How this Baseball Coach Taught Me to Coach my Kids

by Christie Perkins

I have learned a great deal about coaching kids through others. Sometimes kids fall. Sometimes they mess up. Sometimes things don’t go quite right. Our response is crucial to their learning process of who they are. Of the many great coaches we have had in life, one moment stands firm in my mind. I feel impressed to share it with you today, not last week like I was going to.

Someone needed this today.

We all have coaches in life. Sometimes we are the coach. Sometimes we are the player. I learned something great through one of my boys’ baseball coach. I believe it is key to how we coach our kids, especially when they mess up.

“She turned to the sunlight And shook her yellow head,And whispered to her neighbor_ _Winter is dead.”(3)It was pouring rain. But we were playing ball anyway. Too many games have been cancelled this year already. And since the game started out dry that was good enough.

I huddled under layers of blankets with the denim quilt as my oversized poncho and hair destroyer. Lovely. The afghan wrapped around my arms and legs kept me mostly warm with frequent blasts of cold air finding its way through the holes.

Sly comments about a holey blanket in this mad weather kept coming back to me. Again, and again, and again… and I could see the obvious mistake. They were absolutely right. Continue reading

How Dealing with Cancer is Like Building a House

by Christie Perkins

If you have ever built a house you know the deep ditch neuro pathways you carve from overthinking details.

You even sometimes dream about the process… or have nightmares.

“She turned to the sunlight And shook her yellow head,And whispered to her neighbor_ _Winter is dead.”(1)You have lived in other places and you quickly categorize what you like and don’t like. You adopt and adapt from previous experience the things you should do for the next house. But some things you take for granted, like the placement of plugs. You don’t really think about those details because someone else does the thinking for that.

Unless you’ve had a bad experience with that.

In my last house I had one light switch in a bedroom that was vacationing halfway down the wall. Ok. Maybe not that far. But, you would practically jab your armpit with the door frame before you found the switch… and I always prayed that a spider wasn’t playing boogie man as I felt the wall.

That’s crawly (not to mention creepy). Continue reading

Have To; Need To: Knowing the Difference

by Christie Perkins

Have To; Need ToDo You Know the Difference_Today’s going to be different. I’m dropping what I have to do for what I need to do. Today won’t be filled with perfecting a blog, crunching my time to meet a deadline, and stealing my midnight dream opportunities for what has to be done.

My brain and body is going to love this.

Sure. There will be things I “have” to do. Yes. I will eat. But, I’m not just going to shove food down the hatch to satiate the grumbling tummy so I can get to the next thing. I’m going to picnic on my already cruddy floors with my preschool child. We are going to yak about pigs, friends, and monsters. And we are going to put a few more crumbs on the floor.

We are going to connect. Continue reading

The Key To Better Relationships: Stop & Refocus

by Christie Perkins

A while back I prayed to find out what I needed to do to be a better mom (that was the gist of the prayer anyway). I wanted a little more mojo between us. Not that the kids and I had a bad relationship but I just wanted more relationship superglue before the teenage years hit. S A I L O R SC L U BYes, I wanted that uber connection-greed associated with moms and their midget genetic counterparts. A specific thought entered my mind:

…get off the computer when the boys get home.

Ah, yes.

Bingo. It was a good idea. I could see the benefit of this counsel. Sometimes those thoughts come and I shift my head back, turn my chin slightly to the side, and scrunch one eyebrow. That? That’s the answer? But not this time. This made perfect sense. Continue reading