Start the tradition of First Sunday dinners. On the first Sunday of the month, have a "mini-holiday" dinner. Invite family, friends. Use the nice dishes, make a big meal. Celebrate family.


4-18



Sometimes it happens that what you do [for a living] is who you are. I’m reading a great book about that called The Women by Kristin Hannah.


16, 20, 21



Never tolerate abuse. But definitely learn how to throw annoying habits and stupid drama in the bucket of the 10% of things you don’t like about being in the relationship. Even the most beautiful stallions poo, everything produces waste. Clean the waste, deal with it as a constant byproduct of life. don’t $@!#% the horse so you don’t have to deal with poo.


17, 21



A lesson from author Tom Zumba. I hope you’ll never need it: “There is nothing nothing easy about this thing called grief. Nothing. But I ask you to please please please say yes more often than you say no. Say yes to you. To possibility. To hope. To love. To life. To healing. Please choose the light more often than you choose the darkness. Not that there aren't gifts in the darkness. There are. But it's often so much easier to find them the gifts in the light. Do all you can to stay in the light. Please remember that the person you love so so so dearly lived. Don't forget that. He lived. She lived. Here with you. And your relationship continues. Always. Don't be so overwhelmed and paralyzed and pissed off that he died that she died that you spend most of your time focusing on their death. Focus on your life. Together. Say yes as often as you can. Choose light as often as you can. Remember that he lived as often as you can. Don't lose her in the details of her death. This thing called grief is hard hard hard work. But you are stronger than you think. His book is called Permission to Mourn


21



Apollo 13 and The Martian Great movies about space, science, engineering, etc. Watch together.


12



It’s okay to not understand things. Just be sure the only place your ignorance leads you is to education.


15, 19



Remember that whoever you’re grieving would only want the best for you.


20



Being a professional means taking your work seriously not necessarily taking yourself seriously but take the job seriously, you’re there to do a job your income and the income of those around you depend on it is not a joke. It is not something to be played with you made a commitment, honor it. Show up, prepared and ready to work. Be there on time dressed well alert and positive..


16, 17, 21



Being accountable means saying that I was responsible for making sure this did not happen - but it did happen. I accept the blame and an prepared to incur the consequences. I will work earnestly to earn back your trust and confidence. The opposite of accountability is to make excuses or blame someone else for your mistake.


10, 18



Train for a mini-triathlon together as a family this year.


12



Try not to say insulting or hurtful things, but NEVER write them. (Texts, notes, emails, etc.)


11



None of us sit high enough to look down on anybody.


11, 14, 17, 21



Fire drills. Practice what to do, where to go if the house is on fire. Have an escape plan.


5-10



Always have a 5 year plan. Be thinking of goals you want to work towards, however big or small. What inspires you? What drives you? What do you want to accomplish or cure or solve?


15, 17, 21



Sometimes grief looks a lot like anger. Are you upset about something you lost or had to let go of?


15, 21



Keep going. Push yourself. The struggle makes it all the more worth it.


17, 21



“It’s best if we don’t speak for a while.” Practice it


19, 21



If you don’t have anything intelligent to say on a subject it’s fine (encouraged) to say nothing. Listen. Learn.


20



“Where you stand depends on where you sit.” It means your personal situation informs your stance on issues. Try to imagine how you’d vote if you were sitting at a less privileged place.


15, 21



Monty Python movies.


12-15



Talk about how choices become habits. Habits can become addictions. Describe how pathways are literally dug into the brain and it's very hard to change them once those paths are made.


13-16



2

Keep a pair of nail clippers in the car - much better lighting outside. Clipping tiny fingernails is terrifying!


Infant-1



Blessing for the Brokenhearted: Poem by Jan Richardson ___________ "There is no remedy for love but to love more." – Henry David Thoreau ________________________ ________________________ Let us agree for now that we will not say the breaking makes us stronger or that it is better to have this pain than to have done without this love. __________Let us promise we will not tell ourselves time will heal the wound, when every day our waking opens it anew. ___________Perhaps for now it can be enough to simply marvel at the mystery of how a heart so broken can go on beating, as if it were made for precisely this— as if it knows the only cure for love is more of it, as if it sees the heart’s sole remedy for breaking is to love still, as if it trusts that its own persistent pulse is the rhythm of a blessing we cannot begin to fathom but will save us nonetheless.


20



Give baby a banana before bed and they’ll sleep through the night. (Obviously once they’re on solid food.)


1



Alcohol is a depressant. Never drink to feel better. It will only make things hurt worse and be worse. Only drink in celebration or community. Never to numb. That sh*t is poison. Pure $@!#% juice.


18, 19, 21



What’s the Mark Twain quote about it’s not what you don’t know that gets you into trouble it’s what you know for sure that just ain’t true.


13, 21



Checkout Bedtime Math app. It’s a tool to make math fun.


5



Sex: There's no single way to do it "right" but there are lots of ways to do it wrong. Not being respectful and tender towards your partner is usually at the root of "wrong" ways to do it. Also, there is no rush. You may think all your friends are "doing it." They're not. Take your time.


16



The $@!#% never ends. Dealing with the $@!#% IS your job. If you think you’ll ever reach a “post-$@!#%” stage in your life, you’re wrong.


14, 19



Your sex life should be safe, happy, healthy and consensual. It may or may include going all the way. There’s no rush, every relationship is different. You should feel safe and so should your partner. A lot will be a mystery but you should feel safe. You should be able to trust that your partner won’t intentionally hurt you, emotionally or physically. If you don’t trust your partner to keep you safe, get out.


17