{family lab} welcome letter

Friday our lab starts!

I wanted to send out a quick welcome post to get you ready for this adventure. It will take the better part of a year and can be really transformative if you fully engage. Woop! 

Each week you will receive a short essay,  a writing prompt, a creative challenge and a link or two for some outside resources. 

We are a diverse group. I have included a lot of ideas, possibly more than you can tackle or have the inclination to.  Please know that this is your journey and your experience. If there are ideas that do not speak to you, leave them out. Or better yet, change them to meet your family's needs. Please feel free to email me privately or ask the Facebook group for suggestions on how to make something work for you.

Also, there is a possibility that you might feel overwhelmed or miss a few labs. That is OK. The information is not cumulative. Each week's ideas stand on their own, so if you miss a day, you are not behind. I want everyone to be engaged and for us to push ourselves just past our comfort zone if we need to, but I understand that life sometimes gets out of control. You never have to "catch up" or do an older lab before you can do the current one. If you need to, you can save some ideas for later. The goal for our time together is not necessarily to complete every "assignment." We want to fill our toolboxes with new ideas, new perspectives and new friends for support. A good motto might be:


Do what you can as much as you can.


That being said, it would be great if we all committed ourselves to being all in for the month. If we can try a little harder, invest 30 minutes or an hour a day, make an effort to connect with and support the other participants, I think we will reap the biggest benefits. This goes for me too. I am facilitating but will be participating as well. Doing the prompts and the creative activities is something I am really
looking forward to.

The last idea I want to suggest is that we think in terms of collaboration. I recently read Twyla Tharp's book The Collaboration Habit and loved so many of her ideas about the benefits of working with
others. What she writes about dance and creative collaboration can certainly apply to the family organism.

Please look at this year as a collaboration with your significant other and children. The information I share is not meant to be experienced as a top down model. It is meant to inspire you and get
your mind loose and cranking out even more ideas (that I hope you will share). You might happily find your journal packed with maps of new worlds to explore with your kids. But don't forget to include your children in the process. Discuss with them what you are doing. Ask them if they would like to participate.  Write down their ideas for creative adventures. Tharp writes about collaboration as a habit that has to be practiced in order for it to develop.


Let's practice co-creating with our families this year.