Notice gifts and Name them

It has rained quite a bit here for the past week.  I get a little gloomy without sunlight, so all the rain had me a little down.  But then I walked by my hostas and realized that the rain has made them look so beautiful and lush.  The rain is a gift, for these plants.

I cleaned out my daughter's closet over the weekend.  Oh, dear.  So many clothes that don't fit anymore.  So many shoes that she has outgrown.  So many toys that she is getting too big for.  My hallway is now lined with bags of things to donate:  some to hand down to cousins, some for Goodwill, others to take to my work.  When will I have time to deal with those tasks?  I just barely had time to clean out a closet, hah! It can be overwhelming, all the tasks to be done!  But then this evening, as I mulled over my weekly schedule and tried to pencil in Goodwill drop-offs, I realized that I should be thankful that we live in such an abundantly luxurious time, when shoes and jeans and books and toys are actually reasonably affordable.  And I should be grateful that my sweet girl worked hard during a weekend to sort and organize, and was even agreeable about donating her hand-me-downs (which never usually happens! She normally wants to save every shiny gum wrapper, hah!)  Abundance, and outer order, are gifts.

Each morning when I wake up, I try to thank God for several specific things.  I am thankful for my family, for my home, for my dog, for my strong body.  For rain.  For organized closets.  And even if it's rainy out and I have to step over 3 Goodwill bags on my way to the coffee maker, I really do find that when I notice gifts and name them, I am happier with my lot in life.


What gifts have you noticed this week?  

20ish Days of Gratitude

Today, I'm thankful for my husband.

Who makes me laugh.  Who is a true partner in life.  Who dreams big dreams and then makes them happen.  Who finds new music and makes me listen to it.  (OK, I admit I usually enjoy it.)  Who gives me neck massages and listens to me gripe when I'm stressed out.  Who teaches the dogs cool tricks.  Who teaches Flanna to teach the dogs cool tricks.   Who makes excellent tofu.  Who walks or bikes everywhere and inspires me to be healthier.  Who just gets cuter with age (no fair!).  Who has known me from nerdy teenage years to nerdier college years to even higher levels of nerd-dom in grad school and SLP life, and still manages to think I'm pretty.  Who prays before each meal.  Who takes care of me when I am sick.  Who listens to the Indigo Girls and Joni Mitchell without complaint on long car trips.  Who kisses me every time he says good-bye.  Who balances out my anxious nerves with his calm demeanor.  Who is a gentle and supportive father to our little girl.

Seriously, I have a lot to be thankful for.



Who has known you and loved you through many stages of life? 

20ish Days of Gratitude

Today I'm thankful for the gorgeous ground I stepped out onto this morning.  Autumn gusts of wind are good for more than just crazy hair!  They also blow in beauty of the maple variety.

By the way, isn't Maple a beautiful name?  I also love Cedar.  You know, because I'm such a tree hugger.  :)


What beautiful sight are you thankful for today?

Grateful for Opportunities

I'm feeling so blessed right now. 

I've been job-hunting in preparation for our upcoming move to Georgia this summer, and I can't help but feel a little guilty.  I have friends and family who've been out of work for a long time, whose job searches have gone round and round and landed in a dead end.  Wonderful, hard-working, intelligent people, who would make outstanding employees--but opportunities are just slim these days for so many. 

And so, as I set up interviews, and draft pro/con charts to compare job offers, and chart possible work sites on google maps, and read up on super-interesting information that I might be asked at an interview, and meet wonderful possible coworkers who all care so deeply for Georgia's children, I try not to take all of it for granted.  This wonderful career I have.  The amazing opportunities out there for an SLP. 

I'm humbled that I have a career that is so rewarding and continually challenging.  My priest used to say, "onward and upward," about how we just keep learning more and more, and refining ourselves more and more in this life.   He'd say that our journey never ends, it's all "onward and upward."  

And I see that in my career, too.  Onward and upward.  Each experience, each client, each book or article I read, each continuing ed course I take, each child or teacher or parent I learn from, they propel me on as I become a more reflective and careful practitioner.  

Boy, did I ever get lucky in this whole career thing.

I'm grateful, indeed.   



What are you thankful for today?

Give Thanks

When I got married, a kind old widower from our church, Mr. Stroup, gave us some wonderful advice. He said, "Thank each other every day for the little things you each do." Robi and I made a point to follow that advice, and I really do think it's made a difference for our relationship, to feel appreciated each day. (By the way, I recently stumbled upon a neat article about how daily gratitude can improve marriage relationships). Old Mr. Stroup was right!

But the interesting thing is, that it's not just being appreciated that's the key here. Just expressing gratitude can lead to increased happiness. This is why gratitude journals are so useful for boosting happiness, and why some doctors recommend that their cancer patients keep gratitude journals, as well.

So, along that vein, and because it's November, I'm going to start a month long gratitude journal. I won't bore you with it all month, but here's my first entry.

Today, I'm thankful for:

vibrant fall leaves
conversation with a good friend
a job that I love
a sweet and healthy child
frozen spaghetti sauce and fast yummy dinners
a husband who asks about my day each day




What are you thankful for today?

Cultivate Gratitude

Gratitude is a pretty neat thing. It's pretty much impossible to be angry, tense, or irritated when you're feeling grateful. It's like the idea of pain receptors being blocked when touch receptors are acting. You know, when we rub our heads when we have a headache, the pain receptors turn off for a bit because they're being blocked by the "touch" information flowing through the sensory receptors. So we feel better for a bit. (At least that's how I remember it from neuro classes forever ago!). Anyway, to me, gratitude is like that. It's a magical way to turn off stress receptors.

I think that's why the idea of keeping a "gratitude journal" is so big these days. (Not that I keep one, but I do think it's a neat idea!) Just keeping track of what we're grateful for can really make us more open to feeling good.

So where am I going with this?

I've had a very happy weekend. And I think a lot of it has to do with gratitude. All week, I've been thankful for my wonderful new job. Then, my hubby got back home, and I was thankful to have him home. So thankful! Then, he let me sleep in and have a day all to myself this weekend. We went to the park in the morning. We ran into a few of our wonderful friends, watched the girls play and climb trees, and Flanna even got to help give our friend's new baby a bottle! (She is obsessed with babies right now, so it was so cute to watch her being so sweet and gentle with the little guy!) I felt so grateful for the neat neighborhood and kind friends we have made here in the past year. And later, I went out for a pumpkin spice latte, then to a bookstore, where I just read and walked around for a while. It was lovely. And I just felt so grateful for a day to spend however I wanted.

So what are you grateful for these days? A good job? A job at all in this crazy economy? A partner in life? Family who helps you through the rough spots? A dog who snuggles up to you? I'm thankful for all these things, and way more. And just listing those things here really did boost my happiness!





Who are you thankful for today? If you haven't told them so, tell them! Don't worry about being cheesy...people love to be appreciated!

Appreciate Friends

Our good friend Christopher is moving back to Georgia this week. Now that he's done with grad school, he's moving on to bigger and better things. Like marriage! Yay!

We took him out for a goodbye lunch after church on Sunday. We're really going to miss him! It's been so nice to have an "old" friend around here. I think people who know you in many contexts just understand you more easily.

Please say some prayers for Christopher, too, if you pray. He's looking for jobs in the Atlanta area (He does political administration/government work), and job searching right now is no easy business. But he's a catch, so I'm sure he'll find something good in time!

And the best part is that we'll see him again soon...Flanna's going to be a flower girl in his wedding in the fall. We can't wait!



Who in your life knows and loves you in lots of contexts? Call, e-mail, text, or snail mail them to let them know they're on your mind today!

Show Gratitude

When I got married, I got a lot of advice. A ton of advice.

But one piece of advice really stood out. An elderly man in our church whose wife had died a few years before, wrote us in his card, "Say I love you every day, and thank each other every day for the little things." He had been married over 50 years to his wife, so I put a lot of stock in what he suggested. At first, I had to try pretty hard to remember to thank Robi for the little things like taking out the trash, or taking the dogs out. But pretty soon, it became a normal part of our relationship, us both thanking one another regularly for little things. And I could feel how those little expressions of gratitude made me feel closer to Robi.

Today, I stumbled across an article about how gratitude helps maintain romantic relationships. The author wrote that,

"even everyday gratitude serves an important relationship maintenance mechanism in close relationships, acting as a booster shot to the relationship."

Seems that the old man's advice really was good!



What are you thankful for about your partner right now? For me, I'm thankful that my husband let me sleep in a bit this morning! So sweet!

A Little Gift

Those of you who read this blog regularly know that I've been doing a little planting lately. My window herb garden (see the pic?) is doing pretty well, which is really satisfying to me. And just as I was pondering what I wanted to plant outside once the rainy streak finally ends here, an amazing gift kinda dropped in my lap. My landlord, Edna, told me that what I had thought were abandoned flower pots on the back landing are actually communal herbs for everyone who lives in our house. There's some pretty established rosemary, some mint, and two things I'm not quite sure about. (Maybe thyme? I'm a newbie at this!) But Edna promised she'd explain it all to me soon. Yay!

Check out the lovely pic of the rosemary. Some days I'm amazed at how lucky I am.

Really, I'm kinda lucky.

I actually once got a fortune cookie that told me, "You will succeed at everything."

See? Lucky.

I mean, I met the perfect guy for me at 16. I ended up loving the job I naively chose as a teenager. I stumbled into a really cool assistantship in grad school that was amazingly perfect for my skills and interests. I accidentally got pregnant while tons of my friends struggle with infertility. My daughter was born healthy and strong, and continues to flourish and learn.

And now these cool herbs drop from the sky on my back steps.

What luck!

Perhaps I should go buy a lottery ticket.



How have you been lucky in your life?