having to shuffle around the Pocahontas sippy cup to get to a grown up bowl. 

So my quick tweak? I gave them a drawer.

Down low where they can reach it and revel in plates with princesses on them and cups with dragons and soft spouts. They never reach up high and risk life and limb.

I never have to fight plastic tumblers falling on my head when I only wanted a glass.

When I say I'm simple, I mean it. I like little tweaks that give me big breaks. 

And since you're here I might as well show you the Cowgirl's newest tweak.

She wanted bangs.

I held her off as long as I could. I was seriously scared. Bangs are a commitment, people.

When she sat in the chair and the stylist held up the scissors I grabbed my face and in one syllable exclaimed "areyousureyouwanttodothis?!!!"

She was.

And she did.

Little tweak.

Beautiful outcome.

Try and tweak something today.

Calling all mothers

There was such a response from my last blog post about little girls growing up with today's expectations of beauty that I knew there are mamas out there who have something to add. You've emailed and facebooked me and I loved your comments. Now I want everyone to hear what you have to say. We need to join our voices together until our daughters can't help but hear us
Here is what I propose:

Send me a picture of a girl you love (writeme at reginasirois dot com)  and a sentence or two telling why you love them just the way they are. 

I love the light in your eyes when you learn something new

I love never knowing what I will find in your hair- one day paint, one day glitter, one day bird feathers. You make life an adventure.

I will compile them into a post so we can celebrate the diverse loveliness that is our daughters and learn from the diverse wisdom from many mothers.
It is a great Sunday activity to think of how our lives are blessed by our daughters.
Please share your girl's spirit with the world to help other girls who struggle with their self worth.

I love how you take care of other girls who need you

What I wish every little girl knew

I just read a blog post by author Karey White that quotes J.K. Rowling and her hope for her daughters. I could not fit my response into one comment so I am adding my two cents about what I hope all little girls know:

I recently watched one of those pageant shows with my daughters for a specific reason. I waited until the little girls came on screen plastered in make-up and hairspray before I turned to my daughters and told them something they need to know:

 Those girls do not look a fraction as beautiful as you do when you throw your head back and let the happiness in while the laughter comes out.

Those girls do not look half as brilliant and intelligent as when I find you with a book and a flashlight at midnight.

Those girls' smiles are not half as dazzling as yours when you catch a creature and come to show me.

I'd rather sit and hear the thoughts in your great mind than see you parade in a thousand gowns.

I would never feel as proud of you standing on a stage as I do when I see you kneeling in prayer.

Those girls... those girls.... those girls.
Those girls are beautiful and precious and creative and I wish someone would wrap their arms around them and tell them that nothing they wear can make them more lovely than they already are.

No routine they practice is as wonderful or humorous as the spontaneity of youth.

No crown they wear will make them any more royal and special than they already are.

If I could tell my daughters one thing about beauty it would be the same thing my father told me when I was a young woman and we didn't have money for the right brands or fancy beauty salons.
He said, "There are a lot of things that money can buy. But it can't buy class. It can't buy poise. You have both and it makes you more beautiful than you know."
Thank my loving God for a wonderful Dad.

I look at these faces, I look at all the faces of all the little girls and it makes me sick and sad that someday they will pinch their thighs and wonder if they look "hot."

They will pout their lips and wonder if they are "sexy" enough.

My dear, sweet, powerful, intelligent girls- do not believe the cruel lies that surround you. Let your crown of beauty be your kindness and integrity and resourcefulness.
If someone cannot love you for your smile, your guts, and your creativity then they don't have the right to love you at all.

Oh, I hope enough brave girls band together, support one another and reject the world's counterfeit definition of beauty.
I hope they see themselves like their mothers see them- beautiful miracles.

Pants required

The Cowgirl just told me about her dream last night. Apparently she was in front of a group of fifty people with no pants on.
I promptly laughed out loud and said, "You had the no pants dream!"
I told her that everyone eventually makes a pant-less appearance in the strange world of dreamland.
Amazed  that her dream was not unique she promptly demanded to know why we have the same dreams.
"I don't know," I replied. "I guess it's the brain's way of telling us..."
"To wear pants!!!" she yelled.
Touche.

Sorry Freud, it is just about the pants.