Gratitude Challenge 2017

If you've been playing along with Positively Present's 30 Days of Gratitude Challenge, these prompts won't be news to you, and if you've visited me on Instagram, my posts won't be new news, either. However if neither apply, or if you're like me and you like a little consolidation and closure, here it is... my 30 Days of Gratitude, all at once:

1: Beauty

2: Happiness

3: Nature

4: Inspiration

5&6: Amusement and Kindness

7: Comfort

8:Self-love

9: Feeling

10: Nourishment

11: Music

12: Freedom

13: Optimism

14: Challenges

15: Health

16: Creativity

17: Memories

18: Home

19: Friendship

20: Innovation

21: Love

22: Awareness

23: Family

24: Solitude

25 & 26: Generosity and Wonder

27: Meaning

28: Peace

29: Knowledge

30: Growth

See past years' challenges: 2013, 2014, 2015 (2016 I participated on Instagram only)

Mid-Holiday Moments :: Thanksgiving

Early, full, hyper, fragrant, merry, busy, goofy, loud, satisfying, and now- over. Another Thanksgiving is in the books, and it was a good one, y'all. Hoping yours was the same.

Thank you.

To my hubby- thank you for providing for us, thank you for your patience, thank you for your love and strength and your ability to play with our Littles.

To my Littles- thank you for your innocence, thank you for your creativity, thank you for your love and goofiness and for knocking my socks off every day.

To my family- thank you for your support, thank you for your advice, thank you for your love and council and for always being willing to lend a helping hand.

To my friends- thank you for your patience, thank you for your loyalty, thank you for your love and presence and for so frequently being the light when it gets dark.

To my animals- thank you for providing an outlet, for providing beauty, for providing richness in my life.

To my city- thank you for providing shelter, for providing resources, for providing entertainment and kindred spirits and for safety and order.

To my country- thank you for providing a place to belong, a place for roots, a place for growth and the beauty of potential.

To my planet- thank you for providing for life in all it's forms, for the origin of all beauty as we know it, for harboring our past and supporting our present.

For all these things, I give thanks.

Filling Up the Woodshed

It's now about half full- this new woodshed of ours- and we have so much left to cut and split... we might need that second woodshed (and perhaps a third?) sooner than we thought! For now, though, it sure is nice to drive around the curve in the driveway without worry of a limb falling on one's car! Now, if only we could get some steady fire-in-the-fireplace-type weather!

Leaves

Has anyone else noticed how much the leaf fall has increased in the past week? Around here anyway it almost seems as if the trees are in a race with each other, and the leaves are just raining down constantly. It's pure fall magic.

This change in the landscape hasn't escaped my Littles. We took an afternoon walk in our woods today, and as we walked they went on and on about how sad it was that they could only enjoy the leaves while they were outside (don't be too jealous of this picturesque scene, this observation was accompanied by just as many complaints about how cold they were getting). A project started to form in my mind- What if we figured out a way to bring some of the leaves inside?

Step one: gather supple, brightly-colored leaves.

Step two: think up things we're thankful for and write them on the best and brightest of them.

Step three: tie leaves onto branches with embroidery floss and whisper prayers to the fall foliage gods that no one will poke their eyes out on your new gratitude-oriented centerpiece.

When we decided our sticks were perfectly adorned (it happened right about the time thoughts of gratitude turned toward toilets, burps, etc), we noticed Daddy was working on a project of his own, much to the kids' delight...

...so we had to rush right back outside!

The last swipe of the rake was completed as the sun went down, and the kiddos were finally given the countdown to leap into their best and biggest pile of leaves to date!

I'm sure the bathtub will be full of little crunched up pieces of leaves and twigs and such, but I'm also sure that won't be what they'll remember about today. No one loves "leaf season" like these two!