KRELLFISH

Marga My Mom

This is my beautiful mother.  She is with my oldest son, her first grandchild.  When he was little he couldn't say "Grandma" and so she has been "Marga" ever since. 

Yesterday I went to a tea in the third grade classroom of our youngest son.  I sat there and cried unashamed tears of love, joy and inspiration.  He kept leaning over, patting my arm and saying "I'm so glad you're here."  Then he would smile and pay attention to the program again.  Afterwards he said "I'm so glad you rearranged everything to be here.  Thank you for coming."  Have you heard of a kinder, more thoughtful nine year old boy?  I challenge you to find one, because unfortunately, nine year olds aren't what they used to be.  Here is the face of my handsome little man.  Happy Mother's Day to Moms everywhere.

 

Starbucks Tour Stop

This is at the Starbucks in Franklin, Tennessee.  It was my second one of the day, turned out I needed it to stay up for the Cinco De Mayo fiesta we went to that night.  Actually I needed the caffeine to stay up for the next several days.  Sleep was very limited on this trip, and now I am paying for it big time.  I wouldn't change a thing though-

I have implemented a few of the web applications I learned about and have increased my blog traffic by 50%.  With only three days in to the new changes, I am really pleased with the increase.  Thank you for reading so faithfully.

Feels like it Should

Just had the most awesome time at Lifework 2.0 in Tennessee.   I learned so much that I thought my head would explode, in like a really good way.  It wasn't the overwhelming "I don't understand any of this" explosion.  For once, for me, it was "I really get this and it's blowing my mind" explosion.  On top of all that, I met really great people.  Traveling with my friend Marina at RocktheDesert was a total blast.  I know how hard we laughed burned enough calories for several workouts that we somehow never got to.

And then there was the food portion of the trip.  This was my fourth trip to Nashville, but somehow I missed the good food, until now.  Franklin Tennessee has the best food I have ever had in my life.  We went to Saffire for lunch during the conference. I ordered a huge plate of chicken fried chicken with loads of gravy, and subbed the mac and cheese for the best sweet potato fries I have ever had.  It was literally almost spiritual.

Pat Green's Lyrics to Feels Just Like it Should sums up the trip for me:

"And it feels just like it should
It must be some kind of miracle
Like I got sun on my face and rain that ain't never going to fall
It feels so good
Man it's almost spiritual"

Akiarondo

Check out this little bad boy.  It's a mini station wagon.  RocktheDesert and I got crazy and are tooling around Nashville in one of these wild machines.  It's only ours for a couple more days though.....Ours doesn't really look like a taxi, in that it's blue and we don't want anyone to notice us in it. At the car rental place, the woman asked if an "Akiarrando" would be okay with us.  We both said "What?"  And then agreed to our unknown little Spanish mobile.  Turns out she was saying a "KIA Rondo."  Didn't know they still made Kia's.  Looking forward to driving my HondaRondo when I get back home.

We are having a great time in Franklin, Tennessee.  Met several of our fellow conference attendees tonight and had an awesome dinner at Pueblo Viejo.  Some of the best tacquitos I have had in a long time, and don't even get me started on the Mango Margarita.  Incredible.

Tomorrow it's Lifework 2.0 - translation, I plan to rock my clients and fans digital world in the next few weeks.

Hang on, because I promise it will be wilder than your best ride in an Akiarondo.

This post is part of Monday Moments (MoMo) with Marty Holman.  Check out other true stories here.

In Spite of Oneself

Bestselling author Sloan Wilson once wrote "One should not try to be a writer any more than one should try to fall in love.  The only good way to do either is in spite of oneself."

Every article I have sold and/or has been published, has been written when I wasn't trying.  The manuscripts where I have tried too hard, have all categorically been rejected.  Most days I just try too hard.  But the days and nights when I just hold the pen, those are the great days, with the most authentic and best work being born.

The times where I tried so hard to fall in love, were not good ways, and some ended in disaster.  But the time, where the man who is now my now husband walked into my life, and the feelings just fell on, in and all around me, that's the good way to fall so deeply in love.  The forever kind of love that only God can dream up.

I've learned that we aren't just in our own way when we try too hard, we are in God's way. Crowding Him out with both elbows, trying so hard to get my way and pursue things the way I see them, only ends in loneliness and a lot of rejection.

When I just hold the pen and let the love flow through it, I experience a peace that surpasses all understanding.

Being heppered up - good for the brain!

Started with boot camp at 5:30 am - my liver wasn't smiling.

9:00am  Got all "heppered up" on caffeine.  Couldn't write because I was shaking and hyper.  But it does look like I invented a new word.

Noon: "Heppering" wore off so I wrote an article on "Living out your dreams" and submitted it.

3:00 pm Stepped out of my car, my ankle went sideways and broke my favorite sparkly flip flop. 

6:00: Sat down in my desk chair and the wheel came off one of the legs.

8:00: Just received this article from my sister (Kelly B.)  Here is an excerpt :

"Drinking coffee has already been shown to be linked with a lower risk for Alzheimer's disease, but may have benefits for other neurological disorders as well. According to Dr. Jonathan Geiger of the University of North Dakota, "Caffeine is a safe and readily available drug to stabilize the blood brain barrier." The blood brain barrier exists to protect the brain from contaminants in the bloodstream." 

