Day 30: For this challenge because...

I am grateful for this challenge because of the depth of questions on this list (see Day 1 for the full list).  I've done this 30 day gratitude challenge for the past 3 years and it's always helpful to spend an extended time reflecting on all the blessings in your life.  But this particular list focused more on intangible things than the past lists, and even on some challenges.  It caused me to remember people and events that go way back in time, and to reframe certain difficult memories through a lens of gratitude.  I'm hoping that this mental stretching in what constitutes a blessing will be helpful to me in having gratitude towards a wider range of things in my life going forward.  I'm hoping that I will more often think of the people in my life, or situations that are challenging, or regular parts of my life that I just don't give much thought to one way or the other, and see the rich amount of goodness that can be found in all of it if I just bother to look.  I'm grateful that this challenge has helped me grow in this way. 

Day 29: The Inspiration of..

I am thankful for the inspiration of the Obamas.  I listened to two podcasts this week that interviewed each of them (David Axelrod interviewed President Obama, Oprah interviewed Michelle Obama)(and for the record, i almost always listen to David Axelrod's podcast and almost never listen to Oprah's, but that's the subject of a different conversation), and it was inspiring to hear from both of them.  Listening to the interview with President Obama, it was so inspiring to hear someone with such intelligence, humor, grace, and poise speak.  It was good to hear a former president draw on the positive things about our country and our shared humanity, rather than tapping into messages of fear.  It was heartening to remember that our presidential leadership has not always been the way it currently is, and will not always be this way.  Though I disagree with President Obama on some of his policy and political positions,  I respect that he comes to his positions thoughtfully, intelligently, and compassionately.  I deeply admire the way he held the office with dignity and without scandal.  Listening to the interview with Michelle Obama, I had several of the same thoughts - I also admire her intelligence, humor, grace, and poise.  I admire the way she is real, but also so impressive.  It's exciting to think about what both of them might do with their lives to inspire and improve the country in the next several decades, and I'm very grateful for their leadership and example. 

Day 28: I am Thankful for the Help of...

I am so thankful for the help of my mother-in-law, Betty.  She's always finding new ways to help us, big and small, and I don't know how I'd manage without her.  She comes over once a week to help with the kids, and often helps out with babysitting on top of that.  She is frequently our dogsitter for Gus.  She hosts the holiday meals and leads the way on birthday meals as well.  She's gone above and beyond even when we needed help out of town, like traveling with me for Joshua's surgeries in Utah and staying with us for awhile when Zoey was born in Virginia.  I know that I can always count on her and that she's always thinking of ways to be helpful before we even ask, and I'm so grateful for her. 

Day 27: What Makes Home so Sweet for Me

Today I'm doing something that's a little bit of a cheat, but I'm reading a devotional called "Morning and Evening" by Charles Spurgeon, and he wrote a paragraph that nails it about what makes home so sweet.  I'm grateful for everything he writes, and I'm grateful for all the other insights in his great book.  Without further ado, here are his words:  

Day 26: All of the People I am Happy to Have Met...

I am thankful for the Americorps volunteers I met while living in Alamosa, Colorado.  I saw a show recently that cleverly pointed out how no one wants to hear someone go on and on about how meaningful their brief stint of volunteering was, especially when that person started and ended in a life of total privilege.  So I will try to keep that in mind as I write this post :).

The year in Alamosa WAS very meaningful to me and it did teach me a ton of things about working with people living in poverty.  But one of the best things about the year was the friendships made with the other volunteers.  We came from all over the world, ranged in age from fresh out of high school to retired, had different religious and political leanings, and there were some wildly divergent personalities.  But we all somehow ended up in this small town in the beautiful San Luis Valley of southern Colorado, all with the common goal that we wanted to spend the year serving in this nonprofit to fight rural poverty.  We lived together, worked together, and socialized together.  We camped, hiked, snowshoed, and hit every hot spring we could find.  We ate thousands of meals together.  We also spent lots of bored hours together, since our house didn't have cable / Netflix / Internet reception / any of the other devices that allow people to retreat to their own rooms and zone out, and since our town of 10,000 people didn't have a lot of nightlife options.  It was way more intense even than the college dorm experience.  So even though we were only together for 365 days and then we spread back out to our different corners of the world and our different lives, the experience led to deep friendships while we were there, and memories that will last our entire lifetimes.  I'm grateful for so many things about this year, but right at the top of the list is all the people pictured above (and a few more who didn't make the picture). 

