Last weekend my husband and I attended his 20 year high school reunion and man was there a lot to chew on after the fact.

First I had a lot of fun. People kept asking me how I was doing–like in a “how are you holding up?” sort of way–but I loved it! I love talking to people and getting to know people who knew my husband way back when. Yes, I was definitely in supportive spouse mode, and there were awkward pauses and times when I sat at the table for a little iphone break, but overall I had a great time. I’d met a couple of my husband’s close friends from high school before, but still I hadn’t seen them in years. (His highschool BFF married a girl I knew in college, so it’s fun to have that connection.) Another close friend is his high school girl friend, who also dated the same BFF. Later, when she started dating the guy she eventually married, my husband and his BFF became friends with him as well, so it was fun seeing them all together! Ha!

Of course I was reminded of my high school reunion. Unfortunately I missed my 20th (for me and my husband’s 10 year anniversary actually) but we went to my 10th when we were engaged. It was great seeing old friends and sharing our crazy stories (like the time I told my parents I was in the mountains for the weekend, but I was actually road tripping to Kansas) connecting with acquaintances and seeing what and where everyone was up to. There was no drama, just a fun evening. My 10 year was fun, but looking back 28 is still so young! By 20 years it seems that so much more has happened in our collective lives. Marriage, kids, adoption, divorce, death, careers, career changes, big moves, and more life experience. I’m really hoping we’ll have a 25th!

While witnessing this reunion as a spectator more than a participant, I saw lots of hugging and laughing as people sifted through memories. Even the most mundane memories (Remember we were locker partners freshman year? Who was our teacher for such and such? We didn’t hang out a lot but we had a lot of classes together.) float up to the surface and the shared experience of two people remembering an event, a person, a thing from 20 years ago is bonding. They were there. They were pixels in the collective image of your high school experience. I witnessed head shaking in disbelief as people said, “Oh my gosh, that dude hasn’t changed a bit.” (Mostly referring to one guy who could have used an updated 2019 memo on what constitutes sexual assault–yes hitting men in the crotch and tapping women’s breasts was never OK, but definitely not now. Sigh.) Other people hadn’t changed for the better–“She’s still the same big-hearted girl she always was.” And yet some people did change. I was witness to an apology 20+ years in the making and while it was all “water under the bridge” it seemed to be a relief for both parties nonetheless. A moment of owning ones past (and still present) insecurities is definitely a sign that people have matured since high school.
 
[readmore title= “Click here for more thoughts about high school reunions.”]

Hey guys! Things have still been slow on the uptick around here, but I’m hoping that will change soon as I start to get into more of a rhythm. That said, I don’t think I’ll ever be a daily blog publisher, but if I can get 2-3 posts a week that will be great. I know many of you are hoping I’ll get back into the “Special Needs Spotlight” and I’m hoping to get that up and running soon. That said, I’m going to be tweaking it a little–nothing too major–but I just wanted to give you a heads up.

In addition to bringing the spotlight back, what are some other kinds of content you’d like to see on here? Home decor, style, craft/DIY projects, recipes? If there’s anything you would love to see more of let me know!

But I love a good link round up and while I don’t do them very often, every once in a while I like to do it. (Would you like more link round ups?) Here are a handful of links from around the web this week. 
  [readmore title= “This way to 13+ great links this week.”]

I was asked to give a talk in my church’s Sacrament meeting a few weeks ago and after the meeting quite a few people came up and told me that my talk resonated with them, some even asking for a copy. So I thought I’d post what I said today in case it might also resonate with you. I also thought it might be interesting for some people to read who are curious about what a Sunday talk at a Mormon/Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saint church might look and sound like. We have no paid clergy, and instead of a Preacher/Rabbi/Priest giving a sermon, different members of the congregation–even the youth–rotate giving talks each week. I realize that I don’t post as much religious content here as I used to, and that has been a conscious choice. That being said, it was also a conscious choice to post this today. I am open to comments and questions about my beliefs, but I ask that you remain respectful, which is typical for TLM readers. Thank you. Keep in mind that this is what I had written down, but I also ad libbed quite a bit.

