Vacations,Birthdays,Families,Traditions,Organization

VACATIONS,ORGANIZATION

I remember here on our Winter Ski Vacation, that the children, whether 13, 9 or 6,
Whether 12, 11 or 5, are all a bit displaced. I remember that their complaints are because they are uncomfortable and trying to get comfortable, that they are missing something that has been moved and that they are less independant as they CAN be because we are in a New place, a smaller place....

.......My role here in mothering, is to comfort, to listen and not to add to the discomfort anyone is feeling by asking "What is your problem" Not even to myself.
I instead lay out all the ski clothes in packages, i make sure the goggles and gloves are together and set across the table for all six children...I make sure the wool socks are inside the boots and they are being warmed by the fire.

ITS MY BIRTHDAY TODAY:

I remember that the children want to give, its their nature, but they dont have the resources, so I lay out a book of GIFT CERTIFICATES i purchased at Staples and have them fill them out and put them in a bowl with a sign marked "BIRTHDAY GIFT CERTIFICATES FOR MOM"......I love the offers of ""ONE TRIP TO GO OUT AND GET MILK"
and the "ONE BIKE RIDE TO THE BOATHOUSE" or "ONE YOU DONT HAVE TO LEAVE WHEN I ASK YOU TO LEAVE"

FAMILIES, TRADITIONS

We start the EGG GAME TODAY. That is a family tradition. A Game that we play when ever we go skiing.One person holds a UNHARDBOILED egg until it cracks or until they leave it even for a minute and the one to hold the egg the longest wins the prize for that trip. You have to keep the egg with you, ski with it, sleep with it....Its very exciting to negotiate through the rules.

The negotiating through the rules and letting the children create the rules and backing them on the rules they create with eachother enpowers them in a way that feels right.

In this role, I am a mother, but I am not mothering, I am just here and part of your life and playing and listening to you .

I know the legacy I want to leave .....it is not to say:

"I AM STILL YOUR MOTHER, BUT THAT I AM STILL HERE !'
"I am still listening to you"
"Your decisions make me proud"

Enjoy your family holidays !

How many times do you call home ?

When on vacation
Alone with your husband
What is the right amount of times to call home ?

I feel very comfortable answering the phone whenever it rings. An understanding of how important for the younger children to feel safe in their abilities to reach you when they need you....to feel safe enough in their separation from you and its all ok....and in that they grow !

I reach out to the older children and text them. I text them little antidotes or forward them emails I get from Burton (as spam but there is a purpose to them too) and suggest they consider what they need for skiing season....I forward a school email on when the photo retake day is...as a mark that I remembered and cared about the conversations we had about someone not liking theirpersonal photo from picture day.

I communicate with the older kids by making a connection with them outside my role as mother and inside of a role as another human being in this world who considers them as people with cares about their concerns.

I am happy that they are home with my brother....and while I am away from them with their father, my brother comes in to support our children.

Community, family, a great natural lesson I don't want to undermine by constant calls home " Are u ok without me?" Why wouldn't you be ?

Also as I sit here on the beach trying to be peaceful with my husband I send the message to my husband "I am happy here with you and the kids are ok and I need not remain in the role of mother, when I am not mothering, I can now be just wife and share that peace with you now !

Enjoy your time when you are with your children and enjoy your time when you are not !

What type of tribe are you creating?

I realize this morning as I watch TOM AND JERRY with my five year old
that I must leave and speak with the Thirteen Year old about his behavior
after this weekends football game.

He doesnt want to hear that he played well, when his team lost and I know
that I can not console his 13 year old hormones, or ego with anything that
even smells of mothering but I know that there is a lesson to be taught here
in setting boundaries of acceptable behavior.

I dont immediate respond as I want to finish :Parenting with Boundaries< a book I have been reading by Dr. John Townsend.

When it is ok to be disrectful to your parents? When you loose a football game
and your in a bad mood? Can we teach that all the feelings our children have are ok but it is how they respond to them that makes them who they are, and what is allowed as acceptable in OUR HOME ?

There will be LOTS of defeats, understandable. But what about your actual preformance, did it change much during the entire game just because the other
team scored in the last quarter of the game. Cant we still speak about the great play you made?

Here is the time to set boundaries with an OPEN HEART to his perdictament. For I have noticed where the lines of disrespect are crossed, its hard to return to the original starting point.

