 Kelly Neylan, from Columbia, Maryland, is the founder of BuddhiWear Organic Apparel (www.buddhiwear.com) and Lasting Light Yoga & Reiki. Here's what this, dedicated eco-advocate and mother of two, Julia, five, and Ethan, two-and-a-half, has to say:
“I am celebrating finding the time this year to launch my new business and to be an environmental spokesperson. Initially, I thought I couldn't do it since I am the full-time mother of two small children but somehow I found the courage to preserve. I am educating people about the personal and global impact of the clothes that we wear—and doing it feels great. I finally feel like I’m doing something worthwhile with my time. I’m so excited I just want to go out in the street and dance about it. I hope that I can serve as an inspiration to other moms out there to follow their heart and launch their own businesses—it is so , truly fulfilling.
I am also celebrating building a little bit of me time into my schedule. I finally decided to put myself first. Being a work-at-home mom has it’s challenges and I used to find myself becoming burned out and easily fatigued. Now everyday I take the time to do something for myself. Some days, I do yoga or read a book; on other days, I go to the gym (taking advantage of the daycare the gym provides), enjoy a nice cup of tea in room by myself, do a Reiki self-treatment or talk to a girlfriend on the phone. If I’m having a particularly bad day, I try to sneak off to the gym and go into the sauna or hot tub and just relax there while my little ones are in the nursery. I find that these little pick-me-ups really fire my spirit back up, helping me to take on the day and be a good mother and business woman. Putting myself first allows me to refill my well, so to speak, so that I have the reserves to thrive at the busy job of motherhood.” |
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 Sharon Cindrich is the founder of www.pluggedinparent.com and author of E-Parenting: Keeping Up With Your Tech-Savvy Kids. Here's what this Milwaukee, Wisconsin, mother of two has to say:
“Our family loves celebrating. Holidays, birthdays, sports victories, good grades—even bad days sometime get a “We made it!” celebration in our house. If there’s an excuse to eat cake or pick up an ice cream cone at the drive-thru window, we’re there.
This time of year, we are celebrating the first snow of the season, Christmas and the coming of the New Year. We do it up big in our house: cookies, hot chocolate, homemade fudge, stacks of wrapped gifts, a real evergreen tree and lots of fake garland.
The kids are definitely celebrating a highly-anticipated winter break and the half-way mark in the school year. Maddie, my eighth grader, is anxiously awaiting her launch from middle school to high school, where she’s sure everything will be much better, much cooler and much more interesting. Henry, my fifth grader is half-way through the last year of elementary school. He’s looking forward to middle school lockers, à la carte lunch choices and switching classes, all promising to be much better, much cooler and much more interesting than kindergarten through fifth grade, of course.
And tucked between the holiday open houses, school orchestra concert and the Sunday school Nativity re-enactment, between making 40 pounds of fudge for teachers and wrapping dozens of gifts, I’ll be celebrating my 40th birthday—a launch of my own to some divine wisdom? Clarity? Sophistication? Well, at least that’s what I read somewhere. If nothing else, it will be an “I made it” moment for me, deserving of, at the very least, a drive-thru ice cream cone.
What is more clear than ever, as my kids grow and become busier with their own friends, holiday parties and inside jokes, is that whether we are sitting in church together on Christmas Eve or lounging around on a chilly winter day watching cartoons and folding laundry, our regular time together as a family is packed with moments worth celebrating—if only from my own private, thankful, joy-filled observation.
Hey, that clarity might just be kicking in!” |
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 Susan Stonecypher lives in Jackson, Mississippi with her husband of eleven years and her nine-year-old son Noah. Here's what this travel-loving, vegan who rescued four dogs and one cat post-Katrina has to say:
“This year I am celebrating my decision to leave the corporate world to become a stay-at-home mom and Noah's decision to leave school to become a stay-at-home kid. We're having such a incredible time and we are both learning for the pure joy of learning. People have asked me about what we do all day and my answer is what don't we do. We go on dog walks, visit museums, make art, work in the garden, read together and alone, watch movies, etc. Even the errands are opportunities for Noah to learn math, geography, spelling and all sorts of things in context. The bottom line is that we live our lives together as a family each and every day. Having come from a family of educators and having spent so many years of my life invested in schooling, someone would have had a hard time telling me a few years ago that we would become an unschooling family one day. The smile on Noah's face each morning is all I need to reassure me that we have made the right decision for our family. If you are interested in unschooling, check out Life Learning Magazine (www.lifelearningmagazine.com) or anything written by John Taylor Gatto.” |
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