Springtime. The weather is warming up, we're spending more time outdoors, and many of us feel a sense of renewal. Along with all these beautiful aspects of spring, we must add activities such as outside cleanup, gardening, and planting flowers.

This month, we discuss a problem we see often: people forget to ask themselves before they speak, "Is what I'm about to say KIND, TRUE, and NECESSARY?" Our communication can make or break our relationships - including our relationship with ourselves. Because of this, rather than reacting to what someone says, we must take the time to go within and respond with intention.

Earlier this month, Don and I celebrated our 38th Wedding Anniversary. We had a nice long chat about all the usual thoughts people have on such an anniversary.

We are participants in Mesa County’s Five Star Variance Program. The requirements changed on Friday, April 16th, and we now have more flexibility in protecting ourselves and those of you who attend events in our Yellow Room for workshops and private sessions.

Tomorrow, we will begin an amazing journey – one we have wanted to take for a very long time. We are starting our CREATING MINDFUL RELATIONSHIPS course, and due to a few cancellations, we still have room for a few of you to join us.

We hope April is off to a wonderful start for all of you! As is our new custom, we share a VLOG with you at the beginning of each month, and we do appreciate the feedback many of you give us. In our APRIL VLOG, we share WHY we do what we do!

Academy for Personal Development’s Winter Quarter is drawing to a close and it has been wonderful. Our Enneagram 1 class on Tuesday evenings has been great and we appreciate everyone who joined us. It takes courage to learn about ourselves and bring understanding to our lives. We’ve had an amazing class of dedicated participants, and it’s been fun!

We are two lucky ladies . . . Not only do we have all of you in our lives, but we get to witness all the hard work you do to create lives that are meaningful and bring you joy! We are incredibility inspired by the perseverance and determination with which many of you approach life. When you overcome obstacles, face difficult decisions, and don’t give up, you are doing what we call Staying in the Game.

We see everyday how our dietary habits affect our overall outlook on life. That is why today we wanted to show you how to make a simple smoothie that works as a quick breakfast or an on-the-go lunch/snack!

Like many of you, we have a lot on our plates each day. Whether it is related to our work or something going on in our personal lives, many days we don’t seem to have a spare moment. Some folks are great about being able to stay focused on one thing at a time, but for some, just thinking about all they have to do can be completely overwhelming – even to the point where it is difficult for them to get started.

Yesterday, after Sundays with Annette and Ada (which was wonderful!), we made a quick stop at the grocery store to buy Valentine flowers for Don before heading off to our next adventure. As we were checking out, our cashier just happened to mention that her previous customer had purchased real, official gluten free, dairy free Oreo cookies.

It’s February 1st, which means a brand new vlog! Unity is a pretty big buzzword nowadays. We thought we'd throw our ideas into the ring about what unity is to us, how it is applicable on an individual as well as national level, and also discuss how unity relates to leadership. Can we have unity without strong leadership? In short, no we cannot!

Last Tuesday evening, as the attendees of our Enneagram 1 class were packing up to leave, we had a quick discussion that has stuck with us. Our discussion began with someone commenting that it is sad that when people are unhealthy and behave in ways that do not serve themselves or others, the “good” they have done in their lives is forgotten or diminished.

We hope you are doing well this week! What a wonderful day we had yesterday. We started off with our Sundays with Annette and Ada meeting, then we quickly got on Zoom for our Gifts of Imperfection Book Club. We ended our afternoon with the in-person book club. Thank you to all of you who joined us! As we were leaving our Yellow Room after such a full day, our hearts were filled with gratitude for the opportunity to share these beautiful times of connection.

We are sitting in our home office today listening to beautiful music, all caught up on our work, with Greta at our feet, thinking of the events of last week. The safety we feel at this moment is quite meaningful, as we know that life can change in an instant. It has for us on past days, and we’re pretty sure you all can relate to that experience.

This month, we begin our New Year with a discussion on starting again with experience!

We’re wishing you all the very best during this holiday season. Love and many blessings!

Today, the topic of telling the truth is on our minds . . . What does it mean to tell the truth? Quite honestly, this isn’t a simple question to answer and definitely not one that can be answered with blanket statements such as, “You must always tell the truth!”

We hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday. Please be safe, enjoy your family and friends, and know we are thinking of you!

We hope you are well. We sure do miss gathering together IN PERSON with all of you! Thankfully, this past Saturday, we DID gather with the attendees of our very first Courageous Leadership workshop, and it was truly a great day!