New Reality

They just keep coming, transitions, adjustments and overall new realities in our lives. In our home, we recently experienced a big taste of an empty nest as each of our three launched into the big wide world. One set out on his own with a job and into an apartment. Another for his final two years of college, at a university about a 100 miles away, the third and 'baby' to pursue dance training in a city about 500 miles away.

And then the return began, with the awareness  of COVID-19. The threats it presents have been shaping a new reality. Due to the demands for health and safety for, ourselves, our neighbors and communities, they have all three dove back into the nest of our home. It is in many ways, lovely to have them here. Due to the surprise of it, it is in many ways a more impact-ful change than their leaving was. It is lifestyle altering again for each of us individually and for all us as a family. From a family perspective it is a return to a former stage of family life but not of parenting.  From an entire life, work and world perspective, it is a new reality, beyond what any of us have confronted before.

For how long? Who knows? Make plans? Live in the moment?

As a former homeschooling family with three young adult graduates, I have been used to having everyone home. Some seasons included more inside all together time than others. Some seasons were filled with activities, schedules and commitments.

There were weeks of jam packed schedules with activities of travel, work, sports participation, volunteering and other obligations. Other seasons, there were quieter times of stay at home art projects, outdoor nature wanderings, backyard picnics, lots of read aloud time. They were in our homeschooling years frequent days of unstructured time without a schedule.

There were many days when the three kids began some self-
initiated or group project among themselves. I rarely interrupted those self initiated endeavors with my own agenda. A day of them recording their own "radio show" on an old tape recorder, home developed animated lego videos, as just a couple of examples, seemed to have, potentially, more value than would have been gleaned from a lesson from an academic program I could impose.


Even in those free for all, unstructured times it was valuable to approach the day with a routine. To begin together with a breakfast or brunch gathering, a read aloud or a check-in to see what was on everyone's list of to do lists. and pursuits.

Winter was generally a more low key for us but it also frequently, meant responding to what the weather prompted. There were ongoing commitments to neighbors to shovel snow, deliver the local weekly paper despite the cold or assess the temps that produced the right conditions to skate in the backyard rink.

All the many activities and experiences contributed to real life learning and skills; math, reading, writing, communication, project management, along with some joys and disappointments along the way.

So for now, sweet families, try to enjoy each other and your time together. Choose happiness. Choose to be positive. Choose to see the blessings. Relax, meditate, breathe, pray, read, think. Let your mind empty, wander, enjoy the quiet moment and the chaos. Be willing to see what brilliance you yourself posses and can discover in each of those you are sheltered in place with.

Travel, Trust, Technique

Recently, I traveled to Nashville to retrieve my youngest, my daughter, the dancer. She attended Nashville Ballet's summer dance intensive. Beginning her dance training "late" in her young life, she is working hard to catch up with her peers. So being away from home for over a month to focus on dance technique was a part of her plan.

For our family, sending a teen off for so many weeks was a huge first! For myself, it was a sudden transition, a preview of what is soon to come in my own life. I see my future and I am actually excited about the possibilities. First up there will be quiet time, with the possibility of uninterrupted thoughts convening in my mind and coming to fruition (or not) based on my own inclinations, not those of others in our household. There will be more travel with my husband and on my own. We will both be able to work more on our own creative pursuits. We will also have the awesome joy of  watching as our young adult children follow their dreams and goals, taking the road to enter the big world as contributing members of a larger community.

For each of us, myself, my husband, our two sons and our daughter, the possibilities are wonderful and exciting. I am thankful that we made the decisions and sacrifices that we have to spend many hours, days, weeks, months and years together developing strong bonds with each other, growing and learning. There were days of questioning ourselves and doubting our decision to home school. We had to trust again, and again that we knew our children and what worked for our family. We did make the best choice for our family by taking advantage of the option to home school. We aren't quite done yet but it is right around the corner. I caught a glimpse of the future and it is good!

