Friday, January 15, 2010

Mirror Mirror

We start today by drawing names for the giveaway goodies. The winner of the blog giveaway is KIM from Texas. The winner of the Flickr giveaway is Lisa Fulmer. I will need both of you to email me at smsummerville@hotmail.com your full name and address so that I can get your goodies off to you right away.

ART JOURNAL PROMPT is MIRROR, MIRROR

interpret that any way you wish. Create! I can't wait to see your art. PLEASE share by uploading your art to the Your Life Spelled Out Flickr Group. You may join this group through invitation only so if you wish to join email me at smsummerville@hotmail.com with your request. We will have give aways twice a month. All you need to do to be included in the drawing is to upload your art to our flickr page.

Pointing Out to All that I posted another post right before this one featuring another Journal Page from the flickr group. Check it out!

WRITTEN JOURNAL PROMPT

Write a list of at least ten of your achievements. This is a feel good exercise so let's keep our minds focused in a positive direction. Some of you are thinking "What achievements! Great, now I even feel worse about myself"..STOP!! We all have achievements and we should all celebrate them. Maybe you were in an abusive relationship and now you are not..THAT is an achievement. Maybe you went back to college or maybe you never finished high school and went back for your GED..THAT is an achievement, maybe you stopped a bad habit or finally stopped biting your nails after 15 year..THAT is an achievement. Celebrate the small ones along with the big ones and do not compare yourself to anyone else. When I compare myself to others I ALWAYS loose and so will you. In my list I celebrate the small achievements along with the big ones. I have included my list as an example.

1. Gave Birth To Four Beautiful Children
2. Married My Best Friend and Soul Mate
3. Lost 40 pounds last year
4. I beat the odds and graduated High School on time with my class in 1980 even though by the time I graduated I had been married for two years and had two children. I never give myself credit for that. That is a BIG achievement.
5. Left an abusive dysfunctional relationship
6. Owned by own business (a book store)
7. Co-Founded a Not For Profit with my son to provide comforts and needs for children suffering from cancer.
8. Wrote a chapbook of poetry.
9. Was United Ways Philanthropist of the year three years ago
10. Was invited and went to the WhiteHouse with my son Ede for our work with Project Ed Bear (not for profit).
11. Surrendered My Life to Christ.

The best part is I could go on with hundreds of little achievements that mean nothing to anyone but me..like once I stopped drinking coffee for three entire months...Write down ALL of them that you can think of...Big and Small.

Please share if you wish by posting. All post from today until next Friday will go into next weeks drawing.

Have a FANTASTIC Friday.

Sending Love,
Susan

4 comments:

  1. Thanks Susan!!! My email will be on its way!!

    I know that I have achieved a great deal, but there are still things I want to do. My achievements so far are:
    Gave birth to three wonderful children and raised them to be caring, loving individuals
    Found and married my best friend Gerry
    Raised my girls after my first husband died and held myself together as I healed
    Finished my bachelors degree after losing my first husband
    Graduated with my masters degree in Autism
    And the list is still growing!!! :)

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  2. 1. I played a great concert in a park on a stage as second violin, in high school, and the sound made my toes tingle and my heart lift.
    2. At my first job, I wrote and illustrated the new employee training manual.
    3. I completed the personal banker training program.
    4. I survived half a dozen poorly chosen first relationships, miraculously.
    5. I participated on the team of EE for six years, and was part of making a difference in many people's lives, including being the solo dance :D
    6. I survived the wilderness retreat.
    7. I put up with Bob's wishy-washiness while we dated for five years, and now there isn't a better partner!
    8. I made a 3-week trip with a girlfriend to Australia and New Zealand, even though I am a CHICKEN traveler!
    9. I wrote a childrens book, even though publishing it meant copying it at Office Max :]
    10. I wrote my life story-to-date when I turned 50.

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  3. Wow Sooz, that is awesome that our wrote your life story to date! What a great gift to leave your children!

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  4. To Achievements...

    1. Gave birth to daugther #1 after years of infertility treatments and was told I'd probably never have children. She is my pride and joy!
    2. Gave birth to daughter #2 seven years later. I thought I had the flu that wouldn't go away...I know everyday that Courtney was meant to be in this world.
    3.Survived 20 years as a Navy wife...much of it alone in a strange city, raising children alone...and making a marriage work when your spouse is across the world in a war zone.
    4. Have had some very good, rewarding jobs (like the one I have now) without a college education or at times even much experience.
    5.Years ago I worked with MRDD adults and there was a young autistic man who had not talked in years and after alot of one on one time I got him to say HO HO HO at Christmas time and MOM to his mother. The tears in his mothers eyes said it all that day, as did the smile on his face!
    6. As a Navy Wife Support Group Leader of the USS Theodore Roosevelt, we were working on Homecoming bermasay signs in my garage with power tools. This wide eyed, young girl from Arkansas, who'd been married less than a year, said to me, "where'd you learn to use power tools?". I said, "we're Navy Wives we can do anything". I proceeded to show her how to use a saw and sander, which she loved. Later when I was leaving VA she told me I had been a great influence on her and what a good military wife was suppose to be like. Years later, Amber was the head of the USO in Norfolk, Va and was interviewed by CNN. She was asked where she learned to be so giving to the Navy Community and she said,"When I was a young Navy Wife, I had a great mentor". She emailed me to tell me to watch CNN that day that she was going to be on and I wouldn't want to miss it! What a special moment for me!
    7. Three years ago on an elevator at ACH, a teenage boy got on the elevator, all hunched over on short crutches and I said to his family"you can adjust those crutches to fit him better". They looked at me like I had grown horns from my head, but I persisted in telling them that I knew alot about crutches because my daughter had cancer in her leg. The mother broke down and said "so does he". We stood and talked for quite awhile and I gave her some information about a specialty doctor in Houston, TX that may be able to help them. I never seen her again. Jump forward 3 years and we (me and this mother) are together watching the documentary "The Art of the Possible" and she is describing how she met this "Angel named Tricia" on an elevator with just the right amount of information to give her 3 more years with her son. The film crew had brought us back together! I was truly honored to be a very small part in their journey.
    8.My bathroom...we remodeled our master bath last spring and didn't hire a single person to do anything. I designed it, picked out everything. (Well, my husband did have a say in the final draft.) I tiled the entire room and even put down the heating elements under the tile.
    9.I've helped raise hundreds of thousands of dollars with various cancer organizations to benefit children with cancer and especially osteosarcoma.
    10. I'm a survivor...a survivor of alcoholism, child abuse, abandomenet and loss.

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