Friday, April 15, 2011

Food Fight

Our family has a tradition of asking people to donate money on our birthdays, rather than giving presents. Our kids have grown up doing this, and each year, they get to research and decide where they want their money to go. Last year, Nathanael collected 190.00 at his birthday party and donated it to Food Fight (see blog entry 6/15/10), an organization started by high school students in our community (foodfightforhunger.com). In their own words, "Food Fight's mission is to harness the potential of high school students in order to eradicate hunger across the world." This past week, they packed meals at six of our local area high schools. These students have packed over 600K meals in the past 3 years!

We wanted to make sure Nathanael didn't just throw money to something, but actually had a hands-on experience with it. Since they were packing meals this week, we pulled him for part of the school day today so he could participate. He saw with his own eyes the impact his donation made. More than that though, the hope was that in seeing role models of students dedicated to changing the world, he would begin to see his own potential to make a difference, in whatever way he feels led to. Pretty good reason I think to play hooky.




Thursday, April 7, 2011

Disney Reflections

I have to admit, I never wanted to be that family that took a vacation to disney world. It just seemed so stereotypical, so cliche, so overdone, so obvious. But after returning from disney world this past spring break, I have to swallow my pride and admit that I was totally and completely wrong. Disney truly was a magical and joyous time for our family. These were my top 3 memories of the week.

Bonding through Suffering
It rained 3 out of the 5 days we were there. Not just a sprinkling of rain, or on-and-off-again rain. These were torrential, unrelenting storms, complete with lightning and thunder and winds that made the raindrops hit us horizontally. But our family put on the ponchos and waded through disney nonetheless, and our kids got an unexpectedly awesome life lesson. They got to experience that life is imperfect and full of disappointments and difficulties, but attitude and perspective can get you through a whole lot. It was neat to see them processing how to turn grumbling into thankfulness. As a family, we grew tighter as we saw the storms as our common adversary. Some of my fondest moments were when we were huddled together in the downpour, clinging to each other, and laughing in the rain.


Perfect Timing for the Princess
Selah is at that perfect stage of being all things princess. It was truly a magical time for her. She had her hair done by the fairy godmother in Cinderella's castle. She got to wear her dresses and have all the workers and waiters refer to her as princess. She got to meet all the characters that she adores. Every pond we passed by, Selah would stop and whisper, "Ariel, I'm here. Are you swimming in the sea?" Call me a sentimental whack job, but I got teary-eyed every time I saw her light up. Her joy was my joy.




Priceless Family Memories
At the end of the day though, it really wasn't Disney that was so magical. It was our family genuinely enjoying being with each other that made it pretty freaking awesome. For all our lives, we will have this memory together. Long after we forget about the rain, the rides, the characters, the all you can eat buffets (for my boys), we will remember the feeling of family. Nothing sweeter than watching my boys walking around with their arms around each other, or John holding Selah while she rested her head on his shoulder in complete bliss. You can't put a price on that.

I'll end it with this recap from my nine year old.