the cutest grad

She made it through high school!!!!!!!!!!!
Straight A's.  4.22 average.
Super challenging college math class this past semester.

Four years of high school included - Transition from home school to regular school. New friendships. Overcoming shyness.  Growing pains.  Facing fears.  Learning a new educational system of 21st century skills.  Mastering computers, cameras, video cameras, and all things technological.  Dealing with dyslexia.  Lots of reading. Taking tests.  Public presentations at school.  Projects.  Working in groups.  College classes at the high school.

College visits.  College applications.  Scholarship applications.  Essays.  Waiting.  

Tennis classes.  Surfing.  Bad haircuts.  Skateboarding.  Band camp.  Playing concerts.  Feeding the local homeless.  Meditation retreats.  Friends visiting from California.  Travel to many places. Learning to meditate.  World travel to Italy, France.

Diver's ed.  Driver's license.  Proms and other dances.  First boyfriend.

Recording songs.  Singing harmonies.  Playing piano, guitar, drums.  Recording an entire album in your bedroom.

Movie auditions.  TV auditions.  Connecting with people in Hollywood.  Watching lots of films, and honing your acting skills.

A curve ball senior year.  Huli stomach.  Disappointment.  Loneliness.  Growth.  New beginnings.

Our little songstress, comic, actress, braniac, tech savvy, dancing, compassionate, sweet, loving, beautiful magical healer girl.

Sky, you are loved by many.  Your friends adore you.  You have touched the lives of every student and teacher at your small school.  Just read what they wrote to you in your yearbook.  Your siblings look up to you. Daddy and I couldn't have asked for a better oldest child to be the leader of our children.  We are so proud of you and we love you soooooooo much.

Can't wait to see what's next for you Sky!

meditation today and some laughs

I have been teaching all our kids a meditation technique for the last few months. Today I meditated with all three of them together for the first time.

Somehow, this morning, both girls were begging me to meditate with them, saying we missed the last two days.
Shawn decided to peek his head in and see what we were up to.
Then he decided to join us.
And... Shawn left half way through the meditation.

It's all good.

He'll be back.

We had a great time together.  At first we were all laughing together and that felt great.  I told them a story of a woman who used to come to my yoga classes and make a scene with her behavior, her fidgeting, her demands of attention on the teacher, and her weird sounds, until eventually she was so disruptive that the teacher asked her to leave.  I told them not to be like her in my class.  They thought that was hilarious.

corner view~somewhere else

Pretty soon we are going to a new place to live for awhile.  In about seventy days, (not that I am counting), we leave the home we have known for fifteen years, and we are trying something new.  Somewhere else.

We are going to a place we have spent a little time visiting.  We don't know much about this place. We know some of the roads, some of the stores, a couple restaurants, a few of the people.

Yet I feel surprisingly relaxed about it all.  There is plenty of fresh air and green there, and it feels right.

Change is good sometimes.  I think this will be good for us all.

conveyor

Annabel's first EP is available on iTunes and many other music promo sites all over the world, including Russia, Japan, France, and soon India.

Here it is in case you want to check it out https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/rain-time/id983742879?i=983742903&ign-mpt=uo%3D4.

Four songs, all are wonderful.  My favorite is called Rain Time.

prom portraits

To be eighteen years old with your life just beginning to take off.   What a blessing, what a time.  Sky and I had fun finding the perfect ensemble for her final high school dance, just in the nick of time.

It was a low key night for her, but it was just fine that way.  That's how she does things these days.

She is a true beauty, my Sky, beautiful inside and out.  

I adore my girl.

twelve

Happy birthday to my adorable, fun, loving, feisty, hilarious, generous, goofball, good natured, huge hearted, humble, baseball playing, cool as beans, awesome boy. You are a class act.  You are the best.

I miss the little baby you once were.  I love the boy that you currently are.  I can't wait to see the man you will become.

Shawnie, you make me so proud, and it is an honor to be your mom.

You are the light in my heart.

for my children~talking things out

I know it can be really hard but sometimes it's so very important to talk things out with people.  Many times there are misunderstandings that need to be cleared up. Also talking and listening with each other helps us understand where the other person is coming from.  We all have unique ways of seeing things based on our particular mindset.  Past experiences, moment-to-moment moods, physiological influences such as if we feel sick or well, hungry or full, tired or rested, and other people's opinions can highly influence how we act, and how we perceive reality.

The bottom line is this.  If you are out of line, and things need to be worked out, then wait til you are calm, and then stop, sit down and talk. Remember all the practice you have gotten at our family meetings.  Don't be afraid to feel emotions or shed a tear or two.  It just means you are human.  And human is good.

