What Are Your Superpowers?

Just last week I had the AMAZING opportunity to attend the Alt Summit Conference in downtown Salt Lake.  I won a ticket through Instagram last month and it was a crazy mad dash to get ready in time. Or kind of ready.  It's really hard to prepare for something that you've never been to before and can't image the extent of the experiences that you will have.  None the less, the time came to attend the conference and I was half excited and half terrified.  Mostly, the excited half won out.

On the first day, I attended an early bird session hosted by Karen Walrond of Chookooloonks.  The session was a vision exercise to help you determine what your business/blog is about and what direction you want to go.  She went over techniques on building your about page, mission statement and elevator pitch which is great for any small business, online or not.

We started out defining what we are about and she asked some great questions.  We jotted down quick answers but they were questions that really could benefit from some deeper examination.  The first two questions were as follows:

• Who Are You?
• What Are You Passionate About?

The answers were many and varied.  Knowing me like you do, you know my answers ranged from "Mommy" to "Talker" and everything in between.  But the last question was the one that really got me.

• What Are Your Superpowers? 

Not "what superpowers do you want?" but what superpowers do you have.  I looked around at the rest of the room and saw everyone scrawling things quickly into their notebooks.  And I just sat there.  I could not think of a single superpower.  Not one.  After a few minutes, people began sharing their superpowers.  Hearing each one made me so happy.  I was sitting in a room FULL of amazing, talented people and I loved hearing about their unique ways of contributing to the world around them.  But it still didn't spark any ideas for me.

As the conference progressed, that question just sat with me.  Nagged me.  Occasionally taunted me with my lack of superpower or even the imagination to think of one. On the one hand, we all know people who are so arrogant and obnoxious with telling everyone how fabulous they are and I certainly don't want to be like that.  But still....not being able to think of a single superpower?  Lame.

This weekend I took that question home with me and decided to do a little research.  Generally speaking, my research usually starts with subjecting my children to whatever experiment I have pinging around in my head.  They're still young enough to enjoy it so I need to enjoy it while it lasts.  I asked my girls what their superpowers were and they gave me some awesome answers.  Here are a few snippets from our conversation.

Lolly's Superpowers: "I'm really good at naming things...like stuffed animals and stuff like that.  I may not use it much now but it's definitely going to come in handy when I'm a grown up.  And I'm really good at finding the word someone needs.  Ya know, like adjectives.  And I'm good at helping people"

Babs' Superpowers:  "Math!!  I make a really good sidekick.  And I'm good at helping my friends and family." 

They asked me why I was asking and I told them about the class and how I was interested in hearing their answers.  And then they asked me the inevitable awkward question....what were your answers Mommy?  I'm not a great liar so I confessed....I couldn't think of any.  Not a single one.

My girls, being the awesome girls that they are, started spouted off all the superpowers they thought I had.  Starting with making yummy food and going from there.  They are the sweetest girls ever. 

Lolly shared one that has stuck with me ever since.  She said, "Mommy, you're really good at seeing when someone needs something and then helping them out."

Oh, my sweet girl.  She always says the things that just make my cry from the beautifulness of it all. 

I don't know if that's true, but gosh I hope so.  That's the kind of person I want to be.  The kind of person who sees a need and steps up to help.  To keep trying to make a difference, even if it's just a tiny difference.  I may not have a lot of superpowers, but I'm the luckiest mom I know and that, my friends, is the best superpower of all. 

Highlights of 2014

The last two months have just flown by at lightening speed.  FLOWN BY, I tell you.  It has been a whirlwind of dancing, homework, baking, wrapping, delivering and getting sick.  But I guess that's the holidays for you.  At least, that's what they've become for me.

I've seen a lot of  Top Ten posts on blog floating around the internet.  I'm not totally sure I actually have ten blog posts that people have read, let alone a top ten list.  So, in my slacker way, I'm going to highlight some of my Top Ten Experiences of 2014.  Although there probably won't be ten.  There will be.....some. Instead of most popular down to least popular, I will go chronologically because it's easier for me to find pictures that way.  Assuming I even took any pictures........sigh......

Without further ado, I present to you 2014 Chaos Style!

Dexter grew a mustache.  This poor dog.  He is so loved.  I promise.

Babs turned 7!  And also got her first hair cut shortly after. 

June was a big month for our family.  First we had dance recitals.  This was not your average dance recital.  It was a full show.  It was so amazing I'm not really sure why they call it a dance recital.

And then we met Martha Stewart.  No, really.  We met Martha Stewart and she loved my girls.  There was also an extremely unflattering picture of me in the newspaper.  Yay for that. 

 Then we took an EPIC vacation to Orlando, Florida which is going to get a post all on its' own.

Started school, much to this mama's sadness.  Fourth and Second grades this year.

And Lolly turned 10!  TEN!  Double Digits.  I can't believe my baby is ten.

Our fall was busy with Christmasy stuff.  Both girls were in the school choir (which started learning Christmas songs in September) and danced in a local production of the Nutcracker which started rehearsals in October.

 And had some awesome (easy) Christmas hair!

It was quite the year and we loved it.  Our New Year's celebration included thinking back on everything that we learned and did last year and making goals for the coming year.  But that's another post for another day.......