Anyway...About a year ago, I read through Ann Voskamp's amazing book, One Thousand Gifts. It was life-changing for me. Perspective-changing, thought-changing, spirit-changing. I loved every page, and have since read through much of it a 2nd time. The premise of the book is that we should alter our perspective so that we see life through God-glorifying, thankful eyes, instead of the selfish, "more"-wanting eyes we so naturally wear. Ann encourages her readers to keep a list, as she did, of the things around them that they are thankful for. She mentions things from soapy bubbles in the kitchen sink, even though it's full of dirty dishes, to the glow of the full moon.
While I haven't done a perfect job of {anything} keeping a gratitude journal with pen and paper, my perspective has changed dramatically.
One little way that I have implemented teaching gratitude to my little ones is in our "Thankful For's".
Every night, at bed time, I sit on the edge of my beautiful 3-year-old daughter's bed. (Almost 4, now, but I'd rather not think about all of the growing and changing she's doing.) She knows our routine. "Mommy, let's do prayers, and 3 Thankful For's, and 2 Love's before bed." While her little list of things she is thankful for started months ago with things like "all my toys", "my room", and "my princesses", it has started to graduate to more meaningful things the past few weeks. "I'm fankful for Saturday when Daddy gets to stay with us aaaaaalllll day long", "I'm fankful that we got to go to church and see our friends today". She's starting to get it. It's starting to sink in. The big things. The little things. She's becoming thankful for all of them! Me? I'm just so thankful God is teaching me how to cultivate a heart of gratitude in both myself and my family.
{And for those of you wondering, our "loves" are phrases that begin with "I love you more than..." and end with whatever clever thing we can come up with... "all the polka dots on my pajamas", "all the crayons in the crayon box", or Allie's personal favorite, "all the toilet paper." It's a fun little game!}