Using the Atonement of Jesus Christ to increase Self Worth  (the topic I was assigned)  

As I was pondering this talk and this topic over the past few weeks I kept coming back to the Young Women. As a women, who was formerly young, I know all about the trappings that are set for us to CONSTANTLY question our worth. Some of these trappings I experienced as a YW included:

–Media—magazines, commercials and music videos which often depicted a narrow view of what a woman should look like
–School cliques and social circles.
–Media that depicted what romantic relationships that were a little less than ideal. When I was in 8thgrade I absolutely loved the most recent Disney, film A Little Mermaid. What I didn’t fully realize at the time was that the movie was about a girl running away from home, completely abandoning her family and selling her single most important tool—her VOICE—for a guy she had never even talked to. That movie is messed up.
–Grades and colleges. Yes, even being “smart” and academically successful can be a huge problem if we equate our IQ to our worth.

Many of the trappings I experienced as a young woman are the same as what the YW face today, but now they have the added pressures of the internet and social media.  Please understand, I use both daily—I don’t think social media is inherently bad. Like many things in life, it is how you use it.

And now that I’m an adult many of those same trappings that are designed to make young women question their worth are still present.  And they continue for many women even as we age.

But there is something MORE that all of us—no matter in what ways we question our worth—experience. See even as I’ve done my best to work through traditional ideas of self-esteem and have learned to embrace my worth and value beyond shallow ideals, the question that I think can plague any girl or woman (and man for that matter!) is : Am I good enough?  
  [readmore title= “Click here to read the rest of my talk. I’d love to hear your thoughts!”]

This goes along with what I was talking about last week in terms of our current over-sensitive culture, but I thought I’d bring this up separately as it’s been something I’ve been trying to digest in my mind the past few days.

Is it even possible to be shocked by the media anymore? If there’s a mass shooting and the body count stays under 20, we simply shake our heads and move on. Bill Cosby, America’s father, turned out to be a serial rapist. (Serial rapists in general seem to be pretty common these days.) Michael Jackson of course did molest little boys and then Dave Chappelle made a bunch of jokes about said molestation. Nazi’s are a thing again and hate crime is on the rise. And lets not forget our current sitting President, consistently disgracing our nation with the basest presidential behavior ever witnessed with everything name calling to pushing conspiracy theories. Add in his near daily inclination for pathological lying and well I’m not sure I am shockable anymore. I’m all shocked out. 

And that’s just the news. TV shows and movies are blurring the lines between porn/senseless violence/comedy and drama. Kids are watching TV shows and movies that I can’t even stomach as an adult. I don’t think there would have been a TV show in the 80’s or even 90’s that people would have openly admitted to watching that regularly featured gratuitous rape and violence. I know this sounds like a huge judgment for many of you right now (and well, sure… I guess it is) but you’ve at least got to admit there is some desensitizing going on there. I’m not saying these shows turn anyone directly into violent rapists–lets not get ahead of ourselves–but a correlation between violent media and violence in real life? Youbetcha. 

As our shockability, and thus perhaps our ability to feel compassion, is waning, it seems that our spaces are becoming graceless, both in the real world and online. I can’t remember where I was last week, but I was in line with a woman who had someone do something rude to her and we briefly talked about how you can’t expect people to be polite anymore, because we are all so concerned with standing up for ourselves and not looking weak. “It’s not worth it,” and then she said something to the effect, “You never know how far someone is going to escalate things these days.” 
 
[readmore title= “Click here to read more and please, I’d love your thoughts.”]

This is just an old-fashioned blog post brain dump. Starts pretty frivolous, but gets more serious as it goes on. I’d love to hear your thoughts!