Day 25: So far this year

Cleft palate repair at CHKD

I am thankful that, so far this year, we have had zero surgeries and zero emergency room visits.  Our first year as parents was spent with many, many weeks in hospital rooms.  Josh has had fifteen total surgeries.  This is our first calendar year since we became parents that we haven't had a pediatric surgery. 

I haven't kept as close of track on emergency room visits, but I think this might also be the first calendar year since becoming parents where we haven't had cause to visit a children's emergency room. 

Yosemite!

I don't know what the future holds, and I don't know if this is just a calm year in an ongoing storm, or if we've finally turned the corner toward a more permanent state of good health.  The special needs journey is full of surprises.  But I'm profoundly grateful that we've had such a good year with virtually no health problems.  It means we get to enjoy more moments like the one pictured to the right.  It means we all get to have more laughter and less stress.  I'm so grateful that God has brought us safely through so many health problems, and I'm so grateful for a calm, healthy year. 
. 

Day 24: I am Thankful I Pushed Myself When I...

I'm thankful I pushed myself each of the three times I've run a half marathon.  I'm not really a runner, at least not in the same sense as those people who have built running in as a regular part of their adult life.  One one hand, I'm an ex-athlete who used to work out rigorously 6 times per week in high school and college.  On the other hand, I didn't do more than walk for workouts during each of my three pregnancy and post-partum years.  But there are three times in my adult life where I've managed to squeeze in 6 months of intensive running, enough to complete a half marathon each time.  I'm grateful that I pushed myself to do this because it feels really good, physically and mentally, to be in peak physical shape; because it gives you a good baseline of fitness even as you ramp down from the race training schedule; and because it feels like an accomplishment to run 13 miles in a row.  But most of all, I'm grateful to have done it because you realize that, while physical conditioning helps, a lot of the battle in completing endurance races is mental - and this is so much like life.  I think practicing and building mental fortitude under these artificial circumstances helps you with mental fortitude needed for other things in life that are way more important, and I'm grateful for the chance to build up mental strength. 

(Fun fact:  I'm hoping to do another half here in Reno in May.  The small handful of you who are reading these thankful posts can keep me accountable!)

Day 23: A Past Mistake

Whew, this list of thankfuls includes a lot of heavy topics!  I'm thankful today for the past mistake that taught me how important it is to tell the truth.  By nature, I'm a people pleaser.  It's always easier for me to tell people what they want to hear, or what will make the moment easier, or what will spare someone's feelings.  This isn't always bad - it's good to use tact, to refrain from saying needlessly hurtful things, and to encourage and build people up when the thing you're saying is true. 

But it IS bad when you justify lying, which can be a big or small lie, a lie of omission, or a lie that allows a false implication to stand.  The past mistake I'm specifically thinking of is when I broke up with a boyfriend and said it was because of an issue that we disagreed about.  It was true that we disagreed about this issue, and that the issue was important to me - but there were dozens of reasons to break up, and this wasn't the main thing - it just seemed like the least hurtful way to end it.  The problem was, I started dating someone a few months later who also disagreed with me about this same issue.  The first boyfriend found out about it and it led to a nasty interaction between the two of us (which I fully deserved) and more hurt feelings for both of us. 

I'm grateful for this because, as much as I wish it wouldn't have happened, it's a reference point in my head every time I'm tempted to take the easy but not fully true way out of a hard conversation.  It reminds me that half truths are also half lies and will likely come back to bite me and hurt the other person in the long run. 

Day 22: A Book or Movie...