Its like once your child has seem a Pg-13 movie, there is no going back !

I realize that playing football, raising all these BOYS in NYC, I have a hunting tribe, WE MUST WIN, we must be great, we must compete against our classmates for that spot in high school, we must complete for the highest test scores, the best football positions, the most playing time,....the most loved in our house.

In hunting tribes they leave the old behind, and where will your advice be then ?

Yet, in gathering tribes, you are an elder, the holder of the wisdom, someone to
be respected and listened to.

Where do you want to be in ten years from now with your children? Set boundaries with love !

"I" Statements Only

Wednesday night I sit on the floor of the nursery 4's classrooms and learn about the activities my youngest is doing in his classroom;

Thursday afternoon I am in Alexandria, Virginia singing hymn 482 at a Chapel with my fourteen year old by my side as we tour a high school for his 9th grade.

And as we sing praises to god, I feel blessed to be in all my positions beside all my children in their life right now.

I have had a very full day, and whether you work in an office or in the community
of service and friends, we all have very full days.

And so do my children, with their teachers, sports classes, pressures of other children, haves and have nots they are dealing with.

Lets rememeber we are the adults here and our love for our childrens' best interests
has to out weigh our need to be simply in the role of parents.


We play a game of texas-hold em (the four older boys)

after dinner
after homework
after listening to their stories of the day
after reading books, pj's and bedtime for the 4 and 5 year old


and i know, the best advice I can give to anyone, to be in this wonderful place,
sharing special nights like this with your children, and sharing the unfolding
wonderful and beautiful life that you are sharing together and they are experiencing
is to work on yourself......not work on them !

"I would feel so much better if you didnt say that to your brother"
"I want you to stay up past your bedtime, I want you to stay up all night!"
(as i walk them to bed)

"I will feel better if you stayed in your bed. I get tired when you keep getting out"



Today, speak only "I" statements and eliminate any YOU statements.

One simply goal a day....can change so much !

On Responses

One of the greatest lessons I have been learning this week, away from my
children is how to respond better to their sibling squabbling.


I can not react when I am away
I have no reason to change
All the good feelings I have in my moment, when the phone rings
Into my experience and there is one child complaining about the other child
invading their space somehow !

I see clearly how if I were in that room my emotions would attach themselves to
the feelings of my children and my responses would be more reactions to
that....and not responding to the source of the problem or the source of the
needs of my children

That's why they are behaving that way. There is something that needs to be worked out. It will keep occuring until I really help here.

And I am here as their teacher and mother- guide to help them in this moment

And find out how I can really help them.....because it usually is not by
punishing their sibling....its usually by empowering them to feel more
Confident or powerful to deal with their own situations.

Today it might be that they are ok while I am away, they need to take more control of their own personal space and walk away from conflicts that your siblings want to
create.

That conflict is also how your sibling is feeling.

Now some children are born with strong empathy for others...you must plant these
seeds all the time and you teach compasion.

I know, as a mother with so many children, it is hard to consider this type of thinking when you are driving the car home from a long trip and your children are fighting in the back of the car.

You want it to stop
So do they !

If you practice this type of thinking every time you RESPOND or REACT to your children, the times when you are in car and their is fighting in the back......it will come to you easier to insert a conversation between you and them that might actually last the whole rest of the ride home !

on Dicipline

As important it is to grow and expand and learn new and improved ways to handle situations in your life, when these changes involve smaller people, less powerful people, they might not understand the changes taking place and how you are handling the situation differently, they might think it unfair as the rules have changed.

And they might be right.

So you have to be as good at explaining how the 'unjustices' are what is causing the new behavior.

I think you have to explain that when one action doesn't create the result you want, you have to try another.
I am VERY CLEAR that my intentions are not to bring poison or angry words into their lives, for I lov them, they are my children, and I want to see when happy.

I have explained how I see it unfair when the older children beat up on a younger one, or when a value is not respected and therefore it might seem just as unfair for me to remove the internet wire and make the children win it back by having to beat me in TENNIS (my strongest sport).

or

they can stop the ungodly behavior and return to the UNITY OF BROTHERS in our house.

I am clear that they do not have to LIKE eachother, that their feelings, whether love or hate, are ok, they are their feelings and I have no desire to control what they feel.