Believe me, once things get talked out you will feel relieved and lighter.  Then you can go have a day.

this baseball season

This year Shawn is playing in the major league for the first time.  This is the serious league and he is learning the ropes.  Three games a week now.  No more pitching for my boy, now it's outfield or occasionally infield -- first base, second base.  He may pitch at some point.  The league pitchers are really fast and can throw some mean curve balls.  Still my boy has had some solid hits this season off of these pitchers.

He plays for the White Sox, although their uniforms are red and their socks are blue. But hey.

Shawn's team was on a losing streak - they were the underdogs and morale was low, coaches were stressed, kids were stressed.  One of the coaches at one point lost his cool with the kids.  I decided to try and offer support.  I approached the other coach to see if they would be open to me teaching the boys a relaxation technique.  To my surprise, he was.  I worked with the boys for five minutes before practice that same day.  I tried to make it as nonweird as possible, but I was basically teaching them a simple meditation technique.  I taught them to breathe and relax and focus, to calm their minds and their nervous systems.  Later the coach told me the boys were more focused during that practice and he felt it helped. Moral improved for everyone.  I did the same technique with the boys in the dugout right before their next game and they played way better, beating the first place team!!

Since then there have been two games, they have not asked me to work with the kids again, but then both games have been losses.  Still they are playing much better and losing only by one run versus getting creamed.  And they are happier kids.

Tonight the game was played at night under the lights while a man played amplified guitar in the distance. Hawaiian music.  It was a sweet scene.  

Sports have so much to teach kids, and parents, on so many levels.    

a hike day with my girl

Last weekend Shawn had a baseball game and Annabel needed to go upcountry to work on her astronomy research with her mentor.  So I dropped off Annabel. Sky joined me -- we spent the day up on the mountain with our cameras.  We went to a random yard sale.  We took a leisurely hike down a sleepy street dotted with just a few homes, and caught glimpses of the ocean view.  We visited the school where Sky went for kindergarten (the photo with the green building and jacaranda trees in bloom, which is actually her old classroom). Isn't it idyllic? It is a Waldorf school...notice the fairy house with food left for the fairies?

Sky and I had so much fun being surrounded by so much beauty and walking down memory lane. Annabel was happy to crunch numbers and analyze data.  Shawn had a good hit but they lost their game.  Oh well.  Still, all in all, a great day.  

new beginnings

This is all of us back in December.  It's our very first family selfie.

Today is Easter Sunday, a day of new beginnings.  It seems apropos to think about new beginnings now.  Sky will be deciding about college this month.  Then in a few months we will be embarking on a big adventure, moving the family to a new place in California for the fall!  We found a great housing situation in an area with top public schools. The colleges Sky is considering attending are all in California.  I am going to start a new travel blog soon.  I will continue writing this one as well.  We will be releasing Annabel's first album of original songs very soon.  Shawn is now playing baseball in the major leagues.  And...I got a brand new computer, and I love it.  My old one was so slow, this one is so much faster.

Life just keeps evolving.  Cheers everyone, and Happy Easter!      

for my children~strength

Strength is so interesting.
We often doubt we have it, but then when we are faced with difficulty, especially in situations we have never been in before, we find we have more strength than we realized.

Physical strength is one thing.  When we are young, and vibrant, we think of physical strength and ability as true strength.  Yes, there is something amazing about seeing our bodies grow and develop new abilities, and mastering new physical skills. Remember the feeling of breaking boards in Taekwondo?  Remember when you first realized you could swim?  I still remember the way it felt to master a new gymnastics skill, especially a scary one that required bravery.  I almost felt like I was magic.

Although physical strength is important, and helps us develop confidence and helps our bodies grow, I believe that mental strength is extremely important in life.  It is said that success in sports is 90% mental.

How do we develop mental strength???

This takes life experience, humility, time, patience, and hard work.  We have to calm the mind to get to the place of inner strength.  Because it's not something outside of us.  True strength is inside of us.

Strength comes from wisdom.  We waste so much energy concerning ourselves with useless thoughts, useless things, useless experiences.  True wisdom is knowing what to concern ourselves with, and knowing what to let go of.  This is day-to-day, sometimes moment-to-moment consciousness.  Think about that.

You are all very strong.  Believe me, I've seen each of your strengths.  Just believe in yourselves and you will be amazed at how you soar in your lives.

christmas in march?

Last Christmas came upon us quickly, right after Sky finished most of her college applications.   The day was spent with family opening gifts and enjoying one another's company.  The day after Christmas two of Sky's childhood friends came from California, and stayed with us for ten days.  We set her room up, dorm style, and adopted two more teen girls for that time.

northern cal visit

I brought my Sky to northern California last November.  We went to see Amma on retreat and we visited a college.  And it was sweet and fun.  And of course, as life always seems to be for us, the visit was full of surprises, that at the time didn't all make sense.  Now, four months later, they seem to.