Top Ten Lessons Learned from the Winter of 2014

Top Ten Lessons Learned from the Winter of 2014

by | Feb 11, 2014 | Top Ten Tuesday

2014-USFA-Winter

10.   When taking an 85-year-old woman out for lunch in zero degree weather, Panara’s has the best soup and coffee.

9.   But Applebee’s has the most abundant, safe, close-to-the-door handicapped parking spots.

8.    Snowblowers are worth their weight in gold.

7.    As are handwarmers tucked inside mittens designed to hold them while snowblowing.

6.    Laura Ingalls Wlider’s children’s classic, The Long Winter, looses its childlike appeal after a string of days below zero.

5.    Bitterly cold Saturdays offer the perfect opportunity to declutter the house and purge closets.

4.    Cold winter days are the perfect time for novelists to write touching, heartrendingly sweet summer scenes. Conversely, sparklingly bright winter scenes are best written on hot summer days.

3.    Soup is always a good choice for supper.

2.    There’s no such thing as too many pairs of warm, woolen socks.

1.   Central heating is a blessing taken for granted far too often.

Photo Credit

Laugh and Live with Special Needs

Laugh and Live with Special Needs

by | Jan 31, 2014 | Different Dream, Self-Care and Stress, Special Needs Parenting

Laugh and Live with Special Needs

Do you ever get so wrapped up in the challenges facing your child with special needs that you forget to laugh? Guest blogger Kimberly Drew is here with a post about how your child can help you laugh and live with special needs.

Laugh and Live with Special Needs

I have to say, one of the best things about being Abbey’s mom is getting to see her sense of humor. The things that make her laugh are so out of the ordinary. And she has THE BEST belly laugh!

For as long as I can remember, Abbey has laughed at mishaps. My husband and I like to call it her death and peril humor. We were turning the TV channel once and there was a person hanging onto the edge of a cliff with their feet dangling and screaming. I thought Abbey was going to pass out from laughing so hard. We quickly discovered that The Three Stooges is one of her favorite shows. Anytime someone gets bonked upside the head with a 2 x 4 she’s practically sliding off the couch in hysterics. If you are in danger, she is laughing about it.

At some point in the early years, our youth group kids discovered that pretending to knock each other over would set her off. They quickly made a point of doing it on purpose just to get her to laugh. Then she figured out she could walk up to them and barely touch them and they would pretend to fall backward. Such power!  Such fun! It was all well and good until she started grabbing other children by the clothes to pull them down, and then proceeded to crack up while they were crying. We put a quick stop to that one.

Abbey also loves loud noises. Perhaps it’s the hearing loss? When we got a new DVD player it came with a volume knob instead of a button, she learned to practice drive-by volume control. Very casually she walks past and then sneaks a hand out to turn the volume on the TV to its highest setting. Of course this gets quite a reaction out of us, so she laughs at us running to turn it down. She even thinks a screaming baby is hysterical. If you are in the grocery store with a child throwing a temper tantrum, you are Abbey’s best friend. She will find you, she will laugh at your child, and she will probably sit down on the floor while doing it because when she laughs that hard she can’t stand up anymore.

If all of that isn’t funny enough, now that she’s a big girl she likes to grab people’s phones and purses. It doesn’t matter if she doesn’t know you. If you’re not looking, she’ll take your purse and walk off with it over her shoulder. As soon as we catch her, she makes this face and throws it back. She even takes things OUT of people’s purses. It has finally gotten to the point where I just make a joke out of it to keep from being embarrassed. I tell people, “Oh, I taught her how to do that… she’s pretty good huh?”

I love this kid.  She reminds me to loosen up, and that sometimes living with special needs is worth laughing about!

What Helps You Laugh and Live?

What makes you laugh on your parenting journey? Your child? A movie or TV show? A family joke? Leave a comment to get us all laughing!

Do you like what you see at DifferentDream.com? You can receive more great content by subscribing to the quarterly Different Dream newsletter and signing up for the daily RSS feed delivered to your email inbox. You can sign up for the first in the pop-up box and the second at the bottom of this page.

