Looking Back on All My Children Have Taught Me

I’ve been blogging since 2007 and have written hundreds of articles.  And while I definitely have some favorite lean thinking articles like the value stream mapping series I wrote back in 2008… the articles I cherish the most are the ones that have been inspired by my children.

My wife and I recently welcomed our 7th child into the world, a beautiful baby girl, and I’ve taken some time off of work to enjoy some family time.  And, tonight, actually this morning, after getting my my 2-year-old calmed down after a bad dream I was lying in bed thinking about all my kids have taught me.

This really got my mind racing so I got up and started to ping the search function on our blog (see right side of the page if you’re reading this on our blog)… and here are a few of the articles I found.

Riding a Bike

First, in May of 2007 I wrote an article about my then 4-year-old daughter learning to ride her bike.

This weekend my 4-year-old daughter learned to ride her bike without training wheels. She has been after me for quite awhile to let her have a shot but I have been hesitant. I just didn’t think she was ready…

Learning to Swim

A few months later, in August of 2007, I shared the story of my then 2.5 year-old-daughter’s swimming experiences!

My 2.5 year old daughter hit a major milestone last night.  She swam by herself with no life jacket.

She and her older sister (5 years old) took swim lessons earlier in the summer.  My 5 year old caught on during the lessons and was swimming in no time.  But it took the younger one a little more time to get the hang of it.

A Lesson in Courage

Around a year later, in May 2008, I shared a lesson in courage… specifically how my daughter faced down her fears at Great Wolf Lodge during a family vacation.  Man, was that a fun weekend!

Over the Memorial Day weekend my family and I went on a much needed vacation. We normally go to Sea World each summer, but since my wife is almost 8 months pregnant driving in a mini-van for 4 hours didn’t sit well with her.

So, we decided to stay closer to home this year and check out the Great Wolf Lodge in Grapevine, Texas.

Conference Calls, Kids, and SMED

A few days later my wife took off to visit some relatives and I shared the story of how I managed to take care of 3 kids and manage an important conference call at the same time.

My wife is out of town to visit some relatives which means it’s me and my three kiddos for the weekend.

Here’s the sticky part. I had to arrange an important conference call today and was totally stressing out on how I was going to pull it off with a 3-year-old, 5-year-old, and 21-month-old running around in all their glory.

Practice Makes Champions

Next, my kids have been in many different sports over the years… cheer, gymnastics, basketball, football, and soccer.  And in January 2011 I wrote an article about my daughter’s indoor soccer team winning the big championship.

A few months ago I wrote about my soccer coaching experiences with my daughter’s U7 team. To conclude that article I mentioned we were about to start playing indoor soccer.

Well, that indoor season ended Friday night… and I’m happy to announce that our team of 6 and 7 year old girls won the championship!

As an aside, this particular daughter still plays soccer to this day… sadly I no longer coach her… but the memories I have as her “daddy coach” will stay with me forever!  In fact, as I was driving this same daughter home from soccer practice last night I was complimenting her on how awesome she played in her team’s scrimmage.  I then joked that she better never forget her first coach who laid the foundation!  Her sincere, ever so sweet, reply nearly brought me to tears as she said, “I won’t Daddy.”

Dishwasher Kaizen

Lastly, make no mistake… my kids have impacted Gemba Academy in a major way.  And I don’t mean by inspiring me to do a great job so I can take care of them.  That’s obvious.

But, my kids have actually starred in a “Kaizen Dishwasher” video that’s been watched more than 164,000 times on YouTube and FAR more than this on Gemba Academy’s website!  And, here’s a pro tip… if you listen closely around the 7:08 mark you can hear my son humming the Little House on the Prairie theme song… you can’t make this stuff up folks!

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