It’s completely surreal: I’m sitting here in our amazing oasis of a yard, green all around me, with the different colors of all of the beautiful flowers softly waving in the breeze and I am watching the boys run around and goof off in the pool. (Yes, we have a small pool, which is one of the most amazing perks I appreciate every single day.) The sky is blue, the clouds are puffy. Pull the lens back a bit: this beautiful green oasis is completely surrounded by a 19-foot fence

One of the amazing things about this sort of expat life is the opportunities we are given to skim in and out the culture of so many different places. We don't really embed ourselves, right, but rather just move just above 'real’; we are in a place far longer than a tourist would be, but certainly not long enough to absorb and assimilate. So our inherent 'American-ness' remains mostly intact, and easily identifiable. Wherever we are in the world, I can pick out the American

What else can I possibly say? I know throughout this month, I have given you a lot of information to process. It is important to do what you can, and accept what you cannot. A huge part of wellness is accepting what you do, and being kind to yourself for what you can’t get to; beating yourself up for not being able to incorporate Wellness suggestion #357 in your (or your family’s) day is not accomplishing the goal here. Remember that every little thing you do, every little

As we continue our month-long dive into the different parts of wellness, what little things you can do for you, and for your family, this week I look at spiritual wellness. First, let's look a little at just what Spiritual Wellness is. One does not have to be of a particular faith in order to be spiritually well. On the contrary, one can be very spiritual AND not have a defined religion. Spiritual well-being can be described as a sense of inner peace, as well as the journey

As we continue our month-long dive into the different parts of wellness, what little things you can do for you, and for your family, this week I look at mental and emotional wellness. First of all: what is Mental and emotional well-being? Answer me this: how do you feel? How do you handle day-to-day life? The answer is likely to change from day to day, month to month … maybe even minute to minute (perhaps especially for parents, when dealing with preschoolers or teenagers who

As we continue our month-long dive into the different parts of wellness, what little things you can do for you, and for your family, this week I look at social wellness. What is social wellness? There is no one definitive cookie-cutter answer to what this should look like for every individual. Each person has their own degree of need of socialness, for interaction with others, for connections, as well as for their preferred mode of communications. It is important to know wha