Simple Sunday #2

What's simple this Sunday? Lights out! 

This Saturday night was Earth Hour. One hour a year where you turn the lights out for one hour. A single hour, that's it. Whenever it ends, I find myself not wanting to turn the lights back on!

Personally, I think this should be done monthly or weekly even and not just the lights! Not just because it saves energy or the environment but, you learn a few things. Like, how many candles it takes to weather a power outage, after earthquake, tornado, etc. Which is an important thing to know! Growing up in Tornado Alley, it was something I learned had to be done! No matter where I moved or went over the years, be it England, Nevada, Utah or just moving around here, never went anywhere without candles! If you want to go farther, go for an hour and then a night with no electricity! You'll quickly learn what foods to have on hand that can be eaten over a campfire/fire-pit in your backyard or even your grill!

The second thing lights out does is maybe begins to get back the family ties that are slowly getting lost to T.V.s, video games, tweeting, texting, etc. That electronic noise has gotten way out of hand! Your time without electricity does two things, it forces you to interact rather than be distracted. Start doing this when they're young and it becomes a normal family night! Around here we do game night! We play Uno....though a somewhat modified version for the 3yr old! We play Snap, Go Fish, Candyland, our Angry Birds game in a box (though in a well lit area because that bomb bird is hard to see in the dark!). 

 Loosing power at least once a month in the areas of town that we have lived made this a simple transition for the boys. There are some nights we would sit outside on the enclosed porch and talk to each other in the dark even. My mother and I even at our ages would do this and truth be told, at 30 some odd years old, I am closer with my mother now than I ever was and not because I am a mother myself or an adult even. It was and is the times we spend sitting by candlelight on the porch or kitchen table just talking. Sometimes, I'll make the boys a candlelight dinner or snack, just because! I get to hear all the silly stories or things they want to build or do or think they saw that day. Our how my son thinks he's going to marry Taylor Swift when he grows up! Looking around the table at their smiling faces and their eyes dancing in the flickering light, are some of the best times I have all week!

Like I always say, you don't need money to be happy at all. It's nice, but sometimes, it's the simple things that make you happiest!