Today I’m reminded of why I take the time to blog each day.  I am very thankful for the daily habit my blogging has developed.  Quite often I kind of forget that I’m doing it and don’t take time to appreciate the joy it has brought over the past few years.

Many days there is something that jumps right out at me and I just know it’s what I should blog about.  Those days are almost too easy to write about.  It’s almost like they can write themselves.

The vast majority of days don’t have that one thing that immediately comes to mind.  Those are the days when I catch myself thinking about one specific question more and more often each minute that goes past 6:30pm…  “What am I thankful for today?”  I then stop and walk through the day and think through all that I’m thankful for today.  My mind combs through the day and I can’t help but smile as I do so.

This evening I caught myself asking myself that question and the lightbulb lit up while I was running through my day.  How awesome that one simple question can put such a huge smile in my heart each day?  While I write about one of those thoughts each day there are usually a dozen or more things that I pause to reflect on each day.

So today I’m thankful for the daily reflection that comes from writing this blog.  When I started I wanted to find a way to bring more joy to my life.  Today is a wonderful reminder of how one simple question can make such a difference in my life.

Thanks!!!

After yoga we cleaned up and headed up to Wausau for the day.  My brother in law, Matt, and the rest of Team USA had an exhibition curling match against Canada.  Prior to 2:00 today the most curling experience I’ve had was about 15-45 minutes of intermittent viewing during the last winter Olympics.  Never in my life had I watched a full match from start to finish, and I’d never previously set foot in a curling arena (so I’m still learning, is that what you’d call it?  A curling arena?  I hope so, that sounds pretty awesome!).

Thank goodness we were surrounded by a few folks who knew the game very well and were able to help us interpret what was going on.  I had a rough idea – get your stones closer than the opponents’ stones and if you do it often enough you win.  It became quickly apparent that I knew very little.  Have you ever seen a curling scoreboard?  It’s crazy when you first see it, but after it is explained it makes a lot of sense and is easy to read.

The more I watched the more interesting it became.  At first glance I thought it was a pretty simple thing, knock your opponents’ stones out and get yours close.  Then the levels of complexity started to show themselves, knocking out one of your own, blocking, and so on.  At one point I saw one of the teams bust out a spreadsheet.  It took a couple of minutes but I realized it was pretty much their playbook.  When you’re winning by this much at this time go with this pattern of play.  When you’re losing by so much at this turn play this way instead.  I could easily see how someone would get so fired up about something that is a very cool mix of strategy and technique.

The thing I’m most thankful for though is being able to experience something that Mat is very passionate about.  He’s been hooked for quite some time and this was the first time I’ve watched live and in person.  Between watching him throw (is that the right term?  I’m such a newb), interact with his team, and then talk about the game afterwards I became more thankful for having this opportunity to watch him do this.  There’s something special about watching someone do something they are deeply passionate about.  

So I’ve still got a long way to go before I have a better understanding of the sport, but I’m thankful for getting to experience it today.  Throw in the extra time with family and watching Matt live his passion and it’s been a pretty awesome day.

Thanks!!!

Last year Becky and I had the pleasure of catching the Dark La Crosse show. It’s an awesome event that shares some of the more interesting events in the history of La Crosse. When we saw the announcement this year we ordered tickets and opted to bring the boys. They both get a kick out of history and I’m pumped to see how much they enjoy this.

I always appreciate time as a family, the family nights like this are amongst my favorites. Tonight not only provides some time together but will also provide stories we’re likely to share and remind each other of for years. How cool; make memories, learn history, and educate the boys more about the area we live in. Gotta love events like this!

Thanks!!!

When I don’t take the time to focus on the important aspects of life it seems as is the universe is more than willing to fill my field of vision with the urgent. Funny how that works, isn’t it? Even though we know what we really should be focused on there is a gravity that pulls us towards the stuff that wants to be done now but that doesn’t always push us towards our goals and dreams.

Tonight I was able to put the focus where it should be and catch up on some critically important stuff that leads towards the completion of my dreams – of both the short and long term. While I knew I should be focused on it there’ve been so many other things that I e let get in the way for too long. With time dwindling down it was time to buckle down and focus. Once I did my eyes were opened even more widely to just how critical it was to focus on it.

Yeah, it sucked to not follow through on plans to hang out with friends, but I’m feeling so much easier stress now. Had I just gone out I knew that I wouldn’t be 100% focused and present, my mind would keep drifting back to the other project. Once this is complete I’ll be ready to re-engage 100%.

Time to sleep like a champ with much less stress!

BTW – nope, the picture doesn’t have anything to do with my post, but I’m thankful for how much fun these two yahoos had (as well as Dominic and Sam)!

Thanks!!!

There are always struggles and challenges in life. I’m a believer that if those are not present there’s something I’m doing incorrectly. In order to grow and find the true edge I must continue to push myself just past the brink of what I feel is possible. To accept this and live into this means if there aren’t struggles and challenges I’m doing it wrong.

All that said there are times when I’ve pushed to far past that brink and have fallen. Instead of going just a step past possible I’ve instead made a giant leap and landed without footing. To make that mistake repeatedly will lead to eventual failure.

