Beautiful randomness!

Let's have a little bit of random craziness today.
Gabbi has developed a new (strong) affinity to lipstick!  She has to have some in her hand every single day.  The silver lining is that she has now learned to swipe it off above and below her lips to clear it all off her face.  It was a process, but we are finally there.

The craze around here is for the kids to ask their dates to Prom with some sort of significance.  Write it on the windows of their car, spell it out in pinecones in the yard, etc.  So, Paula recruited me to help Clayton with this special piece of jewelry to give his best girl on Valentine's Day.

It must've been successful because he snatched up his date!
Next, the most recent personality test we have explored at MMPT is The 5 Love Languages.  I took the test, and COULD NOT BELIEVE what my love language was.  In fact, I hesitate to discuss it, even at work, because I am a bit confused about it.  "They" say that your love language is really the outward demonstative way you show love.  And I would've sworn that was Giving Gifts.  I feel like I "reward" my workers with gifts, I shower my kids with gifts, and well, if I love you, I probably have given you a gift. However, when I took the test, gift giving ended up being my LAST area!  Everybody at MMPT jokes with me about not being a hugger.  I don't hug a lot, I dont' go up and do the shoulder squeeze, etc, and yet, it turned out to be number three.  And my number one?  Words of Affirmation!  I was literally shocked.  I am not a big verbal praiser.  I don't give you the googoo, you're doing so awesome, stuff that some of my CLEARLY words of affirmation need.

So, you can imagine how surprised I was when the test showed that to be my number one. So, I have just sat with this and tried to figure it out.  And here's what I have realized.  I am a blogger.  I LOVE connection with people.  I LOVE to talk.  I LOVE to use my words!  And it bothers me when I dont' get comments (I only got three yesterday!  Just sayin!... Somebody speak my language, please!!  ha)  I LOVE to tell stories on instagram and facebook.  It is in my soul... as strange as that seems.  But, if we go back to my 5 main strengths, per StrengthFinders 2.0 (which I THINK I have discussed here, but is very, very important to me, and we LIVE by this at MMPT!), I am at my core,  Maximizer (I put people in their strength area and recognize their strengths... which is why I LOVE all this stuff) and a Communicator!  WORDS!  And my other strengths were Ideation (Creative) and Futuristic (always thinking ahead), and my number one?!  WOO... Winning Others Over, aka that person who "works the room".  Tries to touch every person present in every situation.  So, how do I touch them?  with WORDS.  It IS in fact, how I love!  Hmmm...Maybe just not how I THOUGHT I showed love.  And also, Words of affirmation can be my teaching and sharing my life.  It doesn't necessarily have to be "you're so awesome" kind of words.  It can be my sharing with you my story, my life, my experience, and longing to hear yours too.  Connection!  I also came to realize how much it means to me when someone tells me how cute my kids are or how successful my practice is.  I really feel great love for that person when I hear that my girls are smart, or that they look like me, or that my staff totally serves them and understands what it means to give of themselves fully.  It has nothing to actually do with me, but I take so much happiness from this compliment.  Words of affirmation.  I can honestly say, this is NOT how Todd communicates love to me.  He is a great gift giver.  And he is so-so at Quality time, which was my second best.  So, now how to get him to understand my primary love language?!  The good news for him is that I don't feel that my "love tank" is running low.  I get a lot of affirmation from many, but he and I are going to have a talk about this soon.  And I am going to MAKE him take the test.  So far, he's refused!  And strangely, I have no idea what his love language is either.  I am guessing Acts of Service, as he does all of our laundry and cooks all of our meals, and shuttles the girls to gymanastics and dancing, soooo.... maybe he gives what he is actually needing.  I feel the closest to him when we are spending QUALITY TIME, though.  It's not that often, but to sit with JUST HIM on the couch to watch a movie, or to go on a roadtrip, just the two of us.  We used to spend lots of that kind of time together, but now we are swamped in little girl time!  So, that boy is going to have to take the test, soon!  http://5lovelanguages.com/profile/


Shall I move on?!  WOW!
Oh, wait.  NO I can't!  I want to share one more thing! Remember, it's my way of loving you!  ha  I discovered that Ellie's is Quality Time!!  And Gabbi Girl's is clearly Physical Touch!  She wakes in the morning and reaches to rub my arm or hold hands!  But, the first thing out of her mouth is "I love you, mom" , which is also what I hear should she wake up in the middle of the night for even a split second.  She is just full to the rim with love.  It is the first thing she thinks of when given a tiny speck of time to talk, "I love you".  But, she strokes me and rubs me and wants to sit close to me AT ALL TIMES.  As for Ellie... nooooot so much!  She is the kid who (and I didn't realize this until I really thought about my kids' love languages), can tell me every single parent who has been to eat lunch with their child this year!  I mean, like, "Anderson's mom has been once.  Isabellas' mom has been 4 times, Logan's mom has been 3 times"... etc.  She even said, "and you have been two times.  That one time when you came with Gabbi.  And then you and dad and JinJin and Pops all came at Thanksgiving.  Remember?"  It means a lot to her that I walk her in the school in the morning.  And she CRAVES time with just me to sit in the art room and do projects together.  Maybe I'll be surprised someday that I am wrong.  But for now, I am trying to show them love through their unique languages.  I had my schedulers actually SCHEDULE in times to eat lunch with Ellie for the next three weeks. And when I first walk in the door after work, Gabbi runs to me screaming, "Mooom's home!"  And I swoop her up and love on her EVERY day.  And within the first 10 minutes, I have shifted to looking at Ellie's papers from school and sitting on the counter with her (just being honest here!), to talk about her day.

Shew.  Tired of me yet?!  Let's move along, shall we?

So, this is our Christmas card this year.  I don't know if I ever shared it.  I am such a slacker blogger lately.  Sorry.  It's going to be a really great blog week though, so hang on!  And let me redeem myself.

My friend, Becky Sherwin, with Focus Photography, took these pics for me.

And since this is supposed to be a random post, let me say, I really love the quote above, "When the why gets stronger, the how gets easier."  Good thought.  And the one below too.  It was on a card in Tucson... "I base most of my fashion taste on what doesn't itch."  Gilda Radner.

My older kid is obsessed with the game Temple Run, which is an app on my phone.  She screenshots every one of her scores and saves them in my photo roll!  By the way, I got all brave this past week and uploaded EVERY single one of my photos on my computer and then deleted over 2000 pics off my phone.  I got really tired of having to delete a few just to take a new photo.  And so... GONE!  Wow.  That was BRAVE and scary and lightened my load.  And now, I have Temple Run scores all over my camera roll!  Ha.  ANd by the way, if you are a player yourself, she has now reached 351,000.   I CANNOT even fathom that!! I don't hardly break 30,000 (when I am spending Quality Time with her...as I don't like to play those games.)

This is what I did the day I got back from Tucson!  The GO-GO part of my wanted to get a whole bunch done.  I had to totally resist the urge to clean out my suitcase and get my mind ready for the week!

But instead, I did this!

And I will never, ever regret the time I spent doing just this on that Sunday afternoon.  Even crazy, hyperkinetic, antsy, overachieving ME!

If nothing I said today made much sense, forgive me.  I was just typing.  And next thing you know, I was off on one of my string of thoughts and words.  If I go back and read it and proof it, I might change my words or add to them, so I think I just won't.  They are pure.  The words reflect my stream of consciousness as they were coming to me.  Feel free to chime back to me.  Remember, I am a words of affirmation girl.  Hey... WHO KNEW?!

Mo