One Mommy's Memos

I love to read, but for years I have read very little. Last year, I completed only 2 books (not counting books I read to my children)! “I’m too busy” has been my excuse. I’m a Homeschooling Mom. My days are focused on spending time with them and facilitating their education. And for most of their lives, most days, I have felt like my focus was on just making it through another day. I lived in survival mode, just struggling to get by each day. I didn’t feel like I had time for reading or the energy for working on self improvement or goal setting. Each year when January 1st rolled around, I didn’t want to set resolutions that I would fail to accomplish and would only lead to guilt. But in January 2017, things were different. I don’t know why exactly, but at the beginning of 2017, I felt different. I felt open, and motivated to improve and progress in my life. I was ready for change! On January 1st, I set New Year’s resolutions for the first time in years. One of my goals was to r...

I’ve read some awesome books so far this year, and wanted to share.  Here are the books: The Miracle Morning, The Not-So-Obvious Secret Guaranteed to Transform Your Life (Before 8AM) , by Hal Elrod A few months ago, I heard a leader from my church say something along the lines of "Every morning, hop out of bed with excitement and make it the best day." And I remember thinking "Yeah right." But it sounded like a nice idea, so I put a weekly reminder in my calendar telling me to do so. But every time I read my reminder to do this, I just rolled my eyes. That has all changed with this book. When I wake up in the morning, I am excited about the day, and am confident that I can make it a great day. This book has transformed my mornings, my days, and my life. I have been putting the suggestions into practice since February 2017, and as a result, these last few months have been some of the best few months of my life. I will write extensively about diffe...

One of my favorite things is walking into the room to find my 2-year-old son plopped down on the ground "reading" a book. He looks at each page intently before turning to the next. And when he finishes that book, he grabs another from the shelf and repeats the process, sometime for more than 10 minutes. My 4-year-old daughter loves to "read" too, but she mostly prefers to be read to. Of all the things we have done wrong as parents, one thing we feel like we did right was putting a book case of children's book in the room where we spend most of our time, within easy reach of our children. My husband was telling me about a book he read that talks about setting yourself up for success. It tells about a woman who really wanted to go far in her profession, which required her to read academic journals at home in the evening. However, somehow she ended up watching TV every night instead. The book suggested the reason why wasn't merely a matter of a l...