Movie Night

Movie night was revived in our house to review Princess Cut from Watchman Pictures. Our currently full and busy schedule doesn't allow much time for family movie nights. The age range of teen through independent young adult to my husband and I, as well, (let's leave out the age reference here) parents of these, it has become increasingly difficult to find movies of interest to all of us.


Delighted to have something appropriate to view, my husband and I watched Princess Cut with our sixteen year old daughter. The subject matter of finding love and making plans for marriage is relevant to a teens interest and important for a family's conversations. Important considerations regarding choosing marriage partners are overlooked in our current culture, leaving the topic vague in discussions and leaving young people open to relationships of trial and error.


With a Christian perspective, Princess Cut presents the topic of marriage. It addresses considerations important in choosing a life partner in a warm and sweet way. It presents an approach not widely found currently in our dominate culture but one that deserves thoughtful attention. In the film, these considerations are all shared within the context of a family. A family actively transmitting values to younger members as they grapple with life transitions. The life phase of parenting young adults, in my experience, is not a frequently addressed parenting stage and is conveyed in this movie in a believable and welcome way. Most importantly, this film opens the door for and encourages viewers to continue the conversation within their own families about love and marriage. This movie is worth the viewing. Pop up some popcorn!

Gathering Together - The Importance of Family Meals

When our children were very young, we managed to have meals together on a regular basis. As a stay at home, homeschooling mom, I was able to gather all of us together, at the very least, every evening for a family meal.

As my children have became more and more involved in their own individual activities, I have become more of a chauffeur and a spectator. As a homeschooling parent, I am thankful that this has been a gradual process. Most of their activities are scheduled around the schedules of our dominate culture. School attendance dictates when extra curricular activities happen. So as each of our children participated more, our family schedule has had to adapt and for the most part it hasn't been too difficult. The biggest challenge and the one the most significant to our family has been the loss of opportunities for family meals.

I do a lot of driving my children around. In a big city suburb, a ride to the commuter train line can save an college student a few more minutes for study. A committed athlete may have to travel further then the local park or gym for a game or practice. Thankfully, those car rides have become an opportunity to stay connected. Unfortunately, those car rides have also become snack or meal time and even more unfortunately replaced family meal time.

There has been research done on the topic of family meals. There are positive behavioral outcomes of adolescents as a result of having consistent family meal opportunities. All of the research that I have seen points to long term benefits of regular family meal time. Gathering together is a valuable family activity and in my opinion, parental responsibility. Not always easy to accomplish, but important and rewarding.

Without the benefit of reading research, I think most parents realize the value of having regular meals together with their children. Meal time offers an opportunity to reconnect after a busy day. Gathering together around a family meal table can provide nourishment physically, emotionally and spiritually. Time to talk and just be together in an familiar, supportive environment means love to us humans. We all need that to continue to function well in the world.

From garden...

...to table.
Family meals provide an opportunity
to learn about nutrition. 

My own observational "research" is simple. When the Run-Ran family (that's us) skips family meals too often, (over the course of a week or two) my young adult children and teen begin to ask about it. They start to ask when and what's for dinner. If I get it together after those requests, announce a time and a menu, they all make the effort to be there. When schedules permit and a few of us are involved in the planning, preparing and eating of a meal the experience is even richer and more satisfying. We enjoy each other's company and stay connected, despite where each of us is participating in the big wide world.

Meals out and about together are great, too.
My husband serves up pizza during a family vacation.

Someone say "dinner?"

If you are interested in reading a bit of evidence based research on family meals check out the article on the National Institutes of Health website. Link here: PubMed article..

The PubMed article's conclusion copied here:

CONCLUSIONS:

Results from this study suggest that regular family meals in adolescence may have a long-term protective association with the development of substance use over 5 years among females. Parents should be encouraged to establish a pattern of regular family meals, as this activity may have long lasting benefits.

Linked below; a few family mealtime table conversation and encouraging resources at Amazon:

Remembering...