But mutual respect and accountability are the VALUES we share in this house as a family! And here I stand strong!

I have to say that being consistant has brought the children towards me and not drawn away from me as they know what to expect.

They know that their actions are not going to create a reaction in me but a calmer more serious effect.

Be strong with your lessons and make sure they are teaching something !

on sibling fighting

With six children there are so many dymanics within the group, and they shift and change. Now we have the oldest boy 13 and the fourth boy 9, engaged.

For me, it hurts so deeply, when I see my children hurt eachother. And that makes it more of a challenge to control my impulses, to teach them to control theirs.

Its so easy to spit out poison through punishments...come roaring into the rooom
reacting to the anger that is between them.

I bring the 9 year old into my bed at night and tell him that I am sorry. I tell him this is not ok for him to be hurt by his brother and I will protect him and make this stop.

I wait for the morning when I hear the oldest child dressed and ready to ride his bike to golf approach him then.

I tell him I understand that he ;hates; his brother, and that that is his feeling and I can not take that away from him.

I tell him that its ok to have feelings like that, but its the ability to control your impulses, and how you manage your feelings that is going to allow you to mature.

I tell him that there are rules in this house and rules in life.....u get no power over controlling others younger than you, u get power and strength when you know you can control yourself.

So what are your outlets, what do you need from me to help you with this.....because
you have not seen your computer since June, so I am not going to try to threaten
anything anymore.....

I tell him when he comes home from Golf I need to hear from him.

I tell that I dont want him to leave our vacation, but if he can not control his
anger I will make arrangements for him to return to New York with his father and work in the auto body shop (on our block in the city) cleaning cars...no wage...
8:30am-3:30pm.

On Energy

Where do u get your energy ?
Pots of coffee, and lots of sleep, good sleep, early to bed with my kids.

Sometimes its just easier to go to bed when your kids are going to bed..it completely cuts down on
The amount of times they get out of bed and into your room for one reason or another.

Another way I get my energy is to make sure I get the most out of my down time. This is the time when the kids can be own their own, in the house, safe and playing with eachother, by themselves or with their summer house guests.
(In school )

I get energy to continually go back into the mix with the joy that comes from being ready and really wanting to be there !

I get the energy when I create moments, memories, and have chances to exchange good feelings with eachother.

I get energy when I can spend my days in the relationships I want to be in !

On Organizing and being a mom

I am preparing the packing for the exodus from New York. We are all doing it in one way or another. I am heading out to Montana for a 12 day trip.

Even those of us who are staying in the city, must prepare the shift of closets and clothes from the school year season to the summer season. The baseball caps and the sunscreen, the bathing suits and towels, the flip flops and the water shirts must be ready and accessible for the vacation or the city park day !

And there are those of us who are heading out east for the summer!

I feel so distracted with the end of the school year and the packing for the
summer activities, sleep away camps,camping adventures, that I naturally loose
sight of everything going on in the house and with the children.

I appreciate in this moment how MORE of my life and time are spent in touch with the lives of my children in the house that now I can know WHEN I am distracted from this.

My 13 and 12 year old are sleeping, my brother, super uncle, also sleeping! My 10 year old has a friend sleeping over, the eight year old already jumped in my bed where the six and 4 year old were.

Even though Big Johns Movers delivered six tv boxes into my living room, I will hold off and make sure to connect with everyone in the house, make sure to let my brother know he is welcome and my sons friend is welcome and turn the music on Before I start packing !



Have a Great Sunday !

On Summer Parenting Plans

If you want things to become better between you and your children;if you want to be closer, if you want to make stronger the bonds that you share together it is not just going to happen by itself.

Now is the time to write down next to each childs name your goal. What do you want your summmer to bring. If your child is leaving for sleep away camp, what do you want to happen before they leave, what do you want to happen while they are away.
Can you talk about your communication, letter writing, expectations from your child of you?

I thought maybe I could have a special time morning with every child while the other children are in morning camp, or golf. I know that leaves only one day a week to myself or my husband but its only a morning. And to the child it is something they will remember their whole life!


What will you plan this summer.....start thinking now !

