20 Day Mental Wellness Challenge

I saw this online and decided it would be a great thing to do. 

Here is my list for Day 2

10 Things I am grateful for:

1.    My amazing husband- Peter is so loving and supportive of everything I do. He is kind and fun and funny and he makes my life better each and every day.

2.    My two incredible daughters – they are intelligent, compassionate and loving women who make me proud every single day.  

3.    My perfect grandson – William is the light of my life, he is smart and sweet and each day I marvel at how he is growing into a fabulous human.

4.    My Dad – I am so lucky that my Dad is still around and he is the very best role model for the kind of person that I want to be. He is truly an example of the greatest generation; caring for his children, his grandchildren and now his great grandchildren. 

5.    My beautiful home – I am always grateful to live in my house with our stunning view and our pool. My house is my happy place.

6.    My great friends – I am grateful for having good friends that I have known for years as well as more recent friends like my fabulous book club ladies. Friends add so much to my life.

7.    My dog – I can’t write a list without including my fur baby. I am lucky to have had several dogs in my lifetime who have added so much to my life. Lexi is sweet and such a special girl. She makes me feel loved everyday.

8.    My car – There is nothing quite like driving a convertible, especially in the gorgeous Arizona fall and spring. 

9.    The chance to travel – I am so very fortunate I have had the opportunity to travel quite a bit, seeing most of this country and many countries around the world. Travelling is an experience that changes your life. 

10.Words– I am grateful for the ability to write and my love of words; reading and writing have brought so much to my life. 

Feminism is not just for other women. Know your history

I found this incredible list online and just had to share:

10 THINGS WOMEN COULDN'T DO IN 1971…

1. Get credit cards in their own names.
The Equal Credit Opportunity Act of 1974 gave women that right. The law forced credit card companies to issue cards to women without a husband’s signature.

2. Legally get an abortion.
The seminal Supreme Court decision on Roe v. Wade, which protected a woman’s right to choose, didn’t happen until 1973.

3. Access the morning after pill. Or birth control.
The FDA first approved emergency contraception in 1998. The morning after pill didn't become available over the counter until 2013.

1965 The Supreme Court (in Griswold v. Connecticut) gave married couples the right to use birth control. 

It wasn't until 1972 The Supreme Court (in Baird v. Eisenstadt) that single women's access to birth control was legalized in all 50 states. 

4. Be guaranteed they wouldn’t be fired for getting pregnant.
The Pregnancy Discrimination Act of 1978 added an amendment to the Civil Rights Act of 1964, specificyng that employers could not discriminate “on the basis of pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions.”

5. Marry another woman.
Massachusetts became the first U.S. state to legalize same-sex marriage in 2004. That right wasn't extended to all 50 states until 2015. For the pitifully pedantic.......that right did include men. 

6. Fight on the front lines.
Women were first admitted into military academies in 1976. And in 2013, the military ban on women in combat (tied to a Pentagon rule from 1994) was lifted by Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta. Prior to 1973 women were only allowed in the military as nurses or support staff. 

7. Take legal action against workplace sexual harassment.According to The Week, the first time a court recognized office sexual harassment as grounds for legal action was in 1977.
The 1986 case of Meritor Savings Bank v. Vinson, was first time the Supreme Court recognized "sexual harassment" as a violation of Title VII.

8. Decide not to have sex if their husbands wanted to.
Spousal rape wasn’t criminalized in all 50 states until 1993.

9. Obtain health insurance at the same monetary rate as a man. Sex discrimination wasn't outlawed in health insurance until 2010. Until then, insurers regularly charged women more than men for even the most basic insurance.

10. Keep your husband who had been convicted of spousal abuse from owning a gun. Voisine v. United States, 579 U.S. ___ (2016), was a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court held that reckless misdemeanor domestic violence convictions trigger gun control prohibitions on gun ownership. In other words, until this year, the man that was convicted of beating the crap out of you and your children was still allowed to own a gun and keep it in your house if you decided to still live with him. In his house if you managed to get out.

In 1880 the age of "consent" was set at 10 or 12 in most states, with the exception of Delaware, where it was 7.

This is why we all need to VOTE! 

*credit for this amazing list goes to Lisa Bialac-Jehle, https://www.facebook.com/LisaBialacJehle/ 

I’m angry

I don’t know about you, but right now this all just feels like too much to bear. Watching the heart-wrenching testimony of Dr. Christine Blasey Ford and the disgust, disinterest and degradation of the old white men in power and how they disregarded her words has left me feeling angrier than I can ever remember. It is not a momentary anger, this is a built up frustration of decades of men being held to a different standard than women. 

·      This is an anger at un-equal pay, but I can’t even say for equal work because women work twice as hard for half the recognition. 

·      This is an anger at being dismissed simply because of my gender. 

·      This is an anger at  being told I should “smile” as a way to dismiss me and my feelings. 

·      This is an anger at all the times someone accidentally brushed against my chest. 

·      This is an anger at not being allowed to take a maternity leave.

·      This is an anger at the many salespeople that walked past me to shake hands with my husband first, as if I wasn’t even there.

·      This is an anger at the time I first got married and my credit cards were then put in my husbands name.

·      This is an anger at a voting public who believe lies about a female candidate but disbelieved the truth about a male one.

·      This is an anger about watching the Anita Hill hearing on TV back then and realizing that NOTHING has changed.

·      This is an anger at the college professor who gave my daughter a lower grade than her male classmate for the same work. 

·      This is an anger at being told I am too loud and that women should be seen and not heard.

·      I am angry about so many more things like this.

I am ANGRY because I have every right to be angry and I have just one thing to say to those misogynistic old white men who dismissed me and every other woman this week – I am angry and I WILL VOTE. And I am not alone!