Updated 9/10/2018

We attended this emotionally moving event last year at this time. The flag display with featured commemorative events was held in the park of a community that we passed by on a daily basis. As we drove our daily route, we were witness to the coordinated efforts of volunteers as they placed the flags in the field over the course of several days. A quote from the event details for an upcoming 2018 Field of Honor event taking place in Tennessee describes my realization perfectly when this morning my daughter asked and research if the event was taking place near us again this year.

"The panorama of red, white and blue is hard to describe, but once experienced it is not to be forgotten."- from the Colonial Flag Foundation website.

We were all deeply touched by the impact of the field of flags with the attached personal info of each victim of the 9/11 attacks. If there is a Healing Field or Field of Honor Flag Display event happening anywhere near you, I'd recommend a visit. You can find event info here: Schedule of events.

Sixteen years old now, our daughter was one month old on 9/11.

Our youngest was one month old on September 11, 2001. It was a beautiful clear fall day in Chicago-land. My stay at home mothering activities of two young boys and a baby, included preparing breakfast and getting everyone out into the backyard to enjoy the wonderful weather. My first awareness of the attack on the World Trade Center came through a phone call from a friend who knew I wouldn't be tuned into the news. The awareness of the event explained the unusual, and in retrospect, eerie quiet of the beautiful morning. A quick peak at the tv seared an image of the burning twin towers into my mind. Fear churned internally with the added anxiety of being unable to contact my husband at work in downtown Chicago. I avoided sharing the national news with my children. The scary violent images had no place in their young psyches'.

Healing Field Flag Display

We were fortunate not to suffer a loss of a loved one directly, as so many others did that day. 2,976 families were forever altered that morning by losing a loved one, many more in the following days, weeks and years as a result of the attack. Looking back now, I can see that we were all changed that day. We were changed as individuals and we were changed as a country. We all moved on, living our lives, being about our work and raising our families but everything was different.

Education

Learning history.

It has taken me sixteen years and attendance at a local Healing Field to really acknowledge and verbalize to my children the change that occurred that day. A Healing Field Flag Display was hosted by The True Patriots Care Foundation in a nearby suburb. In tribute to those who perished on 9/11, 2,976 American Flags were posted in perfect rows. Each flag bore a ribbon and card with a brief biography of the honored victim. The event included programs and participation from veterans, community and school groups.

I visited the field several times, once with my sixteen year old daughter, once alone and again with my husband and children. The attention to detail and the overall impact of the flags displayed, one for every victim, was overwhelming. Inspired by the display of flags; information, stories and emotions were shared with family and complete strangers. Words alone are inadequate in the processing of the tragedy itself and the resulting pain it caused. The events of 9/11 are still incomprehensible but awareness of it's overall effect on us is essential to the continued healing of our country and to the healing of each of us individually and within our families. We share, we teach. We remember...

Traveling with Young Athletes

Our teenagers participation in sports has sometimes required us to travel long distances to events. So far, this has always been because they have achieved entry into a level of competition that they worked hard to accomplish. A regional or national competition is a big deal and something we felt deserved our commitment as parents to assist them in participating in.

Needless to say, travel is expensive. Our family vacations have predominantly been budget conscious adventures, tent camping, lots of sandwiches on the road, etc. So our earliest sports travel expenses were quite a shock. Fun and exciting, but did a number on our budget! I began to explore options and ways to reduce the expense. One wonderful discovery was of Airbnb. Not only did Airbnb save us money but the accommodations were actually beneficial in many ways, especially for our daughter, as she competed at gymnastic meets.

Staying in the hub (the designated host hotels) of competition excitement can be invigorating but it can also be distracting and overwhelming for an athlete as they prepare for high level competitions. In the case of gymnastics there are often many athletes of varying ages with different needs and expectations. The activity level can be distracting. Socializing looks more fun than getting rest, eating well and staying focused. The food choices, especially if your funds are limited can be restrictive.

