It is cold here in Michigan at the moment. Soon it will be, “stay outside 15 minutes and get frost-bite” cold. It’s time to hunker down. We’ve already had snow days and there are more to come.

What can you do with the kids when they can’t get outside and everyone is antsy?

Some frugal, family-time options:

• Set up a card table and put up a jigsaw people for everyone to doPop some real popcorn on the stove and catch some family-friendly movies.
• Build a pillow and blanket fort
• Light candles, gather blankets and make hot cocoa for a family reading afternoon
• Have a dance party with fancy outfits and glitter lotion
• Write real cards or letters to friends and relatives. Better yet, make your own!
• Board game/card game night
• Pull up Karaoke on Youtube and have a sing-a-long. Or if family members play instruments do a little talent show.
• Set up a table to do crafts – paints, play-doh, or some snow day only crafts
• Do some fun, science experiments
• Create a scavenger hunt where kids need to find items from a list you make up
• Bake cookies from Grandma’s recipe

Stay cozy this winter!

Yesterday morning I was walking along the beach. My grandpa loved to sail so I always look at the boats in remembrance.

There are always many more boats at shore, than in the water.

When I mentioned that to my husband he said that from growing up around here, he’d see people come in from Chicago just twice a year to spend a weekend with their boat. Even the smaller boats like his co-workers have are not taken out much.

I told him that if we had a boat we would take it out every weekend. Then I thought about the blowup kayak which has not seen much use or the tent or the picnic basket.

It’s time to take them out. Let’s use our fun things. Mark on your calendar so every year it comes up to schedule time with the boat, go-cart, fishing rods, or whatever it may be.

I will also watch when I buy limited use, seasonal items. To make sure I have the money AND the time to use them. I already nixed the idea of a porch swing. It sounds nice, but I know I won’t use it much and we don’t have anywhere to put it.

What can you play with this weekend?

I created a workbook to help you make time for fun and self-care. You can learn more here.

So many people seem exhausted lately. Their leisure time is not renewing them. Often lack of presence causes that feeling of dullness. Too often recreation is the background music to our thoughts.

In order to really be reinvigorated we need to be there – seeing, hearing, smelling, feeling.

If I am in nature but I don’t see or hear because I am too busy in my own thoughts, nature can’t nurture. Crafting is relaxing in the feel of the fabric, the colors, the rhythm of the needles. When you don’t notice, you don’t get the relaxation. Reading renews when you are immersed in a book, not when you have to read the same page 5 times because you drift off.

I was reminded of this at a writer’s retreat I was on recently. We were to take an hour in nature for writing inspiration. Instead of looking around I was deep in thought – in my head again. To my left I heard what sounded like hammering. I saw a little grey and black woodpecker with a tuft of red on its head.

The bird continued to disturb the peace, but made me smile. I was out of my head and back in the world of seeing the beauty. A tiny toad almost hopped on my toe. Another huge toad was completely still for minutes. A white butterfly joined us. I smelled the wildflowers and heard the birds.

The woodpecker flew right in front of me to a tree on the right. Finally it noticed me and flew off. I stood up to leave as well to continue my walk. This time with eyes open.

***

We talk about soft time and focus in my Change Your Relationship to Time class.

I had been feeling a little jaded and cynical. Life didn’t feel very sparkly after a period of overwork. Then a ran across the word

fascination

Giggles bubbled up. What would it be like to allow daydreaming and imagination? Riding through the galaxy in my mind on a unicorn.

To be immersed, digging deeper and deeper into interest and truth.

Wondering.

Playing instead of working in my mind.

Re-connecting with soul, meaning and awe.

Feeling so alive that enthusiasm shines like sun on glass.

I want to be fascinated.

Are you feeling tired, cynical, or hopeless? What do you want to be fascinated by?

To add a little light to your day, try these elephant coloring pages. Mine are printed out to color today.

***

Photo is a screen capture of the elephant coloring page by Easy Peasy and Fun.

After a wonderful church service, the beach calls to me. I drive there with the windows down. When I arrive, I leave my shoes in the car. When my feet first melt into the dry sand, it is immediate relaxation. As I walk the pier I hear different languages spoken. Many are posing for pictures on the huge rocks next to the pier. A big black duck with a orange beak suns on one of the rocks.

Others take pictures of the bluer than normal Lake Michigan water with a purple haze at the horizon. White sails of different sizes are near that horizon, almost as many as the seagulls resting on the water. Someone sits at the end of the pier meditating.

I walk back off the pier so I can walk the shore. The cold water surprises me, but makes me feel alive. The rhythm of the gentle waves lapping the shore seems to match my breathing.

