I've been trying not to say thank you to my kids.

 It's a habit though. It's hard to break and more and more all it gets me is a cold stare.

So now I'm doing this instead: 

"Child, you are _____________"   (fill in the blank).

(Ideas:  sitting in your car seat ready to be buckled in, putting the dishes in the dishwasher, staying quiet while your sister has a fit, smiling at me even though I know you are bored standing on this line, tying your shoes, jumping on the trampoline, eating your dinner, doing your homework, watching TV, stretching, doing a handstand, not making any sounds that annoy people.)

(I say that line with little variation in my tone, however with great presence to the subject.)

Then I say:

"What does this say about you?"

or

"What does this say about what you are capable of?"

or

"What does this say about you as human being?"

Very often, I get an actual reply....

"It says I am __________________"  (making a health choice, a good student, caring about my body, athletic......)

I agree with them or sometimes I disagree if that's what's needed to make sure they download what is really cool about what just happend. (No, Sam, your actions told me you ARE A GO-GETTER, AND NOT A LAZY POOP!)

Then sometimes I even get a Thank you!  from them. 

(This has actually happened more than once.)

There were five of us.  Luke died in 1991 when the Mac SE30 was super hot, before email kicked in. Steve died in 2009, before the 2008 financial crisis sunk in, before I got a facebook account, Mark (brother #3) had picked up over 100,000 bags of trash, and before Sandra created Giselle and almost two hundred other giraffes.

Now -  the three of us who are left, are keeping up with the tide of creativity that is washing over our planet. We are keeping up and maybe even in the wave itself, going with it, increasing it's momentum. I feel that we are an ity bity subsection of importance and enormity. 

And we have spectator guardian-angels.

This is my favorite blog entry to date:
http://thetrashwhisperer.blogspot.com/2013/04/how-to-make-bomb-in-7-easy-steps.html

And one my favorite Sandra giraffes from www.sandramoreano.com

My prior webiste was little melancholic. This new one was made by someone else, my neice who knows me. And I like to think it's how she SEES me...Happier, lighter, more colorful, with professional potential. (I'm more than half a century for goddsakes) 

ILOVE IT! By seeing the best in me, she nurture-hearted me.

Here's my old banner for old time sakes.

All of that reminds me of this: