The Gratitude Project: September in July

It's pouring down rain outside, and inside it's cozy. It's pumpkin spice latte weather in July. I have a steaming mug of coffee next to me and I'm wrapped up in a blanket on my couch. My inbox has more work than I can do and my fingers are ready to get typing.

It's all a matter of perspective

Gratitude changes the way you see the world. I've been doing a Gratitude Project for a few months now, finding things to be grateful for. Sometimes it's hard to be grateful. Sometimes I just plain forget. Sometimes the best I can do is "I'm alive," and sometimes it's hard to even feel grateful for that.

But slowly, I'm getting better. And life is getting better. Not that actual circumstances are changing, but that I'm beginning to see them in a better light. And when I can see hope in the world, I react better and create better circumstances for myself and for all of us.

And really, it's amazing what a difference gratitude can make in the way the world looks.

For example, there are two ways I could describe what is happening in my house today.

1) The kids are going crazy and are playing with dirty outdoor stuff that's not even proper toys. The ambient sound in the house is equivalent to a heavy metal concert and just as unpleasant. We're going to be eating hot soup on a hot day because our diets no longer allow for normal sandwiches and we don't have salad in the fridge at the moment. The house is a total disaster and all the shoes are in the living room.

Or

2) Heidi is crowning Ion with the "Crown of Truth," which is a broken tricycle tire, because childhood imagination is amazing. Rori is trying on all of our shoes pair by pair because childhood fashion is also amazing (as is the getup she chose for herself this morning. She managed to find an entire multi-layer outfit full of items that don't match each other in the slightest.) Emory is sleeping peacefully in the back bedroom. There is broccoli cheese soup simmering on the stove because Bear Creek Soup is the gods' gift to busy families everywhere. Ryan has converted the kitchen table into a makeshift shop and is drilling out some sheet metal to fix the running board of our van. We have a massive van that fits our whole family, and we're not paying the dealer hundreds of dollars to fix it because Ryan likes to tinker with stuff. Basically, we're the Weasleys without the wands and I always wanted to be them. I'm living my dream, I just didn't know it came with so much noise.

See? The difference that gratitude makes.

I could go for having the Scourgify spell though.

Love and marriage

Today I am grateful for 6 wonderful years with my love! What incredible things these six years have brought - four beautiful babies, millions of hopes and dreams, and so many lessons in how to love. Here is to 6 more years, and then 12 after that, and many many more years of learning and loving together. I love you more than I ever manage to tell you. 

Bill

Tropical storm rain is the best sort of rain because it doesn't come with tornadoes. 

Bedtime 2

One baby snores in the bed next to me while the other snores in her crib across the room. The northernmost fringes of Tropical Storm Bill drum on the window. I'm sipping green tea with a generous helping of coconut sugar. The dim light from my laptop screen illuminates my fingers as they blather on about something having to do with tree trimming. I'm getting paid for this.

Bedtime

Nothing sweeter than going to sleep on clean sheets, with crickets singing outside the open window and a little boy hiccuping in his sleep next to you. 

Grateful for chaos

Today I am grateful for the chaos that my life sometimes is. It means that I have four beautiful, creative, energetic children who aren't afraid to ask for (and sometimes insist) on what they want and need in life. It means that I have food to feed them, even when that food is scattered all over the table. It means that we are blessed enough to have a choice in food, so they have the luxury of being picky eaters (and therefore scattering their food). It means they love each other and want to play with each other, even when that means someone steps on someone else, or when it means that Ion insists on being Ana instead of Kristoff and Heidi (who also wanted to be Ana) is stuck without a love interest. It means that they have beds and blankets to make a mess of, and they have clothes to wear or pull out of their drawers and leave in piles all over their room.

Chaos means a lot of things that many people in the world don't have. So since my choices are to be grateful for it or to cry about it, I'm going to be grateful for it. And then I'm going to drink a tall glass of blackberry wine (something else to be grateful for) and start to work on cleaning it all up.

#thegratitudeproject