I am grateful for the book "Station Eleven" by Emily St. John Mandel.  Usually when I write about a book, I think about non-fiction books that have taught me something about Christianity or social justice.  But the bulk of books I read are fiction - some are literary, some are page-turners, some expand your imagination, some teach you about a perspective different than your own, and some keep you guessing about plot until the end.  This one does a little bit of all of that.  It was such a pleasure to read, and so unlike anything I've read before.  It's a hopeful dystopia, a defense of the arts, a gripping tale of disease taking down the world, and a story about how people rebuild and find connection and create beauty out of unprecedented disaster.  I am so grateful for the creative mind that came up with this idea, the writing skill she employed in putting it to paper, and the reminder of why fiction is so great. 

Day 21: I Have Grown in these ways

When I first saw this prompt yesterday, my thought process went something like this:  First thought - "I haven't grown in any ways" (the classic female underselling of self); second thought - "C'mon, think harder"; third thought, "I've probably grown less selfish with raising kids, so I think I'll write about that."

So I'm all set to write about what a selfless saint I've grown into, and then we had a morning where everyone seemed to have gotten up on the wrong side of the bed.  Leading the pack in grumpiness and impatience was me.  And with that kind of morning, I can't in good conscience write about how kids have made me so selfless.  They've made me more *aware* of my selfishness.  They occasionally allow me to entertain the illusion that I've grown less selfish, like if all the stars align and I get 8-9 hours of uninterrupted sleep and then I have a little extra patience and love to spare. 

So if I haven't grown (much) in selflessness, then how am I answering the prompt for the day?  I think I've grown in the belief that God's mercies are new every morning.  As the days of my life march on, and as the demands grow and my own capacity to handle every person and every situation well falls short, I realize how weak I am and how much I need new mercies with every passing morning.  I believe that they're there, and I'm so profoundly grateful for it.   

P.S.  An area where I've grown in only the tiniest ways and I hope to grow in enormous ways is to trust God with control of my children's lives.  Here's a great podcast about what that looks like.

Day 20: A person in my past and why

I am grateful for my college track coach.  She was good at her job in the sense that she knew how to recruit, she stayed on top of the newest techniques in jumps coaching, and she was organized.  But the really important thing was that she cared about all of her athletes.  She cared about our athletic performance, but she also cared about supporting our academics and nurturing and growing us as human beings. 

Like many people, college was my first time living away from home.  Moving 1400 miles away to a college and a region of the country that was radically different from my hometown was a culture shock, and it was good to have an adult on campus who you knew you could count on if you needed anything.  There was one meet in my freshmen year where I unexpectedly dislocated my knee.  It was a memorable day in many ways - first time on a military campus (the meet was at West Point), first and only time winning a college track meet, and first time riding in an ambulance.  My coach left the meet in the middle, rode with me in the ambulance, got in touch with my parents, and comforted me as it looked like I was going to need knee surgery (i didn't).  I'm grateful that she helped me get through a scary experience.

I'm also grateful that she gave attention and care to all the jumpers on the team, not just the stars.  The Ivy League has an unusual spread of athletes.  They can't offer athletic scholarships and they maintain rigorous academic admission standards, so this thins out the pool of potential team members and means that some of us would be better suited for a small Division 3 school (i was definitely in this group).  But because they are Division I and provide an excellent education, there's always some exceptional athletes and sometimes even a few members of the team who are future Olympians.  In this situation, where you have a very broad range of talent, it would be very tempting to focus all your time and energy on the star athletes.  Our coach was good at finding ways to develop and encourage all of us, and made all of us feel valued.  I am very grateful for that. 

Day 19: In Nature

I'm grateful for the beauty of the four seasons as reflected in the leaves on trees.  I'm grateful how each season has it's own unique feel and energy.  I'm grateful for how this reflects truths about the nature of our own life:  it's a beautiful image of an entire human lifespan, but it's also a nice picture of cycles we go through within our life.  There are many things you do for just a stretch of time - go to school, raise children, work at a certain job, have a particular close group of friends - that also looks like these leaves, going through distinct seasons.  In hardship I think about winter trees, and how a time that feels dead and impossibly hard might be the springboard for new beginnings, as winter gives way to spring growth.  In autumn, I think about the mature beauty of the colorful leaves and hope my life looks like these trees as I grow older.  I'm thankful for all the lessons in the leaves!

