Now

A few months ago a dear friend of mine gave me a necklace with a simple silver pendant engraved with the word "NOW." I've worn it frequently, grateful for the reminder to try to be awake in what is happening in each moment, whatever it holds. This has been a challenge over the past few months as our family has been nearly consumed by a really exciting future: After years of dreaming about taking our six-person family abroad for an extended learning trip, we finally decided to do it! In two days we leave for Europe to spend "Fall Semester 2012" in Seville, Spain. Our thoughts have been consumed with the planning - passports, taxes, schools, organizing, selling, storing, packing, traveling, etc... from buying the plane tickets to picking through every single Polly Pocket shoe, we are finally organized, streamlined and string-snipped free as birds! I read a stack of at least 10 Spain Travel books, and the kids read about 60 children's books on the History and Art of Spain and Holland this Summer so we will be prepared with mental frameworks to support all the learning we'll be doing once we hit the ground. I'm really happy with our preparation, but the downside of all this future-orientation is that I have let so many minutes pass without noticing them, worrying or fantasizing about our adventure while the magic of life happens right under my nose. So the theme of this blog will be the goal of my life: to be awake to the magic around me every day, whether awe at Art museums or tantrums in train stations. I'll write about Allebest moments and Alleworst moments and everything in between, capturing as many "nows" as I can as they go by.