The three most important ladies in my life… my wife, my mother, and my mother-in-law… have spiritual gifts. Leaders have spiritual gifts. Therefore, the ladies in my life are leaders. (My son told me that, in logical terms, is a ‘valid statement’ (IAI2)). Here is a picture of them with a few other fantastic ladies.
From left to right: My mother-in-law, Nancye. Her Mom, Madge. My mom, Vickey, our friend-Mandy Ball, my lovely wife, Chris, and my favorite sister-in-law, Lisa!
Now, I believe that my wife, mother, and mother-in-law have the gift of hospitality, but more importantly, they have the ability to take some ordinary moment and turn it into an UNCOMMON experience! What do I mean?
Recently, we had friends over to the house for a barbecue. Of course, I would have put out the regular condiments like the ones below:
That really is all you need, right? Relish, mayonnaise, mustard, ketchup. But, my wife took the time to transfer all of the condiments into different containers to make the experience go from ordinary bottles, to UNCOMMON presentation:
The containers were a gift from my mother. My mother-in-law is famous for little presentation ideas like this. It is amazing how she can present grape jelly!! Call me crazy, but I think the condiments actually TASTED better from these containers. You see, these ladies have an ability to take something ordinary like ketchup and mustard and present it in a special, UNCOMMON way. Why? Because they want to do extra work? NO!!!! It is because they CARE about others and want to make an ordinary burger and dog taste like an extra-ordinary experience from a 5-star restaurant! Our friends referred to the ketchup as ‘special’, and to the store-brand yellow mustard as ‘grey poupon’. Frankly, I have not honored these women enough for their UNCOMMON love.
I believe their ability to turn ordinary into UNCOMMON has been a gift to me as a husband, son, son-in-law, AND leader. I hope that I am able to create UNCOMMON moments for others like they often do for me, my family, and friends.
So, I have a couple questions for the Leaders who follow my blog:
1) When was the last time you turned an ordinary experience into an UNCOMMON moment for those you lead?
2) When was the last time you let a special person in your life know you appreciate their ability to do that for you?
Thank you, Chris. Thank you, Mom. Thank you, Mrs. White… for caring enough to create UNCOMMON moments for me and others. I love you all.