Day 18: This piece of technology

I am grateful for the technology of streaming television (particularly Netflix, but also including Hulu and Amazon).  Being an #eldermillenial, I am old enough to have grown up with Saturday morning cartoons, Friday night family friendly sitcoms, and looooong stretches of time where there was nothing on TV that you wanted to watch.  The idea that someday you could choose from thousands of options, on demand, with no commercials, would have seemed more impossibly pie-in-the-sky Jetson-esque than flying cars.  The idea that you could get through a whole television series in a month, rather than waiting weeks and sometimes months for the next episode, also would've been hard to wrap my mind around.  I am grateful for how convenient television has become.  And that's just with me as the viewer!  I'm also super grateful for this technology as a parent!!  Need 20 minutes to get dinner on the table?  Boom, Sofia the First starts on demand!  But also don't want your kid to get bombarded with commercials about sugar cereals and the latest toy they need to have?  Boom, no commercials!  I am grateful for you, streaming television services.

Day 17: Tell someone what you appreciate

I'm going to count this one as a free day to choose your own thankfulness topic, since all of these are going on my blog and are being shared with anyone who cares to read them.  Today, I am thankful for the breastfeeding journey that I got to have with each of my children

I didn't think about the topic of breastfeeding at all until I was pregnant with Josh.  When I started reading up on feeding a baby, I felt like breastfeeding was the one thing I definitely wanted to do in all the myriad parenting choices you make in the infant year.  I stocked up on supplies, took the class, and geared up for the demanding schedule.  I looked forward to the bonding and this special experience I would get to have with my son.  I planned to breastfeed for exactly 12 months, no more and no less.  And as happens so often in parenthood, it didn't go exactly that way with any of my three children.

Josh was born with a series of craniofacial birth defects that made it impossible for him to nurse.  Renown had an awesome lactation consultant who helped me figure out the breast pump and the pumping schedule right away.  And although I had a love-hate relationship with that pump, it was really a blessing to be able to contribute and be connected to my son even as he was being cared for down in the NICU.  There were a LOT of added challenges with the exclusive pumping schedule and especially with doing it while living out of the Ronald McDonald House and being in and out of the hospital all day, but I am so grateful that I got to feed Josh the kind of milk that I so wanted to for his first few months of life.  When he came home, probably due to a combination of factors (stress, having the wrong kind of pump for exclusive pumping, mastitis), my milk supply quickly dwindled, and we switched Joshua to formula at 4 months.  This was in some ways a relief, as we were spending literally 12 hours a day feeding him (between the pumping, offering him a special bottle to prevent oral aversion, slowly tube feeding him most of it, holding him upright for to prevent aspiration, and then cleaning the pumping equipment, tube feeding equipment, and special bottle).  But it also felt like a crushing blow, and not at all the way I had expected or wanted the feeding of my baby to go.  

Because of this first experience, I am so grateful for the nursing journeys I got to have with my two girls.  I had learned not to bring so many expectations with pregnancies #2 and #3, but I still hoped to get to do a year of breastfeeding, and hopefully not via the pump.  My experiences with Zoey and Ivy were pretty similar.  They were both able to nurse, and my body was able to produce, with no problems.  There are always some hiccups - it hurts to get started, there were a couple rounds of mastitis, there were times when I wished I wasn't the only one who could help them get back to sleep in the middle of the night - but overall, things were very smooth.  And this was SO healing for me.  It was a gift to be able to have the moments of bonding and middle of the night cuddling that I had always imagined.  It was a blessing to have things go so easily when I knew firsthand how hard it could be.  It was awesome to nurse with barely any use of the breast pump.  Because of this, I did extended breastfeeding with both of my girls - 16 months with Zoey, 24 months with Ivy (that's why i chose this topic today - Ivy just weaned this month).  I didn't plan or expect to go so long with either of them, but it's special time and I'm extremely grateful for it.  

