I Love You! I Accept You! No Strings Attached!

Today the Friends Of Ricki facebook page asked this question:

Do you love and accept your children for who they are with 

no Strings Attached?

I do and it inspired me to write this post. I absolutely love my children with no strings attached. I appreciate them for who they are and for the very different personalities they both have and I try to foster their creativity and passions even at such a young age. It's easier with my 4 1/2 yr old daughter who loves art and music, swimming, tae kwon do, etc., because she is more vocal with what she wants to do. But we're also learning with our lil guy who will turn 2 tomorrow! 

He loves to dance so I try to play music for him everyday so he can get his boogie on! He goes crazy for So You Think You Can Dance and he tries to copy their moves whenever he's watching or hears music. His favorite dancer was Cyrus and he would just go wild watching him dance. He also loves to dress up in his sissy's princess dresses, high heel shoes, hats, necklaces, etc. He insisted on wearing my daughter's red Snow White t-shirt to Disneyland one day with his brown and green camo pants! It was pretty funny because we could not change his mind. My parents were taking the kids that day and I was impressed with them that they just let him roll as a Snow White army man. I loved that they didn't care that he wanted to wear a "girls shirt" to a very public place and just let him do what made him happy. They mentioned getting a few odd looks and some questions for it too. But who cares? He was only 18 months old! They remained positive in their answers to these questions too. 

I love them for that!  Thanks mom & dad! 

I have never once ever said to my children "that is only for boys" or "that is only for girls." Or "Boys don't do that" or "girls don't do that." Or, "You can't be that because you are a boy or because you are a girl."  And I hope I never will. You like what you like. My daughter loves to dig for worms and play with bugs, she loves science and nature. I call her my "lil Jane Goodall." Girls and boys should be free to be whomever they want. That is what makes the world a beautiful place when people have freedom of expression for who they truly are! 

When I was in elementary school I said to my dad once, "Well girls can't be a plumber, right?" and he said, "why not?" and I said, "because that is a boy's job." My dad very lovingly said to his young, impressionable daughter waaaaaay back in the 80's, "You can do whatever makes you happy. Whether that means you are a truck driver or a plumber, a teacher, a doctor, a mom.  We just want you to be happy."

Thank you Dad!  I love you for that.  I'll never forget that conversation for as long as I live. I pass those words of wisdom along to my children that you spoke to me oh-so-long-ago.  I never did want to become a plumber, but I always knew that if I did, I would be encouraged to do so. Thank you!

How would you answer this question?  Comment below.

"Be yourself; everyone else is already taken."
-Oscar Wilde

Introducing....My Video Blog Outtakes!

I had so much fun stepping out of my comfort zone the other day to make my (first ever) video blog for the Friends Of Ricki facebook community page. It was about how The Business Of Being Born impacted my birth. And it absolutely did! After I posted it I was looking through all the other takes (10 to be exact!) and I decided to teach myself how to edit them together in imovie for a silly little video. It was so much fun! Plus my crazy husband is in part of it too. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did editing it! (I'm now as obsessed with editing as I am with writing!)

A fun problem to have! ;-) 

P.S. This was my very first editing job. If you are an editor for work, for fun projects or you work as an editor in the biz please watch something from this list of films. I

f you have never edited anything before and you don't have the first clue how it's done, then for sure check out my new radical vid!

♥ coco cana

*I'm not sure why my fonts and stuff are freaking out on here. Our computer has been going "buggy" today. 

A Post A Day Project Day #5 - How The Friends of Ricki Community Has Impacted My Life.

So I logged onto the Friends Of Ricki Facebook Page today to get my daily dose of positivity and I see that they are asking for videos talking about how the Friends Of Ricki community has impacted your life. I connected with this right away because recently I made my very first video blog for the FOR community talking about The Business Of Being Born, a wonderful film that spoke to me in so many ways and also had a major impact on my water birth with my youngest baby...and in the process I discovered that making a video blog was pretty darn fun too!

Here is my post talking about my Business Of Being Born video blog, A Post A Day Project - Day #4: Hoping To Share My Water Birth Story On The Ricki Lake Show!

After I posted my first (unedited) video to their FOR fb community page I decided to figure out how to edit all of my takes together to make a new video (and I had a lot of takes to choose from!)  I discovered this new found passion for editing that I kinda had a feeling would be there because I always think in movie plots complete with music (weird, I know) but now I know for sure.  I LOVE it!  

I'll post that vid here soon... 

For now, here is my newest video blog talking about how the Friends of Ricki facebook community has impacted my life as well as my life as a stay-at-home-mom and how it changes drastically from life as a young woman without kids.  I love being a mom, especially a SAHM but I'm not going to sit here and pretend that it's all sunshine and rainbows every single day and that it's not hard and frustrating and stressful at times too.

What good is that going to do anyone?

So thank you FOR and The Ricki Lake Show (which premiers Sept 10th btw!) for my newfound passion for video blogging and editing!