Cheers to Midlife!

I saw this online and I LOVED it. This is one of the best parts of Midlife, learning to be comfortable in your own skin. 

One of the best lessons that we learn as we age is that life is too short to worry about what other people think. There is something incredibly freeing about Midlife; being able to make your own choices, being finished with raising your kids, and having the knowledge to value your time. 

We all only get so much time on this planet, and there is something about beginning the second half of your journey that gives you the confidence to put yourself first. 

I know I have worked hard my whole life. I put my husband and kids first. I volunteered in their classroom. I participated in my professional organizations. I worried about what others thought of me.  I don’t worry about that at all anymore. I worry about being happy, spending time with my loved ones and achieving my dreams. What someone else thinks of me doesn’t matter at all.  

Cheers to Midlife for helping so many of us learn how to really enjoy ourselves. 

A Day for Memories

Today is a very special day for me. No matter how many years pass, this day is one that is etched in my memory.  Eleven years ago today my life changed forever. Today is the anniversary of the day my husband killed himself.

Every year since then I have noticed that this particular day, September 14^th, is hard for me. The funny thing about this year is that I almost didn’t remember that it was today. About halfway through the morning I realized the date and I was surprised that I hadn’t even thought about it at all.  Usually on this day or somewhere near it, I tend to get emotional. I find myself feeling uncharacteristically sad, or just not quite myself. This year I didn’t feel any of that. What I did feel is a bit of nostalgia. 

I spent some time today looking though a very special memory box that I keep. Inside the box are piles and piles of cards filled with sweet and kind words from family and friends after he died.  

Eleven years feels like a lifetime ago and in many ways it is. I am happily re-married now and I can honestly say that I have never been happier in my life, but every once in a while I think about before. I think about my first husband and our life together. Our lives have all moved on without him, and on days like this I wonder if I am the only person in the world who even remembers this day. Reading through the cards helps me feel like he was real, like he did exist and that he is remembered. 

I know that people often say time heals all wounds, and while I agree that time can soften the sharper edges, wounds leave a scar, and emotional wounds leave just as prominent a scar.  

Eleven years ago my life changed forever, and today, for just a few minutes I spent some time looking through memories, and that’s okay because these will always be part of me. They helped to shape who I am today. When I finished, I put them all back in the box to look at again another time. They will always be part of my story. 

Legacy of Love - A Grandparents Anthology

Pre-order your copy today

I am so incredibly excited to announce my latest creative work, an Anthology of stories to celebrate and honor grandparents. This new book has been such a labor of love. I am thrilled at this collection of stories by a variety of authors and I hope that everyone else will love it as much as I do. 

As a relatively new Grandma I have been overwhelmed by the joy that my grandson has brought to my life. I spent an afternoon talking with my own father about being a grandparent. He shared so many wonderful stories with me about his own experiences with his grandchildren and now his great-grandchildren.  Our conversation inspired me to pursue this project. 

A variety of authors from across the country and even internationally submitted stories for this anthology. Each story celebrates the relationship that grandparents have with their grandchildren. I hope you will enjoy this collection as much as I do. 

You can pre-order a copy for you, or a gift for someone else. Click here to order your copy

The official release date is September 4th, just in time to celebrate Grandparents day. 

Adventures in Exploring Creativity

One of the perks of getting older is having the time and the willingness to explore new things.  This past week I decided to sign up for one of those silly Paint & Sip parties. You know the ones, you get to drink wine and try to paint something with the help of an artist.  Mostly it is just a fun excuse to get out of the house with your friends. 

I saw an event posted on Facebook for a local bar near me, so I asked a friend if she wanted to go.  

Showing up I will admit I was intimidated by that big blank canvass at my spot. The usual fears, what If I’m not any good, what if my picture looks terrible and I look silly in front of these other women. That’s when I realized that everyone had that fear, and the worst possible thing that could happen was that my picture would be awful and I would be out the $30 fee for the night. That’s not too awful, so I began to relax and have fun.

Our artist was fantastic – she had obviously done this many times before and she knew we would all be nervous and overly critical of our own work. 

 The first step, after ordering our alcohol of course, was to simply paint the entire canvass black. Now that seemed simple enough. 

 Feeling good that I had accomplished step one, she asked us to rinse the brush thoroughly and add some water to a portion of our white paint, so we could spatter some white onto our black background. Although this was a bit messy, I really enjoyed flicking the white dots all over my canvass and once I was finished I felt like I was looking at a night sky.  

Now came the harder parts, first she demonstrated tilting the canvass and making our big U shape for the bowl of the glass.  Somehow I tilted my canvass and still managed a glass that was straight upright in the center of the painting. I wasn’t sure how I managed that feat, but my glass looked fine so I kept it as it was.  

As we took a short break to let our paint dry, we got the chance to wander around and look at each other’s paintings. It was actually comical how different everyone’s paintings were. It was at that moment that I began to fully relax and enjoy the process. Sure I wasn’t the best painter, but having fun was really all that mattered. We mixed our colors, added some wine into the glass, and then finished by outlining the glass shape in white and adding details. 

I stared at my finished work, and decided that in honor of my wonderful book club, which ALWAYS includes copious amounts of wine, I wanted to add a book to my painting too, and the lovely instructor indulged me by helping to draw a book on a napkin and giving me a head start.

Reflecting on the whole experience, it was so easy to dismiss my talent and creativity, trying to compare my work to others. When I let go of that expectation, my whole evening changed and I was able to relax and make a pretty fun painting. Sure it probably won’t hang in the Louve, but its mine and I had fun making it – and that’s what really matters after all.