Curtaingate.  
If you follow me on Instagram you know that I’ve been in a little Curtain/drapery situation, but I finally finished them up and now I have curtains (drapes?) in my master bedroom. And they look good, REAL GOOD. Because for the first time ever I paid attention to drapes and how they look and how they should hang because I honestly didn’t know–like they should be billow-y when closed, so you need about 2.5-3X the amount of fabric as your windows are wide, and the bottom of the curtains should just graze the floor. You guys, IT IS ALL IN THE DETAILS. Love, good design, whatever– it’s all in the details.  I’m trying to make my home a detail oriented place in both form and feel. Which is hard. I’ll admit, sometimes I care too much about how it looks. In part because how it looks does contribute to how it feels, but like most things, too much of any one thing (or too little) can become a pain point. Avoiding extremes and striving for the ever elusive, balance. For example I grew up in a home where how our home looked was more important than how it felt, and that didn’t turn out so well. On the other hand a friend of mine grew up with a very doting mother, but her house was constantly dirty and things left undone and she resented that as well. Of course if I have err, I will try to err on the side of caring more about the details in terms of how our home feels, but still… the curtains have mattered to me. And while they’re not as billow-y as they should be, they turned out well. I’m proud of me. 

Kids in School.
I still can’t quite get over the fact that ALL my kids are now in school full time. Perhaps I shouldn’t be as excited as I am by this, but I can’t help it. I’m thrilled! I LOVE my children dearly, and I love being a mom and while being a stay at home mom was a privilege, it was also a sacrifice. I don’t know why motherhood has always felt like such a big deal to me–I mean it IS a big deal–but for me it’s been in a “I can’t believe I did this and survived it” sort of way. I’ve been trying to unpack this a little, here are some thoughts: I was on a podcast a few months ago (check it out here–I really liked this one) and they asked me this innocuous little question that had very little to do with the main point of the podcast (which was about caretaking of children with disabilities), but the question (as I remember) was, “So take us back, who were you and your husband before you had kids?”

Full stop.

Who WERE we? I don’t know. I have to squint to even see those two dumb kids in the distant past. From first date to marriage was 8 short (wonderful, exciting, but also stressful) months. 2 weeks after marriage we moved to New York City where my husband started dental school and I… sat in a lonely apartment and worked from home. By myself. And with Oprah–thank heavens for Oprah.my husband’s schooling kept him really busy, and we didn’t have a lot of time to settle into who we were as a couple before I got pregnant. We were married only 18 months when we had our first child and between the transitions to marriage and a new life in New York City, I hadn’t quite regained my footing before jumping into motherhood, which was by far the biggest change and challenge of all. I was 30 when I had my first baby, so not significantly young, but somehow it still all caught me by surprise. Who was I? Days after my first daughter was born the complete and dense thickness of post partum depression would be another new constant in my life, but one I didn’t even recognize was there (life feels hard so I guess I’m just always bummed now… shrug) and a feeling of life living me, instead of the other way around.
 
[readmore title= “Click through to read more about what’s been on my mind lately.”]

Hello! I’m so excited to be back once again to share one of my all time favorite posts with you guys. Every year I share an updated version of this post, as it seems like every year I gain new insights and understanding. In the past I’ve written two versions of this post–one is how to navigate a special needs encounter, which is to help parents and caregivers know what to do when your child meets another child, who happens to have disability, for this first time. The write up I did at Cup of Jo earlier this year is really my favorite version of that post–you can read it here.

The other version of this post is How to Talk to your Kids about Disability, which covers a lot of the same material but this time, instead of waiting until you meet a person or child with a disability in real life, you’re having the conversation before hand to better prepare them for those encounters.

This year I’d like to take it a step further with my thoughts on How to Raise Disability Inclusive Kids. Like other identities disability is not something you can just ignore and hope your kids will “get it.” And like other identities–race, gender, sexuality–people with disabilities aren’t embarrassed or ashamed to be disabled. It’s not the whole of who they are, but it is an important part of who they are. Keep in mind, that if you were to talk to your kids about race or sexuality, would you say it in a sad tone that conveys you feel bad for people of color for being people of color? Or that you feel bad for gay people for being gay? No! Of course not. Too often people think of disability as inherently sad, negative or undesirable, but it’s not and therefore it’s important that when you talk to your kids about disability it’s not a “isn’t this so sad?” kind of discussion. Disability is full of color and variance and is just another way to exist in this world. Without further ado, these are my tips for raising your kids to be inclusive of their disabled peers.
 
[readmore title= “Click through to read my suggestions for raising kids who are inclusive of people with disabilities!”]