Food

Healthy nutrition is an important component for competing athletes. Eating on the road is typically more restrictive and finding good nutrition on the road is difficult without over spending. It can be difficult to maintain a healthy diet especially one required by a young competing athlete while traveling. Staying with Airbnb hosts has been amazingly beneficial for us, in this regard. We have been able to find accommodations that have provided access to complete use of a kitchen, allowing us to prepare food for ourselves instead of eating out or resorting to packaged items. In one case we were asked by our host in advance, what items we would like to have available for breakfasts. When we arrived we were greeted by a well stocked supply of appropriate, start your day right, meal choices.

Share the Expense 

Trying to keep costs down, we have organized with other families, to share the expense. Due to different competition levels, schedules and needs of the athletes, arranging to share accommodations can be helpful or honestly, only add to the level of stress. We have at times been fortunate to have teammate families that have been willing to share travel and/or accommodations. Depending on the location and distance, sharing driving especially, can be much more cost effective than air travel.

We have shared both hotel rooms and airbnb accommodations.  The advantage to sharing an Airbnb is the wide range of options available. There are whole houses, or single rooms. There are luxury accommodations, or bare bones facilities. In one situation, we shared with another gymnast and her mom, we had two lovely bedrooms (the girls shared one, us moms the other), The downside of this arrangement was the chatting that went on into the night, infringing on sleep. And it wasn't the girls who were up late into the night chatting and losing sleep. We have always had access to a kitchen when staying in an Airbnb.  As a result, we have been able to provide the best nutrition and cook up some great meals. After one meet we were able to share a wonderful meal of celebration with our hosts. You never know where support for your young athlete and your family will come from.

Pineapples are symbols of hospitality. Airbnb hosts deliver.

Visit Airbnb

Heritage Food In Our Family - Rosolje - Beet and Potato Salad

We have so many ethnic food choices in the USA.  At any given meal, we can eat cuisine with influence from almost anywhere in the world at a local restaurant. We can eat take-out of almost any kind and most of us know at least a recipe or two to cook up in our own kitchen that isn't originally from our own ethnic background.

My husband, Avo, is Estonian. Both of his parents immigrated to the USA following World War II. His first language was Estonian, his early years were spent in a thriving and tight knit Estonian community in Chicago. As in most ethnic communities, opportunities to get together included traditional food.

Estonian Flag

One Estonian side dish that I delight in is Rosolje [row-sohl-yeh]. My appetite for Rosolje may be one of the little things that contributed to my change of status from out-law to in-law in my husband's family. I love this salad. I consider it a complete meal in itself. It contains all kinds of wonderful and nutritious goodies; pickled beets, apples, dill pickles, and sour cream, meat and eggs for protein.

When I've questioned my mother-in-law about the origins of Rosolje, she shrugs with the common response of someone being questioned about their own cultural traditions "It's just always been there. My mom made it, then I made it." Too familiar to question, we had to do a bit of research to learn the history.

Traditionally served in the fall, you may also find this amazing salad at any gathering, including the summer solstice, Jaanipaev celebration. Rosolje became popular in the 1920's, originally made with herring (common Estonian fare), it has evolved and each cook adds the meat of her choice. The measurements of each ingredient were hard to pin down, even the published recipes vary in individual amounts per ingredient. When I make it, I have done the same and fortunately, my results have been given the nod of approval from both my kids and mother-in-law, from where I was gifted the recipe.
Thanks, Tiina.

Here's the recipe.

Rosolje - Serve cold.

Cube the following ingredients:
2 cans of pickled beets (Aunt Nellie's) Save the juice.
5-6 dill pickles
4 apples (Granny Smith or Golden Delicious)
6 big potatoes - boiled and peeled
3 hard boiled eggs
Cooked cold meat - cooked cold pork roast, smoked turkey or smoked ham are a few of the possibilities. I use ham and have never tried it with the traditional herring. Cube about 1 - 2 cups.


Get some help for cubing (it takes awhile). The expert Estonian cooks say, whatever size you cube the ingredients into, to try to get all of the cubes the same size.

For the dressing:
1 1/2 cups sour cream
1 1/2 teaspoon dry mustard (Colman's)
Add beet juice until you have the desired pink.
Mix it all together. Refrigerate for several hours.
Serve cold.

