4 Things I learned in May

One of my favorite authors and bloggers, Emily P. Freeman, inspires us to discipline ourselves in looking back on where we’ve been and what we’ve learned. I’m slowly finding my way around this practice although I still get surprised by the last day of the month as if it came out of nowhere.

So here’s some things that come to mind as I look back on the month of May……

I learned that I have some amazingly strong friends. A friend who is battling colon cancer right now wrote these words in a note to me this month, “This (cancer) is just another bump in the road of my path to heaven. God is in control.” Those words have been lingering in my heart and head all month long. I want that kind of eternal perspective – where even the yucky hard things can be viewed in light of eternity. This friend’s faith in God and her strength that comes from that has been such an inspiration to me.

I learned this month that compassion brings healing. I heard this from Aimee – the girl with the flesh eating bacteria who is now an amputee. She spoke at a commencement service in GA and it’s floating all over Facebook. If you’ve not seen it check it out below. Great stuff!

I learned that Sports has a wonderful impact on a student even those who aren’t straight A students. I’ve never been anti-sports. But team sports has not been a part of a school years to this point because our daughter is too young for team sports at school and our son has never had any interest in sports. And we don’t push it  –  their choice completely. So this year when our son came home saying he wanted to play baseball we were shocked and excited. We said, “Go for it!” And he did. And it was harder than he thought. The long practices. The even longer games. The bench sitting (hello, you gotta start somewhere.) Games when he didn’t feel like going. It forced him to finish what he started and be a part of a team. He studied harder because he had less time. He got physical exercise that he wouldn’t have had otherwise. And he was proud to be a part of his school’s baseball team. Something about being in an awesomely cool uniform just makes it all feel so right. We’re strongly encouraging a second year of baseball and even cross country in the Fall but again we’ll let him make that choice. I really hope he chooses to play.

I learned how to make strawberry cobbler from Mitchell’s Science teacher. And it was yum. It didn’t exactly look pretty like hers but it tasted really good. I can’t quite seem to get the “tastes great and looks awesome” combination down yet. It’s one or the other. Ha!

Here’s to saying goodbye to May and Hello June!