Gratitude

For the last four Thursdays, I have been posting "Thankful Thursday" submissions each week to help shift my focus towards Thankfulness for all the blessings in my life even though it has been a very difficult fall.  Beginning on Monday I am spreading the Gratitude Project to our entire family.  I want to teach my children about the importance of gratitude and giving thanks for their blessings beyond the routine "thank you."  I also want to increase our collective awareness of the beauty, richness, and blessing that is our daily life.

To try and keep our project on track and have a more tangible way of expressing our thanks,  we have created our "30 Days of Gratitude" Calendar from Jessica Sprague.  It was on sale for only a $1 a few weeks ago and contains printable files and instructions for a month long daily observance of gratitude. I admit that actually assembling the project did lead to some ungracious feelings on my part.  It essentially requires assembling thirty pockets and tags -- including printing, cutting, adhering (I used glue lines, of course), threading ribbon etc.  Of course given my frustration with repetitive tasks this was not a good fit for me, but B jumped in to help with the final phases which helped enormously.

It is cute and we have our pockets assembled which will hopefully help keep us going. Tomorrow, we will hang ribbons with the pockets on them somewhere in our living room (where M can't reach) and begin having a daily moment where we gather and write down our five things we are thankful for.  The idea is that it will be five different things each day recorded on the corresponding note card, but we will see.  I'm not sure how well we'll do with remembering each day, but we're going to do our best.

Before beginning assembly of the calendar, I purchased the 30 Days of Gratitude Mini-Album file set as well (this weekends $1 Hybrid project).  It includes spaces for all our cards and places for pictures of things we are grateful for as well as quotes.  I'm hoping it is a bit less repetitive than the pockets project, but am holding off starting assembling it for a week or so as other things need attention first.

I'm throwing all this out there just as some ideas for contemplating gratitude all month long.  I have a few other projects and posts planned for this month and Thankful Thursdays will continue through Thanksgiving as well. I find I am seeking grace and awareness of life's gifts in this phase of life and November seems the perfect time to build it into our days in a more concrete way.  I hope you will join me and welcome any ideas you have for other Thanksgiving ideas or crafts as we focus on the important theme underlying the big feast. (I'll likely have some recipes to share as well as we near the feast).  Have a wonderful week!