R&B What day is it anyway?

4? That sounds right. I just noticed I've been calling it the wrong thing all along. Whoopsie daisy. To me, it's beans and rice, and therefore a Beans and Rice Challenge. To Solid Rock International it's rice and beans, or a R & B C. They say tomato, I say beans and rice. It's all the same once it's down the hatch...

Have I mentioned I'm adoring this challenge? Like with utter crazy inordinate infatuation adoration? Truly. I am a huge fan of the nightly discussion we're having with the kids and the learning that is taking place with this one little simple change in our lives for one little week. It's eye opening for them, and for me. The homeschooling woman whose love language is chatting can not get enough meaningful conversation with her people. This spurs that a plenty.

Take this tantalizing tidbit from one of the daily inspirations:

I grew up poor, or at least what I thought was poor. My family never owned a car less than 5 years old and often times we shopped at thrift stores and only went out to eat once a month (and that was for cheap pizza.) Actually we weren't poor at all. None of us ever went hungry and the idea that we might never even occurred to me. But there are people who do go hungry. They have to find a way to feed their family for not much more than a dollar a day. In the Dominican Republic, that is not possible without rice and beans. 

Well, in the words of the most blessed and renown Ma Ingalls, "I declare!" By those standards the Deutsch clan is poor too. But wait, then we read these stats on another daily inspiration:

Annual wold economy breaks down like this:
Low Income, $935 or less: 37% of the world's population
Lower Middle Income, $935 to $3,705: 38%
Upper Middle Income, $3,706 to $11,456: 9%
High Income: $11,456 or more: 16%

That's annual, folks. Annual! And wala. Just like that, once again we are rich.
Perspective, my babies. Perspective...

As a high school girl, I often sat in class and daydreamed of having 4 kids. I would completely ignore my teacher's ceaseless droning scribble their imaginary names on a piece of notebook paper and imagine what my grown up life would be like. Natalia, Gabrielle, Alec and Isaac. Then, I would sign my own name, Tisha Spangler. 

Now that our kids are getting older and Jayla can sit in the front seat and she is able stay home alone with a few of the kids while I run errands, I find myself gazing at minivans with undiluted, pure green envy. I could drive one that seats 8 and ditch this mondo 12 seater maxi van, except for occasions in which the entire family was together. In which case the man that I actually did marry, Roberto Deutsch could take the enormous wheel and I would never again have to pull the anything-but-sleek giant silver bus into an itty bitty parking space marked COMPACT. Not ever. Twould be sublime.

Never once, not for a single instant when I was young could I have predicted that I could one day covet a minivan. A minivan! To quote the gentle and famous Ma Ingalls, "Land sakes!" How did a minivan ever become a stylish object of affection? Perspective, people. Perspective...

The sweet Meadow sleeping on a bed made on our floor in case she needed to wake me up last night. The girl had 11 teeth pulled yesterday. 11! 4 wisdom teeth, 4 permanent molars that won't fit in her small little mouth, and 3 baby teeth. She was weeping when she woke up from the anesthesia. It broke my heart. I loved her in that moment and I love her in this one and I am eternally grateful and glad for that love.

Land sakes, I declare. It is a lovely thing to L O V E.