On Communication

What a great Memorial Day Weekend. Its 3:35pm and I am home and unpacked and sitting at my air conditioned desk. my loving husband went to return the rental car across town and the children have disbursed to their various corners of the house to begin their 'returning home' rituals. What this means for;

13 year old Head to Guest Room and check out his friends'IM's
12 year old Head to the Indian Room (den) and play XBOX
10 year old and 4 year old Are putting together all the IRON MAN
toys they got at WALMART on our stop driving home
8 year old Head to the back playroom
6 year old Organizing her markers in the library

Its completely peaceful here and now.

and its my chance to start the process on better communication with all my children.

Listening to Anthony Robbins "Live with Passion" audio discs in the car on the way home, I was fortunate enough to have the COMMUNICATION disc be the one I choose.

The entire car ride listened to Tony Robbins teach us that the goal to being a better communicator is to NEVER, NEVER questions someones intentions.

You can question their behavior but you can never questions their intentions.
You have to assume their intentions are good. They are your children. They are good.

There have been times when I have broken this rule....and now I have a chance to prove to my children by using better words that I might have broken this rule, but I dont want to break it ever again !

Another lesson we learned is that every situation has two sides. There is no benefit in making sure that you prove that the other person is wrong. From that position, what can they feel, how can they learn.

You can offer up your side of the situation......and eventually your influence will improve as your side continues to prevail.

Good luck in your communications !

On Music

I race out of the shower. Full of joy and life for this new day.

I wonder how fast I can write this post before I have to rush off to help the kids for school, I am late and i am excited.


"Theres a land that I see where the children are free, take my hand come with me to this land.......to a land, where the children run free, to a land with a shining sea, to a land where you and me are free to be, you and me." Marlo Thomas

Now I was a pretty hip child as you might imagine.....and i remember dancing around or holding dear to my heart the FREE TO BE album. When i remember this music today
I remember the song "Its alright to Cry" being played when I was sad and needed to cry.To be free a yearning for in adolencense.

I borrow my sons (12) ipod every morning for my ride back from their school on my bike and I hear songs that speak of "shoes with no laces....(some in jail) Women who are b'tches, drink and smoke some more.....

I scroll around the ipod and I Notice that there is a SLEEP playlist and this list consists of classical music, bethoven, taylor swift, a gospel song.....and I am touched at the personality in this music and in my son!

I want to be touch enough to help make this the greater sounds in his life !

On Being Kind

Its a funny thing, being kind. Because being kind is such a simple thing to do, SILENTLY.

I notice the nasty face a pedestrian made this morning when my six year old, in crossing the street between blocks on her tricycle, got a little to close to her.

This nasty face....and snearing sound which came from her mouth spread a small evil germ to everyone around. To the other people also walking by, to me, feeling bad, a person in this world really can be brought so easily to a low place, by a bike riding child!

I wonder how these people are living ! Are they living completely without passion
that they can not see the joy in a child learning to ride a bike in New York City?
Is being kind being happy with your life, to offer love and kindness to another.


Then I thought of last night. Someone who helps out with laundry in our house, who always takes the summers off, asked is she can work this summer and make extra money.
I immediately thought I would love to help out this girl, as the world would be a better place if we all just helped out those around us.

She knows that there would be no laundry around as our family will be exploring America for the most part, but she wanted to straighten up the house and keep it
tidy and dust free while we are away.

My first reaction was, she has never dusted the rooms around the laundry room, while the laundry is running. But I am kind and I know it must be hard for this person to ask so I will invite them to come once a week during the summer to be kind !

I am kind to my children by being a good listener even when the eight year old wants to explain all 100 yu gi oh cards, I show interest and in share kindness, I hope to teach my children by my actions !

Teach your children kindness today !

On Children Fighting

“My nine year old just punched my eight year old in the back. Eight year old comes in cryingtelling me what has been done.(WE HAVE ALL BEEN HERE)I ask first
“Is there anything I can do to help you, how bad are you hurting” Second I ask to see the nine year old. I asked the nine year old " Why he needed to hurt his brother this morning, he said “Where did he say I punched him” I said "So I hear you punched him" and he said “It didn’t even hurt him”

Now here is where I say “ I am sorry you feel it matters where you punch him, and I am sorry you feel that he wasn’t hurt, but those are your feelings. His feelings are he was punched and it did hurt.

Then I add "and you know, and I know and he knows thats wrong."

Then I say, "You need to ask him how you can make him feel better, you need to apologize for touching him"...........

i dont want to
create a suitable punishment, Because I want you to take care of it and take resonsibility of what you did.

