Spain - in color

More Spain Photos...

These were all taken the first day of arrival...beauty around every story filled corner.

Barelona, Spain
November 2011

Gratitude

Today is my favorite day of the year: Thanksgiving Day. Its the one holiday where there isn't anything on the agenda of a selfish manner. No "what did you get me?", "that doesn't fit", "I would have rather had blue". No obligatory chocolate hearts, flowers or teddy bears.

Nope. Today, for me, has always been just about being grateful for the ridiculous amount of treasures in my life. Some that I have to remind myself from time to time to consider. Some that are obvious - some that aren't as obvious, but should be.

It was traditional when I was growing up that we would spend Thanksgiving with my mother's family; Christmas with my fathers. My grandfather on my mother's side (aka "Grandad") was a southern Baptist minister and he never let an opportunity to "give thanks" slip by. Each Thanksgiving, we would sit in a circle after Thanksgiving Dinner and each take turns telling the group of family members what we were thankful for that year. There were always a few uncles or aunts that would go on and on and on and onnnnnn....long speeches of Snoozitude..oops I mean Gratitude. Others had something short and sweet to say like "I'm thankful for my car". As a child these people were my favorites. This meant this circle could end soon and I could get back to eating pumpkin pie.

As an adult I miss those Gratitude circles. I miss getting to hear the ways in which the people in my life are grateful. We never fail to go on and on and on with complaints when things go wrong, but its so rare that we take out the time to go on and on and on about whats so great in our lives.

I'm not going to go on and on (ok, maybe a teeny bit), but for the few of you who read this: today you are my circle and these are the things I'm grateful for this year:

First, I'm thankful for simple but profound things, like the fact that I'm breathing and my fingers work to type this, and my legs were capable of walking me to the chair to sit comfortably without a wheelchair or prosthetic leg like the precious little PCRF children that I've been working with. I'm thankful that both of my eyes can see and that my ears can hear the music that's pouring into them right now.

I'm thankful that I have a flexible job, where I can take 10 or 15 minutes out to write this as a way to start off my Thanksgiving Day right, even if I might be AT work on Thanksgiving Day (albeit not for long!). I'm thankful that even though I'm not spending the day with my immediate family, I'm spending it with people who mean SO much to me and who will hopefully become my family of the future.

There aren't enough words for how thankful I am for my friends - near and far - who constantly open their hearts and lives to me, showing me love and friendship in the most amazing and special ways. And for those friends who are to come - I'm already thankful for you!

I'm thankful that my family is healthy - even if I can't see them. I know they are blessed and ok. I'm thankful that they know how much I love them, even if we can't talk all of the time or be together as much as we would like to be. I can't imagine a sister or brother more amazing - a father more hard working and caring. A mother that pushed me to be the best version of myself. A step-mother that loves and cares for my father as perfect as a person ever could. A step-father who did the same for my mother. Grandparents that were role models I could really respect and look up to.

As funny as it might sound, I'm thankful to be turning 26 next month. ;) Another year healthy. Another year of adventure and love. Another year of new things, new cities, new people. One more full of laughs, smiles, a few tears of meaning, a few that weren't...and overall a life that is stunning to me.

I'm thankful for my new camera...and the passion and focus that has come with it. I'm thankful for the ability to create something new, day after day after day, and hopefully to bring beauty and meaning to what I show others.

I'm thankful for my time this year with the PCRF kids. What an eye opening experience that has been. I'm not sure any other one experience in my life has shown me so much - especially in the way of gratitude.

There will never be a "last" thing that I'm grateful for....but lastly for today, I'm grateful for the person who daily changes me into a better version of myself. I didn't realize how amazing a person could be until I met him. He IS the epitome of love and acceptance. Not just for me, but for the whole world...he embodies everything that I hope to be as a person. Truly...and somehow he gets to be mine. My Chrissy.

I hope that each of you has a blessed day with your family and friends. And if you have a free minute (or 12), I would love to hear what you are grateful for. I'm grateful for YOU!

Now, where's the Pumpkin Pie!??

Spain Photos - 1 of a few...

I've already been back from Spain for a few weeks and haven't posted any pictures. Mainly, due to the fact that I haven't been able to open half of them. Don't ask.

Here are a couple so far from the trip...

Barcelona, Spain - November 2011

a Vision of Love

For all of the negative in this world - there is an infinite amount of positive. In my quest to return some sense of balance to the "spreading of news", I'm choosing to share the stories in my life that are the most positive. At least for today. :0)

My latest work with the PCRF children has supplied me with an abundance of smiles, gratitude and perspective - its given me a chance to see Life outside of my own struggles, wants and desires and through the eyes, hopes and dreams of those who start this great journey out with far less, but who sometimes give far more.

Meet Zain. She's 2 years old, from Gaza. She was born without eyes, and will sadly never see without a miracle. However, through the work of the PCRF and their teams of medical providers, Zain just received prosthetic eye lenses, even colored just like her mothers, so that she and her family can enjoy her life in as normal of a way as she can.

