Stay tuned for details…

I was lucky enough to spend the entire month of July at my mom’s with 7 of my 8 siblings, most of our kids, little, big and in between, and a whole posse of cousins, friends and assorted kin. It’s an annual gathering of the clan and has grown bigger each year both with family and friends and new babies too. It’s filled with lots of picnics and parties and sometimes weddings and baptisms or other special events planned at that time because of the gathering already. We all love the connection we feel with both the people and the place. And we are grateful to have the space to make it happen and a mom who taught us through demonstration the joy and the importance of the lifelong connection.

At these gatherings I get to hang with some of my favorite people in the world, my mom, siblings and all my nieces and nephews. I get to watch my kids connect so intimately with all these same people, building lifelong connection and incomparable summer memories. We swim and eat and talk and sit around the fire and eat and drink and talk some more – sometimes until the wee morning. It fills me up like nothing else and sustains me in all that I do from that point on. Really and truly and unequivocally.

Next Friday, August 7th, from 9am-pm, Carrie and I will be holding our third Mama’s Five Hour Fill Up with all sorts of new tools and ideas. I plan on bringing some of the many lessons I learned from my own mom and family into this workshop too. It is a chance to discover ways to fill your own cup, learn ways to stay connected to yourself and your family, how and when and where and why and ways to slow down and how to have fun and relish your role in all its multi-facets and many layers. We’ll offer tea, snacks, a beautiful lunch and the time and the space to just be, be, be. All you need to bring is yourself, ready to relax, receive and fill up.

Come join us. You will be glad you did.

BOUNDARIES…

I’m in New Jersey these few weeks – exploring my familiar motherland, seeing family and friends and really reveling in the fact that though many things have changed since I grew up here, there are many things that feel much the same. For example, the mountain at the end of our dead end street where I spent my first 11 years has been declared green space. The trees are a bit taller and the pathways have changed a bit, but knowing that it will be preserved for all time and for all to explore, gives me great pleasure.  I can go up there with my own kids, up on, “snake mountain” as we dubbed it, and hike, climb the giant rocks that jut out at the top, and make fairy houses out of the green moss and mushrooms that grow in every nook and cranny.

In these spaces I’m also getting to spend time with my 8 siblings, all their kids, my mom and a whole passel of cousins and other kith and kin. Lucky me! Lucky us.

We have lots of great late night talks around the lake or around the fire or around the kitchen table. Last night we were talking about allowing the lessons to unfold on their own – rather than forcing them or forcing ourselves to know what is next or what to do.

To this discussion my sister said, “We don’t have to know what to do as parents. We can trust that if we just pause, wait a bit, the answers will present themselves.”

I like this idea. It makes me think that maybe I can do this job after all.

On this day in our house we celebrate my husband and his amazing status as papa of four. A status that doesn’t surprise me, but I think still catches him by surprise from time to time. The kids made cards and a few sweet small gifts. And my older two kids saved money for 4 months to buy him an Ipod to record bird sounds so he could take it into the woods and call the birds to him. (yes, he’s a bird geek.) And we spent the day at home with little pomp and circumstance, but home all together to revel in the idea of being a family.

And on this day I remember my own dad too. Dean Charles Noll born 1927 died 2003. He was an engineer. An amateur magician. A teller of bad jokes. A loving husband. A public speaker. A lector at church. A world class runner. A carpenter. And a really great father of nine.

He died at home six years ago this summer and I was privileged to be there – as we are most summers. And one of my favorite essays I ever wrote I wrote about that experience. Happy Father’s Day Dad! I miss you so much.

Slow parenting isn’t really all that new. It followed the whole Slow Food movement when the term was coined a few years ago by Carl Honore in his book In Praise of Slow, in which he uses the term Slow Parenting to talk about bringing balance into the home.

In the past several weeks, there’s been a lot of press about the latest swing towards slow parenting. Lisa Belkin, New York Times Motherlode Blogger extraordinaire, whose blog I follow religously, wrote about it in an article called Let the Kid Be. The Today Show had a segment with our own Slow Family, Carrie Contey on set. There have been blog posts galore and slow parenting is just on the general radar for being up these days. It is touted as being necessary in the face of the recession but it is also a bit of a backlash against the idea of hyper-parenting, or helicopter parenting, that has become so widespread in our society these days.

I’m glad about this movement and this discussion being brought into the mainstream. I think it’s time for people, families specifically, to find ways to slow down. But the part that is being lost in this current discussion, is the idea that Slow Parenting and Slow Family is about the idea of finding balance and truly connecting with each other and finding the joy in family life. Slowness is not just about slowing down and doing less, but about connecting with the whole process of parenting and with family life as a whole and with each individual family member as well. And that premise: slow down, connect, enjoy is the very foundation for this whole Slow Family movement of ours.

In all the teachings and writings of Slow Family Living, we really believe, and want to help others see, that family life can be the well where members go to fill up, to find inspiration and to have fun. We strive to provide the science, the practicals and the lens for understanding, believing and appreciating the richness of building and maintaining lifelong family connections. It’s not just about slowing down. Although that is a major part of it. It’s also about connecting and really enjoying family life. Finding the fun in it all and savoring it as it comes. And I guess the slowing down, the pausing, the really looking, hearing and seeing each other is what allows that connection to form and be sustainable for the lifelong.

Our children are only children for a relatively short portion of the whole parenting experience. Soon they grow and turn into adults with whom we have adult relationships. So this idea of Slow Family and Slow Parenting, it’s not about doing less or more. It is however about pausing long enough to really and truly connect. For now and for all time. And I firmly believe, above all else, that the connection really is what most people want. With our families, with ourselves, and with all the people with whom we encounter in a day.

The end of school that is. And with the end of school comes a crazy amount of activities. At a time when I think most parents are realizing all the things they need to get done, the amount of time and energy that is required of them on the school front reaches a fever pitch. Awards ceremonies, class plays and concerts, teacher appreciation events, class trips, and more are added to the calendar in a somewhat scattered arrangement. For anyone trying to scurry to get things done before the kids are home, or at least before everyone is on a new, random, summery schedule, it seems there could be less demand on parents.

I must remind myself to slow down and try to achieve some presence which can come so sparingly when we are rushing from event to event. Scheduling less doesn’t seem too possible right now so I try to at least add spaciousness to the getting to and fro. It at least helps take away some of the panic that can ensue when I am rushing from thing to thing.

And I have on my schedule this week to set some intentions for the coming months ahead. If I don’t do it now, the panic will definitely prevail!