I dont want to to forced to create a suitable punishment, but I will to keep order in this house !

If i become mean mommy I am just another pawn in the game of hurting!

Be a SuperMom today !

on Courage

On Courage
Courage isn’t a brilliant dash
A daring deed in a moment flash
It isn’t an instantaneous thing
Born of despair-with a sudden spring

But it’s something deep in the soul of a man
That is working always to serve some plan.
….Edgar A. Guest

Everyone was laughing last night at the dinner table. I said something that
In “kid” language meant a private part or another slang phase unbeknown yet to me.

Was it courage that my Twelve year old displayed after everyone left the table to share with me what it was that I said and what it meant.
Was it courage that caused the great argument that my eight year old son had. He wanting to walk to school alone at 7:00am to get there early and me not being ready to let him go to Third Grade, walking alone this early?
We teach our children that courage is standing up for yourself or someone else in unpopular situations. Choosing to be right to oneself, to the standards you have been brought up with, and not just be a part of the popular moment!
How can you teach courage today?

On parenting, On childrens Clothing

Parenting is the art of bringing children up without putting them down!




I always wonder when I watch TV shows and a child character comes into the room wearing something inappropriate. The TV mother or father character seems completely shocked that this outfit of clothing is in their house. I can think of an instance when the child character was about ten years old. Now, ten years old is about the age of a fourth-grader. Surely a mother and father in their day-to-day supervision of their child have knowledge of the type of clothing in their fourth-grader’s closet? After all, who is buying the clothes? Why are these TV characters so surprised?

Well I am glad that's not real life because in real life I have a lot of time to influence my children and prepare them enough so that they make choices based upon my good influences. And if they don’t, well you can be assured that my ten year old does not have any clothes that I bought for them that I would not want them wearing or for that matter that are in the house !

What is your child thinking when they get dressed? How can you influence them today so they will make good decisions when its their time to make them completely? Do you include them when your buying clothes?


What can you do today to lift your child up, to tell them how wonderful they are just by being them, how great they are by having the courage to bringing something new into their lives, by trying something new? How can you tell them how great it is to make a new friend, or to work in a group at school with different people, or hear new and different ideas?


Your six or eight or ten year old dresses themselves every morning for school, well, you are proud, such a mundane thing they are doing, but yet a milestone in some way. For you too !



Tell them !


(I dont know if I would praise my 12 or 13 year old, might sound a bit overboard to them!)

Bring your child up today!

On forgiveness

“He who cannot forgive breaks the bridge over which he himself must pass.”
- George Gerbert

As I read this quote, I think about the fact that every day in my life I need to forgive something said or done to either me, the things I care about, or one of my children. I think of other people in my life who must forgive - perhaps a child must forgive another child - and over and over again I realize what a huge part forgiveness plays in the trials and tribulations of raising six children.

“He spilt his drink all over my place!” Of course it was an accident, but recovery from cleaning the dripping puddle that is inching towards another child’s lap, and returning back to a civilized dinner is not easy for a large family when all is said and done! But true forgiveness is undoubtedly a work in progress. My son won’t let me watch his football games, but I’m still his mom and I don’t stop asking, “what can I do for you to help you today.”

I teach forgiveness as an expression of unconditional love. ‘You, my son, don’t have to let me watch your football games. You’re my son I forgive you for this behaviour because you don’t know that it hurts my feelings not be to part of your football games. I understand your need to have power over some things, and I am still here to help you and love you. And when football gets tough, I hope you come to me so I can help you and love you and give you confidence to get back out there.’

‘You need printer ink. Of course it will be waiting for you so you can do your homework. Because I want to help you even if you don’t want me to watch you play football! I want you to be successful in doing your homework. You are still very young and don’t have the means to take care of everything yourself.’

What can you forgive today?

On Children Misbehaving

On Children Misbehaving


Children misbehaving and Parents behaving incredibly well! Parents who are able to step above the BEHAVIOR and see that this person that they love, this child of theirs, (or another’s) this very young person who whether 5 or 10 or 13 are just so young and learning…..

And has not

*The ability to filter all that is coming at them

*The ability to make the RIGHT thumbs up choice when
Dealing with emotions all the time

Do we?

You lean over to give your child a hug, and accidently elbow your child in the face
And they run away completely upset at you, what do you do?