Photo Source

By

Kimberly grew up and went to college in the small town of Upland, IN. She graduated from Taylor University with a degree in Elementary Education in 2002. While at TU, she married her college sweetheart and so began their adventure! Ryan and Kimberly have four amazing kids on earth (Abigail, Jayden, Ellie, and Cooper), and a baby boy waiting for them in heaven. Their daughter Abigail (Abbey) has multiple disabilities including cerebral palsy, a seizure disorder, hearing loss, microcephaly, and oral dysphagia. She is the inspiration behind Kimberly’s desire to write. In addition to being a stay-at-home mom, Kimberly has been serving alongside her husband in full time youth ministry for almost fourteen years. She enjoys working with the senior high girls, scrapbooking, reading, and music. You can visit Kimberly at her website, Promises and Perspective.

Author Jolene Philo

Archives

Categories

Subscribe for Updates from Jolene

Related Posts

Jolene’s Special Needs Resolution: Be Grateful

Jolene’s Special Needs Resolution: Be Grateful

by | Jan 6, 2014 | Different Dream, Encouragement, Spiritual Support

Jolene’s Special Needs Resolution: Be Grateful

Happy 2014 everyone, and welcome to the kick off of Different Dream’s New Year’s Resolution series. The series will run every Monday and Friday for the first three weeks of January. Guest bloggers Steph Ballard, Amy Stout, Kimberly Drew, Sylvia Phillips, and Becky Hallberg will stop by to share their special needs parenting resolutions. Some will make you laugh, some will make you cry, and we hope all of them will get you thinking about how to approach 2014…which is what writing the piece below made me do.

I Will Be Grateful

New Year’s resolutions. Never before this year has the practice of setting them found a place on my January to do list. Mainly as a push back against the perfectionistic tendencies that cause me to latch onto goals with the tenacity of a pit bull. So why, I reasoned year after year, feed that beast?

Character Flaw Revealed

But this year. Well, this year, God changed my perspective about New Year’s resolutions by zeroing in on what I thought was a minor character flaw. As in, I thought it was a mere speck in my eye, but in reality it’s a log that needs plucking out.

Thank you very much, Sermon on the Mount.

The minor flaw log is a consistent lack of gratitude for anything–person, event, obstacle, suggestion–that does not match my agenda for the moment, hour, day, week, month, or current five year plan. After months of nudging pushing arm wrestling with me, God made it clear that he wants me to respond to the events of life, special needs and otherwise, with gratitude.

Gratitude for his sovereign ability to work every challenge and obstacle, every hurt and grief, every evil and injustice to good.

Character Flaw Redeemed

Though I’m not 100% sure what that will look like in every aspect of life, here are a few instances that come to mind:

  • When the land line rings and interrupts prime writing time, I will be grateful for the chance to stretch while walking across the room to answer the phone…even when it turns out to be a robo-call.
  • I will look at the pictures of my baby boy in NICU and be thankful for the tears that accompany the memories of his birth 30+ years ago. I will be thankful for this sweet and painful grief that binds together parents of kids with special needs.
  • Instead of feeling guilty when a writing deadline means saying “no” to volunteering for something at church or in our community, I’ll thank God for this writing ministry and for moving me out of the way at church or in the community so someone else can volunteer.
  • When a family member, friend, or stranger needs something God has uniquely equipped me to supply, I’ll thank God for replacing my agenda for the day with his.
  • Rather than muttering under my breath when tech and computer issues arise, I’ll thank God for using them to grow my understanding.
  • When the guilty voice in my head whispers, “You’re not a real special needs parent because your child is fine now,” I will not cave. But I will thank God for healing my child so I have the time to minister to parents actively caring for their kids with special needs.
  • Each time I want to blame someone or something for latest blip in life, I’ll ask God to show me how to be thankful for his grace yet to be revealed in the situation. And I’ll ask for strength to wait faithfully and patiently for as long as it takes for his grace to become evident.
  • As this New Year’s Resolution breaks and becomes tattered, I will thank God for his mercies which are new every morning. And then,  I will try again, grateful for a God who loves me, even when I fail.

 

Character Flaws Shared

Do you struggle with being grateful? Or has God revealed a different character flaw he wants you to address with his help? Share your resolutions, ideas, and encouragement in the comment box below. And come back on Friday, January 10 to learn about Kimberly Drew’s special needs resolution.

