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What can I do to hide my dark under-eye circles?
Seriously dark circles (like mine) require an extra step. I love Bobbi Brown’s Corrector in “Light Bisque”. It’s a pink gel-like cream that neutralizes blue undereye darkness and serves as a primer for your regular concealer. Yes it’s one more step in your makeup routine, but I promise, it’s worth it!
By Shannon, a (usually) grateful mama
 It seems like every time I pop into Barnes & Noble these days, there’s a new book out about happiness. I like being happy, really I do, but as children of God, we’re not promised continual happiness. But we’re always expected to be grateful — and happiness tends to be a by-product of gratitude.
I’ve noticed that when I start to feel overwhelmed by work or marriage or mothering, my thoughts often turn to everything I don’t have. But my attitude turns around when I stop looking at what I don’t have and focus on what I do.
Then I become thankful for that barrier reef of laundry, because it means I have abundant clothes to wear. I thank God for the leaky roof because it means I have a house to live in and enough money to pay for the repairs. I may not have a new car, but I also don’t have a car payment.
It’s just a matter of perspective.
Most nights, when the lights are out and it’s time for sleep, I try to think of everything I’m grateful for and tell God how much I appreciate these gifts.
Sometimes, like last night, when I finally put my weary head down on the pillow and started to give thanks, I was so tired that all I could think to say was: “Thank you, God, for this bed.”
And then I proceed to show Him just how much I appreciated those cozy covers and that soft pillow by falling asleep before I could offer up appreciation for anything else.
In Psalm 92, the Bible says, “It is good to give thanks to the Lord, and to sing praises to Your name, O Most High; To declare Your loving kindness in the morning, and Your faithfulness every night.”
Here’s praying you’ll count your blessings today and remember to thank God for them tonight (unless you’re asleep before your head hits the pillow). Have a fabulous Sunday!
By Gwen Rockwood, columnist and mama of 3
About a month ago, Tom and I experienced a role reversal. He started working out of our house, as I usually do, and my fledgling business required me to make outside sales calls and work much more often. It was a big change, and neither of us was sure we liked swimming in the new pond.
Even though I’d worked in the business world before my kids were born, diving back into it was unsettling and scary. I’d stay up until after midnight working on e-mails and sales presentations and then wake up the next morning feeling sick to my stomach at the thought of meeting strangers and presenting my business pitch. I wondered how in the world Tom, who has always worked in corporate sales, had managed the stress all these years.
Meanwhile Tom took on the job of getting our kindergartener to school. He woke him up, made his breakfast, packed his lunch and drove him to school. When I had to be out of the house for meetings, Tom floated between work and kids, trying to field business calls and e-mails between diaper changes and sibling fights. It drove him a little nuts, a condition we work-from-home moms get used to over time.
None of it was easy for either of us and tempers sometimes flared. But we kept treading water, and, over the course of a few weeks, began to find a way to navigate this new course. I thought it was just our day-to-day routine that had shifted, but, in reality, that change of routine slowly changed us. We were both given a new perspective on what it’s like to be someone else and juggle his or her responsibilities. We both figured out that things were never as easy as we’d assumed them to be for the other person.
I learned a few things about being a dad, the most important one being this: An outside job drains a lot of energy and attention out of you. As much as you want to live in the moment with your kids when you’re home, your brain can’t seem to let go of work, especially when there’s a lot riding on your success. And shifting gears from work life to family life is not nearly as simple as we moms often think it should be. I get it now.
Tom also had a few epiphanies about being the work-from-home parent. He learned that working amidst chaos is part of the job. With small kids in the house, there’s no such thing as solitude, not even for bathroom breaks. You type with a baby in your lap. You interrupt your work focus to fix the broken Jack-in-the-Box for the tenth time or make a snack for somebody or clean up the mess they made while you were trying to get something done. And it goes on that way all day until they go to sleep at night.
One day I came home from making a sales call I’d been dreading and found Tom on a cell phone talking business while picking up about 100 paper plates our toddler had gleefully unpacked while nobody was looking. When he hung up, he looked over at me exasperated and said, “I just cleaned this place up and look at it now!” I smiled and knew we had truly traded lives for a while and were getting a real appreciation for what life is like on the other side.
We both learned it isn’t easy. We both learned it wasn’t ever going to be completely fair or 50-50, as far as workload goes. It’s going to fluctuate and change. Sometimes I’m going to cover for him and sometimes he’s going to cover for me. Sometimes we’re both going to feel like we’re the one doing way too much and we’ll probably both be right. Such is life with kids, work and a household to run. But we wouldn’t have it any other way.
Haley Villines of Rogers recently sent us a message about a new product that she can’t wait to use on her 2-year-old son, Caleb, this summer. It’s called SafetyTat (www.safetytat.com), temporary waterproof tattoos that can be customized with your cell phone number or other important information like allergies, etc., on them. They won’t put your kid’s name on the tats as a safety precaution (so strangers won’t be able to call out their name and confuse the child into thinking they know each other).
In addition to being a mom, Haley is a speech-language pathologist and makes some very good points.
“I work with lots of families who have a child who can’t clearly and effectively communicate his/her name, phone number, or parents’ names if lost,” she said. “When I share this concern with them, many have never even thought of it. After all, we never dream that it will be our children who are lost at a theme park or separated from us in the mall.”
Haley said for years she’s suggested that parents use a wearable ID (dog tags, wristbands, etc.) for their children when they’re in public places.
“These tattoos are so much more kid-friendly!” she said.
Haley shared the SafetyTat link with a friend who previously worked at Disney World and the friend said she’d seen a lot of children who could speak normally in any other situation, but when they were lost and scared, just couldn’t remember their information or were crying too hard to get the words out.
So Haley wants all the moms out there to be aware of these tats!
“I hope that my child’s tattoo never has to be used, but if it does, it will be worth infinitely more than the $20 that I spent,” she said.
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