What I Learned in August

Well, August has gone the way of all the other summer months and is now a memory. Happy September 1st, friends!

Here is a little list of the silly and serious I learned last month.

What I Learned in August:

Seeing Lady Antebellum perform live is AWESOME. Full stop. (We actually saw them perform at the tail-end of July, but since I didn’t do a What I Learned in July post, I’m sneaking it in here.) At their concert, I sang ’til I was hoarse and danced ’til my feet hurt. This means for the evening, all was right with the world. (And I promise Charles, Hillary, and Dave have faces in real life. But you know, iphones and night time and all that.)

Having a landing page for my book gives me a bit of rest, too. Have you seen it? It has all kinds of pretty graphics as well as other useful information about my little book Girl Meets Change. If you want to share the book page with your readers or friends, simply refer them to www.girlmeetschange.com. It’s easy to remember and will take them right to the page.

Being the mom of two freshly minted 16 year old boys has taken me further down memory lane than ever before. During my own growing up years, age 16 stands out for me in so many ways. It’s when I got my driver’s license, my first car, and my first boyfriend. I can easily picture myself at 16 agonizing over what to wear to school, thinking about college, and believing I was so grown-up. But I look at my boys now and think Wow, I was just a baby.

There is talk of a Top Gun sequel. I’m not usually a fan of movie sequels, but I find this one rather fun to think about!

What looks like a limitation or a disruption can really be a blessing. Two to three times a week, James takes one class at a different high school. Since he only has his driver’s permit, I have to take him–or sit in the passenger seat while he drives. This class is in the middle of the day, and at first I thought it would be a nuisance to interrupt my work day with one 20 minute car ride followed by the wait while he sits in class for an hour and thirty minutes followed by another 20 minute car ride. But I’ve thoroughly enjoyed these mid-day excursions where we have some of our best talks each week. They remind me that yes, the interruption means I can’t be as productive on the work front, but it also means I gain productivity on the connection front. And since I only have 3 more years with this precious child, that’s a better trade. Bonus: he likes to sing as loudly with the radio as I do.

You can invert the colors on your iphone. My friend Cheryl’s daughter Meghan taught me this little maneuver. I think its chief purpose is to make looking at your phone in the dark easier on the eyes. But I just think it’s a fun party trick! If you want to invert the colors on your own iphone, just go to Settings>General>Accessibility and scroll to the bottom of the list. You’ll see an option called Accessibility Shortcut. Tap on it to open the list and you’ll find six iOS accessibility features. Check Invert Colors. Once you’ve allowed this shortcut, you can enable or disable the shortcut by triple-clicking your home button. Yeehaw!

I’d love to know: What fun and fantastic things did you learn this month? And stop by Emily’s to read more “What I Learned” tidbits!