Day 16: This hard lesson

I'm throwing this one waaaay back to my elementary school days.  I'm grateful for some discipline I received that taught me some lessons that I still remember today.

The situation was this:  at the end of the school day, my babysitter was in a conversation with another adult that felt like it was taking forever, so I rolled my eyes behind her back.  Although the babysitter did not see it, another adult saw me roll my eyes and told my parents about it.  My parents made me write an apology letter to my babysitter.  At the time, I felt both humiliated and infuriated because the babysitter had not even seen the eye roll, so now I was having to tell her about my bad action towards her; also, I didn't feel like it was that big of a deal, and now there was a whole group of people involved in resolving the situation.  But I wrote the letter, my babysitter received it graciously, and we moved past it.

Here are the lessons I am grateful that I learned from that situation (which I don't always execute perfectly, but which are good ideals to strive towards):
1)  You should treat people with kindness, patience, and respect, even when no one is watching, because this is the right way to conduct yourself in the world, because this will build the right kind of heart attitudes, and because this is what it means to be a person of integrity.
2)  You should treat people with kindness, patience, and respect because you never know who is watching.  A small little throwaway word or action might have ripple effects into relationships and your reputation that you never know about. 
3)  It's annoying when people call you out for acting badly, but this is often at least *partly* because you know that you shouldn't have done the thing and now you are being held accountable and needing to acknowledge that you were wrong.  So when you're annoyed because someone is saying something hard to you, it's good to start with introspection about whether any of the annoyance is because they're right. 

I'm grateful to all of the adults involved for planting the seeds of these important life lessons at a young age.

Day 15: These special talents of mine...

We are rolling into the holiday season, which means there's a lot of holly jolly stuff happening in the next 6 weeks.  For our family, this also includes some birthdays and a trip halfway across the country.  As we head into this busy season, I'm grateful that I'm good at managing mental load.  I'm good at keeping track of tasks through lists, and for the most part I'm good at moving through these lists pretty efficiently.  Both of my parents role modeled this for me, for which I am grateful.  And I'm tremendously grateful that I have more time and bandwidth to devote to mental load since Kenny is earning all the household income right now, which makes an enormous difference. 

My organizational abilities are hit or miss - we do not have a particularly organized house, for example.  But when it comes to the mental load of running the household (things like meal planning, signing the kids up for activities on time, doing all the school and special needs paperwork, etc.), I'm grateful that keeping track of tasks comes pretty naturally and doesn't feel like a huge burden.  This absolutely does not mean that mistakes are never made and that things are never missed, and actually by naming this skill in this post I'm fearful that I'm about to miss some huge thing - but I don't actually think the universe works this way, and I'm still grateful that things with mental load have gone pretty well up to now.

Day 14: 5 big things

On the eve of midterm elections, I've got politics and constitutional amendments and types of government on my mind.  Lots of people, myself included, are unhappy with aspects of how the U.S. government is currently being run.  But you know what's awesome?  We still have really important freedoms.  Many of these even facilitate our ability to push for change in the government.  So today, the five big things I'm thankful for are the five freedoms guaranteed by the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.

1.  Freedom of religion - We can practice our religion freely, and we can be assured that nobody else's religion will be forced upon us.  This is one of those dichotomies that is always being worked out and is never perfected, in the same way that individual freedom and the common good sometimes bump up against each other and decisions need to be made that restrict one or the other.  But it's awesome that our country has named both of these freedoms as things to aspire to.  

2.  Freedom of speech - This is a pretty humble little blog, but there are countries where I could be thrown in prison for using a forum like this to write any thoughts that go against the government message.  Ditto with any thoughts that have come out on social media.  We can speak our minds with freedom and the only fear is getting in an online fight with an acquaintance who feels differently.  

3.  Freedom of press - Yes there are some problems with biased news sources on both the right and the left, but a robust free press is keeping the public informed and keeping the government accountable.  Especially in a time when truth is treated as optional, it's good to have the press poking holes in lies.  

