Can’t stop! Won’t Stop! (but I will remember to stop and enjoy the moments)

Have you ever been so busy that when you finally take a breath and you hear birds chirp that you are surprised by that beautiful sound?  I have had my head so buried that I was not seeing, or hearing, the beauty all around me!  This happens to me sometimes and I need to pull myself up and find some balance!  I am grateful to the birds who pulled me out of the minutia and back to gratitude!

It is so hard to find the balance when so many amazing things are happening that all need your attention!

In the last week, at the National Playhouse alone, we finished our build-out of the new expanded GiGiFIT Gym and GiGi Professional career training center for our adults, hosted hundreds of people at GiGi Fest, welcomed the executive committee of the Barrington Junior Women’s Club, facilitated the groundbreaking full day Artificial Intelligence meeting with Microsoft, partied with 50 families for the Amina Grace Speech & Language program $100,000 check presentation, did a grant presentation and oh yea, facilitated program sessions for hundreds of kids!  This does not include the other day to day activities for the GiGi’s network and my family life!

 

 

Each one of these events was special in its own way!

  • Finishing construction on the GiGiFIT gym and GiGi Professional will allow us to more than double the number of kids we serve in therapeutic fitness and career skills.
  • GiGi Fest celebrated 15 years of GiGi’s Playhouse and millions of hours of free services to our families!  Last year alone we gave out over 200,000 free therapeutic, educational and career development program hours!
  • When we first opened Barrington Junior Women’s Club was one of the first grants for the Literacy Program that now serves thousands of kids across the country. They visited the Playhouse and witnessed the incredible growth we have achieved since their initial grant. Support like these powerful organizations continues to help us grow and achieve our mission.
  • OMG! We had the Microsoft meeting! Microsoft came to GiGi’s for an 8-hour planning session on how Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning can help individuals with Down syndrome!  We have agreed to start with hypotonia (low muscle tone) but the possibilities are endless!
  • We also celebrated the Amina Grace Speech and Language program with the family who started the program.  I am always in awe of this family.  They lost their beautiful daughter at just five years old but continue to honor her with this program by serving hundreds of families with FREE speech therapy!

As you can see these events are incredibly important and I am blessed to be a part of them all!! However, I was still feeling like a failure for letting other balls drop.  Once I stopped for a moment and heard the chirps from the birds I knew what I was doing was not sustainable!  I realized at that moment I could only do what I could do and I just had to hand it over to God, in fact, after I did that something incredible happened. I was sleeping and woke up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom and when I walked back to my bed, I pulled the covers back and a penny literally fell into the palm of my hand!  It was like one of my angels gently placed it there!  Here is the midnight picture that I took!  It was that amazing!  This really opened my eyes to the fact this growth is happening because it needs to happen and I am never alone in any of it.  My angels are with me and I must trust them.

 

So… I allowed myself time to help Bella with her college applications, I worked out, I hung out with GiGi and I even watched a movie!  It was the recharge I needed and I am grateful to those birds who opened my eyes and ears.

 

 

Now I feel blessed to work on my favorite event coming up next week.  The GiGi’s Playhouse National Conference represents the entire GiGi’s network!  It is a 4-day leadership conference that is full of inspiration, education, networking, and fun!  54 GiGi’s Playhouse locations will be represented by over 300 GiGi’s team members (board members, staff & volunteers)  from around the country and in Mexico, coming together to change the world! I am so excited to be around that incredible energy! I hope to be present for all of it and hear those birds chirping away! Please take a quick minute to watch the video from last year’s conference!

 

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9d_GriP0FEc&w=932&h=524]

 

 

xoxo

Nancy

 

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