I tell my kids they have no choice but to have fun! When they are down, annoyed, aggravated or do not get things their way; I tell them to see what is good about it, ignore it, move on, deal with it, and always see the positive view.

I really feel happiness is a choice, and I love what my friend wrote about it below.

Àdísà Àjàmú

Unhappiness can be an addiction.* Sometimes we are so addicted to being unhappy that we need an intervention to help us get us to kick the habit of being unhappy. Bad things happen to good people, but so too do good things.

Make the commitment today to kick the unhappiness addiction: stop hanging with other unhappiness addicts, avoid or minimize entertainments that promotes negativity or disrespects our extended selves, search intelligently for the best in others, let discernment be your goal rather than judgement. Seek sun-life: expand your circle, try new things, meet new people, learn to love in new ways, find bliss and the beauty in the wonders embedded in the ordinariness of life: Reflect God and breathe life into your possibilities and into others. —Àdísà

* By unhappiness I am not speaking about occasional sadness, or those who suffer under the oppressive canopy of depression, mental health challenges or chronic illnesses.

 

Today is the Hebrew birthday of my firstborn, Yud Gimel Elul, he is 9 years old, and we will be celebrating until September 13! He is so wise, with a photographic memory, and a heart of gold, always helping everyone around him, not to mention handsome.

I am feeling grateful and blessed for our journey, becoming a mother, and learning how to go with the flow even when life throws you curves. Yesterday was a day with every plan going awry, but we kept on figuring it out, and that is all you can really do, what is the alternative?

We originally had plans for a play date for my little guy around noon, then the plans got changed to one, but we got a call that our baby cousin wanted to play, so we headed early to the splash pad of our play date later that afternoon. When we arrived, we learned that it had broken down the day before, and there were no plans to fix it since in October it gets turned off until the following summer. I called our play date and suggested we meet at 1pm at Stoner Park, another water place close by, and joined our baby cousin at an indoor playground at a mall. I treated my kids to Coffee Bean, spending all my cash, it was a nice cool way to spend a few hours before heading back outside.

We get to Stoner Park, it is packed, they have an Aztec Festival with costumes and full band, no parking, finally found parking. It is hot and humid, our friends have hard time find parking, we have plans with other friends in the afternoon, so our play date time is running shorter and shorter. When they arrive, I realize it would cost $6.50 to enter the pool area, my cash is gone from earlier, and my friend only brought $10, with her and her boy we were all one dollar short. We decided to try to figure it out, go up to the window, she forgot her bathing suit, nobody is allowed in without a bathing suit. So we head to the playground nearby, the boys have fun, it was the first play date ever for my five year old. After half an hour, we run to our barbecue, swim, eat, and enjoy friends.

Isn’t that just how life works?

We figure it out,

Most importantly we have fun!

Coach Yulia