Do you like what you see at DifferentDream.com? You can receive more great content by subscribing to the quarterly Different Dream newsletter and signing up for the daily RSS feed delivered to your email inbox. You can sign up for the first in the pop up box and the second at the bottom of this page.

Photo Credit: www.freedigitalphotos.net

By

Jolene Philo is the author of the Different Dream series for parents of kids with special needs. She speaks at parenting and special needs conferences around the country. She’s also the creator and host of the Different Dream website. Sharing Love Abundantly With Special Needs Families: The 5 Love Languages® for Parents Raising Children with Disabilities, which she co-authored with Dr. Gary Chapman, was released in August of 2019 and is available at local bookstores, their bookstore website, and at Amazon.

 

Author Jolene Philo

Archives

Categories

Subscribe for Updates from Jolene

Related Posts

Thank You, Trusty Little Toyota Corolla

Thank You, Trusty Little Toyota Corolla

by | Dec 9, 2013 | Out and About

toyota corolla

Thanks to my trusty little Toyota Corolla,* I am writing this column from the comfort of my own home. If not for its good handling on slippery roads, I might be shivering in a ditch somewhere between home and frigid Lincoln, Nebraska.

Now don’t get me wrong.

As my friend and Ohio native Katie Wetherbee says about her first trip to Lincoln last weekend, “The weather is cold, but the people are warm and welcoming!” The people truly were warm and welcoming during our three days working with volunteers and ministry leaders at Lincoln’s First Free Church. Their passion for and commitment to developing a quality, inclusive special needs ministry program is phenomenal.

But the weather.

Now that’s a different story. Katie mentioned the cold, but it’s about the same cold in Iowa where I live. So that wasn’t the problem. The problem was the light snow that began falling in Lincoln after midnight Sunday and proceeded to move east along the route I took home. By the time I left Lincoln a little before noon on Sunday, the interstate was wet and messy, but not slippery. The first 70 miles of interstate in Iowa weren’t bad either.

But then.

The roads got a little slippery. And a little slipperier. A semi was in the ditch in the westbound lane. I slowed down. Then I noticed an armored car decorating another portion of the ditch. I went a little slower. And passed a couple pick up trucks in the median. So I went slower still, until the exit came into sight and the intrepid Toyota crawled along the exit ramp, tires firmly gripping the snowy surface until turning onto the two lane highway.

Which wasn’t slippery at all.

The rest of the trip was uneventful. And this morning, I’m very thankful to be home since more light snow fell through the night, and the road reports say it’s slick, slick, slick out there. Which is why the man of steel drove the Corolla to work. It’s better for winter driving than the big ol’ pick up truck.

Thank you, trusty little Toyota Corolla, for keeping us safe once again!

*In the interest of full disclosure, the photo above is not my car. It is the same year, make and color, though mine has a sun roof. And even though the dealer who sold me the car said white cars don’t show as much dirt as other colors (I’m not making this up. The dealer really said that, and in the process, created an instant, inside family joke), my car is much, much dirtier than the pictured vehicle.

Photo Source

Top Ten Reasons to Be Thankful this Thanksgiving

Top Ten Reasons to Be Thankful this Thanksgiving

by | Nov 26, 2013 | Top Ten Tuesday

Thanksgiving baking

10. Our home is pet-free, so we can take off whenever we want.

9.   Costco’s yellow legal pads and architecture mechanical pencils. Don’t know why, but they make me very happy.

8.   The internet. It makes the writer’s life so much easier.

7.   Public libraries. Without them I’d have to sell internal organs to pay for my reading habit.

6.   We are healthy and active. Good health is an undeserved blessing we too often take for granted.

5.   My husband. He said “Go for it” without batting an eye when I decided to quit teaching and give writing a try.

4.   A mother who taught all her children to cook. Really, really well.

3.   Grandma Conrad’s pie crust recipe. Yes, the recipe came from Mom when she taught us to cook.

2.   The family’s coming to our house for Thanksgiving. I’d much rather cook than pack.

1.   Mom will tell the same stories she always tells. And I’ll be glad to hear them all over again since that means she’s still here!

What will you be thankful for this Thanksgiving? Leave a comment!