I just thought of this though, wouldn't one of the contaminants in the bloodstream actually BE the caffeine?  I'll just go with "Like cures Like" and..... 

Coffee is good for the brain.

Could be the best news I've had all day.  : )

Watercooler Wednesday (The Kindle)

Hey everybody it's Watercooler Wednesday!  Check out Randy Elrod's Ethos blog for all kinds of cool,creative conversation.

Today I submit to you: The Kindle.  My husband gave me an amazing product for Christmas.  It's an e-book where I can download most of the bestsellers in under a minute.  I can also have a variety of daily newspapers waiting for me when I wake up in the morning.

Today's question is this: What is your opinion on e-books?  Would you or do you miss the deliciousness of holding a book in your hands?  The smell of the pages, the slick feeling of the cover, the raised letters in the titles, the broke in feeling of a well loved book?  Or has a fire been started inside you and you're ready to move on to lighted, light speed digital stories? 

It's mixed for me.  I am allergic to news print, so we haven't taken a paper in decades.  I love the wireless ease of downloading a new book, but I miss the beautiful comfort of having all my old friends around me.

It takes a lot of green to be "green"

My wonderful sister, Audra invited me to be a guest blogger. So, here goes my first blog.

My first born is going to kindergarten next year. When I was growing up you went to your neighborhood school and that was the end of the story. Now, there are "grades" placed on schools and scores of academic achievement tests to sort through before deciding which school your child should attend. Once you decide on the best school, all the other families in the area think their kids should go there too. The good schools are so popular that they hold lotteries to see who will attend. We won the lottery with less than an 8% chance of getting in (I think I'm going to go buy a lotto). Now, that piece is over and we can move on to actually attending this school.

We received our supply list for the kindergarten classroom and became very excited for our daughter. Do you remember the smell of wood pencils and big pink erasers? Yum! We want to teach Sophia to be responsible at school and in life, so we decided she was going to go "green" at school. I logged onto greenofficesupplies.com and to my shock found out that a dozen wood #2 pencils cost over $12. Suddenly they didn't smell so good anymore. Other items like markers were equally expensive. We were in green shock!

How are we supposed to be green and help her grow up wanting to save the planet when we can't even afford to do it? Maybe we'll ask grandma for a hemp backpack for her birthday this summer--hopefully she won't think we're asking for drugs--just kidding-but can you believe how times have changed?!

Thanks for joining me in my first post.  If you don't like it, my sister wrote it.  If you do - let me know!

Kelly B.

Boot Camp

Does your life ever go in "themes"?  I find that mine does, all the time.  One of them has been a Boot Camp theme for the past two weeks.

A couple of Saturday's ago, I went to a Publishing Boot Camp.  It was really good.  I have since entered writing contests and submitted several articles to various publications.  The "camp" also inspired me to start my new book.  You can check out the writer's association that hosted the morning HERE.

Then this morning, was my first Boot Camp at the gym.  I have written before about a few of my most irrational fears.  One of them is that I will be forced to join the Army and I'll have to do push ups in the ocean like GI Jane.  Well minus the ocean, I found myself sort of facing my worst fears at 5:30 this morning. 

The instructor/drill Sargent was wearing camo pants!  He had watermelons for upper arms and a deep, all business, commanding voice.  We started with a million push ups, 2 million crunches and then came the sprints.  Full length of the gym, fast as you can, sprints.  We capped all that off with lunges, more crunches, "mountain climbers," throwing a medicine ball around and finishing with more push ups.

When I got home, I could barely walk up the stairs. 

It's 9:16am, is it time for bed yet?

The Liver Part Deux

I mentioned earlier that God had been speaking with me about the health of my liver.  I have since ran into our doctor friend at the baseball field and will be seeing him again on Wednesday.  He is an orthopedic doctor and will be taking a look at our oldest son's freshly broken wrist.  The Advil has been back out my friends, and boy is it hard to stay on the wagon.  The good Doctor also informed me that Advil causes kidney damage.  Whoa.

So back to my liver.  When God speaks in three's I know He is more than serious, but fours?  I better really listen and obey.  I just finished Elizabeth Gilbert's Eat, Pray, Love a couple of weeks ago.  In it, one of her characters is a Balinese man that tells Liz she needs to "Even smile in your liver."  I decided to try it and it has been great!  Whenever I pray or stretch at the gym, I think about smiling in my liver.  It releases my lower back.  I love to smile in my liver.  That's one of those things you never thought you'd find yourself saying in life.  But I am pretty sure, that Jesus likes it when I smile in my liver.

Last week the wise Mom sent me an article on plastics.  Some of the nasty,old, cut up plastic we eat and drink off around here has been emitting toxins that the liver just can't process.  I have thrown away plastic bowls from eleven years ago. And the cute plastic ducky cup my husband had from when he was a kid?  I would have burned that thing if the fumes wouldn't have killed us all instantly.  It's amazing any of us are still alive.  I am trying to only eat off regular plates and drink from glasses!

So for optimum liver health you need to just do four things:

1. Drink Liver Detoxifying tea
2. Don't eat or drink off plastics including plastic water bottles
3. Do not take Ibuprofen
4. And most importantly, turn that frown upside down and always, always

         Smile in your liver while you pray.