4.  Freedom to assemble - We can meet up to organize for our causes.  We can peacefully march and protest.  

5.  Freedom to petition our government for redress of grievances - we can complain to our government or seek the assistance of our government without fear of punishment.  So if you don't like how Congress or the White House is performing, light up those phone lines!

I'm so grateful for these freedoms guaranteed by the First Amendment.  

Day 13: 5 small things

This weekend is the annual "Fall Back" of Daylight Savings.  As many memes have noted, when you have young kids, this does not usually mean sleeping in.  BUT, how often do we all wish for more time?  Getting the gift of an extra hour means we all got to enjoy a long, lazy morning together.  Here are 5 things that I am grateful that I was able to do because of our longer morning:

1.  Read the kids a story about Pocahontas - getting our history on!
2.  Make homemade pizza dough, simplifying dinner time later. 
3.  Play a board game.
4.  Finish a novel that I've been trying to get through for months.
5.  Make it to church on time!

Day 12: I love this about how i look

Oooh, this is an uncomfortable one!  I'm grateful that I was lucky enough to inherit the long, lean body type from the Fickenscher side of the family.  I like that, because of that, I can receive hand me downs from my more fashionable mom and sister.  I'm grateful that it has allowed me some athletic opportunities in high school and college, and that it makes it easier to pick up running even though I'm more of a dabbler than a hard-core dedicated athlete these days.  I'm grateful that I can reach things that are up high.  I'm grateful that, by sheer luck of genetics, I've been able to get back to about the same shape and size after three pregnancies.  There are things I would love to change about my body shape, just like everyone, but all in all I'm grateful for what I've been given in my body type. 

Day 11: About my school or job

The secret to looking lawyerly when you're young:  glasses.

Today, I'm going to discuss something for which I was grateful in two of my former jobs:  I got to work in two non-profit law firms where the vast majority of attorneys were female.  There were so many things that were awesome about both of these workplaces that they could (and probably will) fill a whole volume of thankful posts, so today I'm going to focus on the mostly female workplace part.

First, I'm grateful for what there was not - nobody was trying to undermine or beat out anyone else.  While many of us were competitive by nature, we applied our competitive nature to our cases and our non-profit mission.  There wasn't any locker room talk or boy's club atmosphere.  There wasn't gossiping and backbiting. 

Second, I'm grateful for what there was:  Friendship.  Support, encouragement, and cooperation.  It was inspiring to be surrounded by these smart, driven women who were using their talents to better the world, and it gave me a model for what I wanted my career to look like.  Both offices took great pains to be flexible and family friendly.  People knew each other's kids and spouses, at least a little bit.  People made time to help each other with cases. 

There were males there, too, and they were great.  (I think it takes a certain sort of strength in a man to do well in a working environment led by women, so kudos to you men.)  But I'm grateful to have had the experience, twice, of being surrounded by co-workers who were smart, social justice oriented, kind, and mostly female. 

Day 10: About my Friends

I had to think hard about which friends to shout out for this post - not because I'm so ragingly popular, but because I've been lucky to have really great friends in different stages of my life.  I'm deeply grateful for my good friends from school and different church communities we've been a part of, but today I'm going to talk about the friends who I see the most these days and who are helping me get through this stage of life.   

I'm so grateful for my playgroup moms here in Reno.  Some of the moms in this group knew each other back when we were childless co-workers, so it helped that we already had a friendship and some things in common before kids were added to the mix.  I love that I can talk to these moms about all things good and hard about parenting; about my thoughts on when and whether to go back to work (for the bazzillionth time); about the silly or the deep.  I am so deeply grateful for their encouragement and support and sense of humor.  

We had the same core group meeting for a solid two years.  Now in year three, we have started to meet less frequently as the older kids reach school age - some are back to work, some are now homeschooling, most of us have added another kid or two, and for all of us it's hard to get together as often as we originally did.  But I'm so grateful for the continued relationship via texts and mom's night out and birthday parties and group swimming lessons.  And I know that I will always appreciate the group that helped me get through these sometimes lonely and challenging young child years.