Thursdays Gift
Good Morning Friends,
Thursday is knocking on your door to let you know the week is winding down. I hope this email finds you in good health, well rested and ready to greet the day with a Positive Attitude. Have you made time to share a kind word, a smile or a moment of laughter with those you have encountered this week. Sharing these things with others; only helps to keep the positive things coming back to us. Our opportunities are endless if we so choose; don’t let life’s challenges hold you back in fear, they are given to us to make us grow and be stronger than the days before.
Welcome every morning with a smile. Look on the new day as another special gift from your Creator, another golden opportunity to complete what you were unable to finish yesterday. Be a self-starter. Let your first hour set the theme of success and positive action that is certain to echo through your entire day. Today will never happen again. Don't waste it with a false start or no start at all. You were not born to fail.
~Og Mandino
The Price of Children
This is just too good not to pass on to all. Something absolutely positive for a change. I have repeatedly seen the breakdown of the cost of raising a child, but this is the first time I have seen the rewards listed this way. It's nice, The government recently calculated the cost of raising a child from birth to 18 and came up with $160,140 for a middle income family. Talk about sticker shock! That doesn't even touch college tuition. But $160,140 isn't so bad if you break it down. It translates into:
· $8,896.66 a year,
· $741.3 month, or * $171.08 a week.
· That's a mere $24.24 a day!
· Just over a dollar an hour.
Still, you might think the best financial advice is don't have children if you want to be "rich." Actually, it is just the opposite.
What do you get for your $160,140?
- Naming rights. First, middle, and last!
- Glimpses of God every day.
- Giggles under the covers every night.
- More love than your heart can hold.
- Butterfly kisses and Velcro hugs.
- Endless wonder over rocks, ants, clouds, and warm cookies.
- A hand to hold, usually covered with jelly or chocolate.
- A partner for blowing bubbles, flying kites
- Someone to laugh yourself silly with, no matter what the boss said or how your stocks performed that day.
For $160,140, you never have to grow up. You get to:
- finger-paint,
- carve pumpkins,
- play hide-and-seek,
- catch lightning bugs, and
- never stop believing in Santa Claus. You have an excuse to:
- keep reading the Adventures of Piglet and Pooh,
- watching Saturday morning cartoons,
- going to Disney movies, and
- wishing on stars.
- You get to frame rainbows, hearts, and flowers under refrigerator magnets and collect spray painted noodle wreaths for Christmas, hand prints set in clay for Mother's Day, and cards with backward letters for Father's Day.
For $160,140, there is no greater bang for your buck. You get to be a hero just for:
- retrieving a Frisbee off the garage roof,
- taking the training wheels off a bike,
- removing a splinter,
- filling a wading pool,
- coaxing a wad of gum out of bangs, and coaching a baseball team that never wins but always gets treated to ice cream regardless.
You get a front row seat to history to witness the:
· first step,
· first word,
· first bra,
· first date, and
· first time behind the wheel.
You get to be immortal. You get another branch added to your family tree, and if you're lucky, a long list of limbs in your obituary called grandchildren and great grandchildren. You get an education in psychology, nursing, criminal justice, communications, and human sexuality that no college can match.
In the eyes of a child, you rank right up there under God. You have all the power to heal a boo-boo, scare away the monsters under the bed, patch a broken heart, police a slumber party, ground them forever, and love them without limits.
So . . one day they will like you, love without counting the cost. That is quite a deal for the price!!!!!!!
Love & enjoy your children & grandchildren!!!!!!!
A bit of humor for your day
The Taxi Driver
A taxi passenger tapped the driver on the shoulder to ask him something. The driver screamed, lost control of the car, nearly hit a bus, went up on
the footpath, and stopped inches from a shop window.
For a second everything went quiet in the cab, then the driver said "Look
man, don't ever do that again. You scared the daylights out of me!"
The passenger apologized and said he didn't realize that a little tap could
scare him so much.
The driver replied "Sorry, it's not really your fault. Today is my first day
as a cab driver - I've been driving hearses for the last 25 years".