Mix dressing to desired pink.

Handing down a traditional recipe.
Adah and Grama Tiina.

This recipe shared on Creative Muster.

Into the World of Competition

One of the amazing places my youngest, my beautiful and talented daughter, Adah, has

led us to, is into the world of competitive gymnastics.

We didn't set out to be gym parents but as a homeschooling family, we looked for opportunities to have our children interact with others and to be physically active. Play dates worked for quite awhile, especially when my children were toddlers and when my boys were under five. As they grew and their interests broadened, they gravitated toward the learning of more nuanced physical skills. While they still enjoyed and valued unstructured play, they desired the learning of specific skill sets. Developing and incorporating new physical skills requires teaching, training and practice. So we began to supplement the free play with some structured activities.


Organized sports programs.

Community organized sports offered interaction, physical activity and the opportunity to learn specific sports skills. Pursuing all of the above, we have found ourselves involved in organized sports programs with our kids for over a decade now. Our boys have participated in organized baseball, basketball, hockey to varying degrees, as well as in friendly neighborhood pickup games. There are more than a few stories, current and from recent family history about those activities to share. However, the given moment of the season is with my daughter; this post is about the amazing and demanding sport of gymnastics.

The gymnastics pursuit all began as an innocent interest on my part in getting my daughter into an activity of her own, where she could meet others her own age, where she could have an experience of physical activity in a structured class of her own. She had been spending a lot of time at her older brothers' baseball games and though they willingly taught her baseball skills, she showed no interest in following that beaten family path for herself. The most appealing thing about a baseball game to her was the park playground.

The climbing, tumbling fun of the playground, her interest in dance, her desire to meet and share time with other girls and probably significantly, winter, led us to a community tumbling class. I never dreamed that class would lead us into a competitive sport with my youngest. She enjoyed it and she was good at it. One class lead to another, to a training team and an invitation to join a competitive team. Eight years later, we are entrenched.

Gymnastics takes a huge family commitment for a child to participate beyond a class or two and into competition. 

As she achieves new skills and advances through the levels, I marvel at what we and so many families do to support the participation of a child in gymnastics. Despite the fact that it is her sport ( I work really hard to keep my own issues separate and to maintain the resolve that it is her sport, not mine, not ours, hers) it is a sport that requires a huge commitment from those supporting an aspiring gymnast. A gymnast's, almost daily, attendance at practices requires transportation and family scheduling to accommodate. Everyone else in the family has to adjust. We continue to eat dinner as a family regularly, but that meal isn't usually served until 8 pm, after practice. There is a substantial financial commitment that is placed on a gymnast's family that can be a burden when money is tight. (For more on that ask a gymnast's siblings).

The rewards are great as well. 

To watch a child grow and learn from the demands required is inspiring. To achieve the series of movements it takes to perform a seemingly impossible routine on a balance beam, or to finally tumble a dreaded pass across the floor with grace is a truly remarkable feat and a joy to behold. There are benefits that make providing the support behind the scenes worth while. 

The benefits of participation in the sport of gymnastics that I have observed for my now teen daughter include:

• Excellent physical conditioning, 
• a strong sense of what she can accomplish,
• an understanding of what it takes to excel in an elite sport or in any endeavor,  
• confidence,
•  positive self and body image,
• discipline, 
• strong bonds with teammates and friends who participant in gymnastics,
• appreciation of the challenges and accomplishments of others, 
• required healthy eating habits, 
• an interest in maintaining good health, 
• an interest in women's sports in general.

                                                                                 

So we are off to the next level of competition. I am looking forward to witnessing the culmination of all of the hard work my daughter has put into this endeavor. I am grateful for the opportunity. I am most grateful for the opportunity to have a very special trip together that rewards her dedication and her hard work and will more importantly, allow us to create lasting memories of love and support. 

Good luck, Adah! No matter where you place, you will always be a 10.0 in my heart!