A family of ducks visit a couple on their beach towels. They simultaneously take pictures and try to shoo them away. Children laugh as they splash. An artist uses elaborate containers to create a sand castle.

My feet reach the sand once more. The sand feels warm against my numb feet. Now I walk to the channel and watch the boats slowly go in and out to Lake Michigan.

I am renewed.

Last weekend, my husband and I rode the motorcycle to the "Blessing of the Bikes" in Baldwin. We stopped by the usual diner, to meet other riders we go up with. Half as many motorcyles were in the parking lot when we pulled up.

One of the riders got a big smile when he saw us come in. "I am so glad you showed up or I may have had to ride home and do some work."

We ate our breakfast as the others filled us in on people’s absences. Mainly people didn’t come because they were working on house and garden projects.

I felt so sad. This event only happens once a year and they all seem to love the ride. They missed out on the gorgeous weather, the conversation, the people and motorcycle watching. So they could work on projects.

I see this as a huge trend. Instead of living life, a lot of people are doing more and more work on their houses to match what they see on HGTV and other shows like that. Every weekend they are working on their houses, missing out on renewing fun and other people.

I think house projects can be a delightful, creative outlet. But, when all your leisure time is eaten up by your house, you may be missing out on living life.

On my "Things I want to do this year" list, for the past few years has been "Go out dancing."

I hadn’t done it. For years.

I didn’t want to go out by myself. My husband is a no-go on any dancing. My close friends, I thought would not be interested in going out dancing. Not that I actually asked them.

So every year I thought how fun it would be. And every year I didn’t go.

When an acquaintance of mine invited a group of us to go dancing at a live band walk in a nearby city you think I would have been saying, "Yes!"

But, then that snotty voice appeared. "You don’t even know these people all that well. It will be so awkward." "You are too overweight and old to be going out dancing." "You can’t really even dance." "Boy that is late. You won’t get home till after midnight."

I almost talked myself out of doing what I had wanted to do for years.

Instead I tucked my ego into my pocket and went out dancing. I had so much fun and got to know a group of ladies better.

Do you have anything in your life that you’d really like to do, but that ego talk is getting in the way?

Do you want to save the rainforest, but don’t want the room Moms to look down on your for not bringing baked goods? Do you want to take a "frivolous" class that would light you up, but then you might have to ask your husband to drive the girls to gymnastics? What would the church ladies say if you started riding on a motorcycle for fun? (For me, absolutely nothing.)

We simplify our lives so we can do what fills our spirit and brings light to others. But, if we are stopped by that voice, we will keep filling our lives with stuff we don’t need and don’t want to do.

So what is one thing you would like to do? Can you move beyond the voice to do a tiny step towards that?

I think one of the reasons we have so many magazines or torn out articles is that we aren’t telling ourselves the truth about why we read them. We think we read them to learn new things and make changes.

But, in reality, we read them to imagine and relax.

Magazines have so many how tos, recipes, new fashion looks. But, how many per magazine do we actually use or implement?

When I read a magazine, I no longer tear out articles, except for recipes. I read with a pen to write down books I want to read, ideas for clients, and websites to visit. But, much of that is because of the work I do.

Most people don’t track any of that info. They read and tear until they have a guilty pile of magazine articles.

What if you thought of magazines as a novel or something else to relax with? You don’t have to do anything with them. You don’t have to tear out articles for future use.

The truth is, when you go to do something, most of us now go straight to the internet for a how to. We don’t comb through old magazine articles.

But, we lie to ourselves because we don’t want to admit we are relaxing. We tell ourselves reading it would be a waste of time if we didn’t do anything with it. So we tear out articles or keep the magazines to ease the guilt.

How about the next magazine, you try to relax with it? Enjoy the design. Pretend it’s a novel. Browse through it for downtime. How does that feel?

My daughter created this decoration out of a glass vase, Christmas balls, fluff, green tissue paper and an ornament.

Unless you love to overdo decorating and it’s fun for you (see Giddy Christmas), you may be simplifying your decorating this year.

What helps for me is to come up with a theme – perhaps color (this year it’s red, green, white/silver), or an objects like snow globes or angels, or themes like country, woodland, or 60’s.

A theme limits the decorations you get out of your boxes. All the gold, blue and maroon decorations went back in the box this year. A theme provides a cohesiveness to your decorating. It also allows your creativity to flow as you find objects from other parts of the house to bring into your decorating.

Need some ideas for decorating this year?

Fresh Christmas Colors

Christmas Theme Trends for 2013