I said to my friend yesterday

“I am not getting on the roller coaster ride today”

I was referring to my eldest son’s emotional state.

The other day I was picking up a younger one of mine at school and there was this hysterical child, I mean the hiccupping type crying, above the regular cry.
I was not listening, and I am not judging, but what I did hear at the end was the mother screaming for her child to pick up the backpack and follow her. It seems the mother was walking away and the child would not pick up the back pack in some type of power play!

I have to share a story. I standing in line at the airport and my hands were completely full with all the carry on I had since I did not check luggage. My purse, a pulling travel bag, the passports and tickets in my hands, and my daughter did not want to carry her travel bag. It was one of those color the front yourself tog bags.She actually threw it down on the floor and said I am not carrying this to the plane.

I left it there! That was it! and we boarded the plane without it !

Now I am not saying I would have left her coat there! As I needed her to have her coat, but this was her personal bag with her things and that was that.


I think children misbehaving is most corrected by parents choosing to pick their battles. Parents rising above the words and displays that are in front of us to be able to

Visually see yourself consoling…………….Unconditional Love

Congratulations to all those amazing parents who I have in my life. I see you and I admire who you are and all that you do!

On childrens freedoms

On Kids Freedoms in New York City

Many times I am asked at what age you let your kids outside on their own. I have to admit that Raising Six Children does let you have many perspectives on this question and on the practice of freedom to give your children.

I believe a bit in routines and the freedom and safety and comfort ability that comes with routines. For example, our family has been riding our bikes to school for four years now. This means that we take one route which involved travelling down one block to the very end and another avenue across.
That's it. Back and Forth, the same avenue across and the same block up over and over. You start to have a very good understanding about what to expect, which sidewalks are wide enough for people and bikes. Which sidewalks you have to be extra careful on. After Checking with the 19th precinct of Manhattan, children under the age of 12 are allowed to ride their bikes, their tricycles and their two wheelers on the sidewalk. The older children and I, we are in the street.

We are lucky to live in a community where both these blocks and avenues pass several schools along the way so we a community of people getting their children to school in the morning and picking them up in the afternoon. There are crossing guards who we are not connected with our school, but we remember them on holidays, as they remember and recognize us all year long.

The route....to school.....the routine.....provides a certain level of safety, and thus allows for certain freedoms I might otherwise not give.

For example, the thirteen and the twelve year old leave for school first, and have complete freedom getting there….as the route! The ten and eight year old leave second and I follow with the kindergartener. They can leave ahead of me (the 10 and 8 year old) being that I am travelling right behind them.
EVERYONE MUST take the ROUTE, no exceptions if they want to bike to school.

Walking the dog creates the same routine and rituals which also teach safety because the children going up and down the block on their own or around the block can understand how long it takes to run back home, what things might look uncomfortable to them.

Both these freedoms I offer the children at these ages and I find are quite different then just letting them ......go out.

Freedom in New York is not a gift when it is given to someone not ready to handle it. If your child has been asking for certain freedoms try to practice offering them routines such as:

-Going to the local deli, grocery store for milk or bread on Sunday nights.
-Taking a taxi to the corner where you live and letting them walk home (you follow behind after a local errand)
-Let them Pick up the Pizza or Chinese Food from the local restaurant if it’s close enough (prepay it, its easier)

These are the types of freedoms you can ENPOWER your child who is READY.

Be safe and know at one point they will have these freedoms and you are only helping them to learn how
To feel confident with them!

on Maturity

On maturity, On Nannies

Can you introduce Morality as a priority that your children need in order to reach maturity?

I find in day to day life with my kids, I am questioned on why I am doing something. For example, someone worked for our family for eight years, staying home while the babies slept while I ran around the city with the other children. Now in our house there are no more babies to stay home with, could I just fire this person?
I explained to the children over and over again how she dedicated so much of her life to us, that we need to see that she gets another job….We need to keep her employed until she does, because it’s the RIGHT thing to do, because she has done so much for us.

Here is a chance for your child to see another’s life.
Here is a chance for your child to manage destructive feelings as mthey might not like this person. I need to teach that his dislike for her doesn’t need to equal a wish for her demise!
Here is a chance for your child to change his assessment....

The prize here is his maturity……and the start of Morality Lessons which we can all teach!

What can you teach today?