There’s a fine balance to walk. Challenge enough without taking on the insurmountable. Become comfortable with being consistently uncomfortable. Somewhere in that balance lies the line I want to live on (or just a tad on the other side of 😉).

Today has been amazing. In pausing to consider the day I can’t help but see just how much of that give and take I’ve lived just today. I’ve pushed myself, I’ve been challenged, I’ve found ways to make life fit, and I’ve enjoyed the entire ride (except for the five minutes when I lost my cool before I realized my password had expired after repeatedly trying to log in).

Today has been a full day. I’ve pushed the edge, found the calm in the storm, and have enjoyed squeezing every ounce of life possible out of the day. Ahh…

Thanks!!!

When I opened up my Facebook memories from today I saw these gems from this date over the years:

As I looked back fondly on each of these moments the memories came flooding back. It is wild how many memories come back so clearly with a picture and a note.

And that’s when I realized what I’m thankful for today. I saw these two memories from the past two and three years ago:

In taking time to read what I wrote about years ago I was reminded not only of memories, but of my thought process, emotions, and the stories behind the story. Even though they are each only about 1/1500th of my blogs I can still remember writing each of them clearly as I read them. Having that level of memory to go back to has been awesome!

By writing a daily blog of what I’m thankful for I’ve stumbled into the habit of journaling.

Thanks!!!

One of our clients recently had to do a very unexpected layoff of many of our associates. While it started as just a couple of day event my team quickly saw that it might go longer than expected. Many of our associates who were impacted would have had a very tough time with not receiving a paycheck for a couple of weeks. My team quickly realized this and took swift action.

The team contacted many of our current clients and asked if they had any additional temporary work for our associates. In some cases they had to negotiate ways to make things work. When there were still more people who needed to work they even saw an opportunity to have several of the associates come in to help paint one of the units of our office!

When all was said and done they were able to help almost 30 people keep a regular paycheck coming in – all while helping our client retain some great people when they are ready to ramp back up.

One of our core values is “Do Right” and I’m so thankful for the way my team lived into this and then some. I’m so appreciative of how they went the extra miles to help do right by our associates!

Thanks!!!

From Friday night through tomorrow morning I’ve spent the majority of the time at home.  Sure, I headed out for our date night last night, out for church this morning and so on, but for the most part I’ve been at home.

The past few months have been pretty wild as the fall sports season is very much full speed ahead.  I’m sure the winter season will to, but this weekend was an excellent way to pause and prepare to transition to the next season.

With this time at home I’ve had time to catch up on a lot of things and do many things I’d been putting off for a while.  This included catching up on some work, getting a bunch of stuff ready in my workshop for the winter project season, and spending some time taking a deep breath to relax.  I’ve been busy much of the weekend, but it’s almost all been stuff that hasn’t felt stressful.

The weather really helped that feeling of changing seasons.  How beautiful was it this weekend?  This is some of my favorite weather all year!  Whenever we were outside it was so cool to see all the beautiful leaves.  So many times I caught myself mentally pausing to enjoy the change in the season.

I can tell I needed some time at home this weekend and I’m glad it worked out the way it did.  This was a great sequel into the next season of life.  Today reminded me to be thankful for the season and craziness we’ve just had, to be thankful for the next season of life, and especially to be thankful for moments of quiet and calm like this weekend.

Thanks!!!

It’s always nice to go on a date with Becky. Not only we get a date, we got to try something completely different – a murder mystery dinner party!

Becky was it online a while back and we signed up along with Steve & Kathy. We weren’t quite sure what to expect, but when we got an email with our parts we started to see where this was going.

Spending a few hours in costume was a blast. Sure, Dr Druid was totally under appreciated for the greatness he tried to bring the world, but maybe the world wasn’t quite ready for brain transplants. 😉 Regardless of whether my evil genius got the respect it deserved or not I had a great time.

Huge thanks to Becky for finding this and signing us up, I’d totally do it again. Always a great night when I get to hang out with Becky and our friends and try to solve a puzzle.

Thanks!!!

On Saturday Dominic’s high school JV season was completed.  The varsity team had their playoff game yesterday so they had practice all week.  Instead of letting the season be done Dominic decided he would ask his coach if there was anything he could do to help out the varsity team.  He offered up running drills, scrimmaging, and even team manager type duties.  Coach was happy to take him up on it.

All week long Dominic was able to do full on practices with the varsity team.  Not only was he able to help with practices but they let him come along with the team to the playoff game.  On Thursday we got the following picture texted to us:

Coach decided to let Dominic suit up with the varsity team for the game!  How cool is that?  Dominic thought it was pretty awesome to do warm ups with the team.  He was also very pumped to have his name called at the beginning of the game when teams were announced.

They lost a very close game so now the season is over.  That said, I could definitely see a little extra fire in Dominic’s eyes as he talked about it briefly tonight on our way to dropping him off for Scouts.

I’m so thankful for him to have such an excellent life lesson.  When you want something badly enough take the time to do the extra work.  Ask for the extra work if you need to.  All those extra hours and reps will pay off in the long run.  So excellent to see it work out so well for him!

Thanks!!!