This little girl has stolen my heart completely. Because she cannot see, her sense of hearing is very developed and acute. She is a true music lover and I've often thought while watching her that I might be looking at the future's female version of Ray Charles. When she hears music, the rest of her world stops and she becomes fully engaged.

She also, not surprisingly, loves phones.

If you spent the day with her, you would mostly either see her swaying to the music (sometimes so faint in the background that no one else even notices) or holding a phone. Up until a few days ago one thing that I hadn't seen her do much was smile. Or laugh.




Until we put her on a swing.

I cannot tell you the last time I felt as happy as I did watching her on that swing - pushing her higher and higher and watching her sweet face react to the pull of gravity on her little tummy that resulted in recording worthy laughs and giggles.

Her little fingers clasped SO tight around the ropes that when it was time to go, I physically had to pull each of them off of the rope - one by one, much to her displeasure.

I'm not sure how much of Dubai I will remember when I leave and return to my life in the States, but one thing is for sure....this little girl is a vision of Love that I will never EVER forget.

(enter: Mariah Carey)


(Zain returned this morning to Gaza, complete with new prosthetic eyes and a glowing smile to match their twinkle - thank you, PCRF!)

Community. Love. Healing.

Since I've lived in Dubai, one thing that has been a constant complaint of mine is that I just don't feel like I "fit" here. In three long years, outside of my work family, I never really felt like I found my "group" here, and I very much need to feel a sense of community and oneness. Everything seems so shiny and brand new that you are constantly questioning its integrity, "soul" and sincerity. This has been at the core of my displeasure in living here.

Until now.

Even though I've been sponsoring a child of the PCRF for the last two years, there is nothing like getting personally, physically involved with a charity that you are passionate about. And I only "thought" I was passionate about these little guys before. Now, that I've touched one, hugged one, heard one laugh, seen a sweet little girl with one eye blow kisses goodbye to me and tell me in Arabic that she loves me.....I'm hooked. I feel like I have finally found the "community" of sincerity, integrity, "soul" that I was looking for. These people are not concerned with a life that revolves solely around themselves, their schedules, their own successes and finding ways to constantly get, more and look like "more". They are concerned with the lives of precious babies who have no way to take full care of themselves - not now as children, and without the organization, perhaps never even as adults.

To see the work that they are doing is beyond miraculous. Children come in with no legs and leave with two prosthetic legs. The little girl I visited yesterday came here with one eye that doesn't see at all and the other that has only partial sight. She will go home with a normal looking left eye and a right eye that has almost full sight.

Each year, the organization provides more than 150,000,000 USD of surgeries for children affected by the war in Gaza and they only need approximately 1,000,000 USD in order to fund this work. The money goes strictly to the transport and care of these children in hospitals around the world where the doctors are performing the surgeries pro bono.

This is why I say that Angels exist. I have now seen them with my own eyes.

Yesterday, after spending about 4 hours with little Lana and her mother, I walked away feeling THANKFUL that I was in Dubai so that I could know about this organization and have the opportunity to be apart of it. I felt THANKFUL for my eyes, my legs, my nose, my sight, my independence, my ability to run and play like a normal child, my ability to play the piano having had all of my limbs, fingers and toes. I walked away feeling "whole" again...and thankful for it. After becoming involved in a group that's sole interest is to heal those who cannot heal themselves, I found that not only did I see healing happening with these precious little children, but I felt it inside ME.

And that's the wonderful thing about Love and Community, isn't it? You get back what you give ten-fold.

Angels

When I was a little girl, I was weird (Ok, so maybe not that much has changed), but I was REALLY weird. For instance, I wouldn't eat grapes off of the vine because I didn't want to take them away from their "families". Single grapes were fine. Grapes on the vine cluster were SO not fine. In my free time, I used to sit outside watching the heavens for Jesus to come out of the clouds. And one of my most vivid memories was of my nightly prayer to God that He would let me see a real live angel in my lifetime. With my literal eyes...not my daydream eyes and not in my (clearly) very overactive imagination's eyes. I wanted to see one like David saw one in the Bible.

Thirty-odd years later, my whimsical hopes and beliefs in such things fell somewhere by the wayside. At some point, not only did I reject the belief itself, but even the desire for it at all. Sad, I know.

Lucky for me, God has a funny way of dealing with this type of attitude. He not only let me see an angel, He pretty much surrounded me with them. Non-stop Angels. Real Live Angels.

This week is the week of my mother's birthday. Three years ago, my mom became my full time angel (I won't tell you all of the reasons that I know this - you will think I'm even crazier than you already do). She definitely believed in angels, so its fitting that she became one. She knew I believed in them. She knew I wanted to see one in my life, and I think she also knew I needed a revived belief in them.

As I think about her this week, and all of the ways that I've been surrounded by her love and the love of my grandmothers, grandfathers and all of the other angels that now fill my life, I am in awe. And tonight, I sat in a room full of real live angels. As true and real as the word "Angel" can be.

More to come on those angels later...for now, I'm just thankful that even a 35-ish cynical misplacer of beliefs can see angels not only with figurative eyes, but with literal ones, and that in those eyes the belief can truly be held that Angels DEFINITELY do exist. I have proof.