Gratitude Journal

Last year I started to keep a sort of gratitude journal. It came after a counselor advised me to begin a journal to keep track of panic attacks/ episodes of severe depression to try to find the origin of those issues, but that just sounded so depressing (which was the point, I guess). So I half took his advice and began a gratitude journal instead. A few nights ago I found it in the rubble of my room and decided to share a few pages from it:

I fell in love with the sentiments I shared in that journal, and decided to start another one for this new chapter in my life. I'm not ready to share the inside yet, but here is the outside of it:

"Let the beauty we love be what we do." -Rumi

I love it. The journal itself was $1.50 at Michael's, the gold letter stickers were about $5. I also grabbed a Smash Stick to make documenting easier (pen on one side, glue stick on the other).

I have filled a few pages so far using instagram picture and a few scrapbooking papers, again from Michael's. It's just so fun. *Note: I print my instagram pictures using this tutorial.

Scrapbooking/journaling inspiration: Dear Lizzy / A Beautiful Mess

Preschool and Motherhood

I am not a mother. Not yet. No where close. And that's completely fine by me. Because right now, I have something close, and that is pretty darn cool.

Last week I started working at a preschool. Just helping out, shuffling through the different classes so the teachers could go on breaks throughout the morning. It started as more of a favor- some of the staff are family friends, and I like helping people out. My responsibilities are pretty light, too: I'm basically getting paid to push kids on the swing set, and make sure they don't die.

But as the days go on, I seem to understand a little bit more why motherhood is so beautiful.
And weird. But mostly beautiful.

The other say as I was pushing a little girl on a swing, she started singing a song about how great "Ms. Allie" is. My heart just about melted.

Random little kids come and give me hugs when they see me coming. They wrap their little arms around my hips, look up, and give me these huge magical smiles. They radiate. I love it.

And who knew knock-knock jokes were so funny? Or maybe it's just how cute the 4-year-olds look when they're telling them. Either way, they steal my heart every time.

On a similar note, check out these sweet love notes from a soon-to-be big brother to his yet-to-be-born baby sister.

alice and lucy

(Source)

I think until recently I have spent most of my life very selfishly. So concerned with being able to do what I wanted, finding out what I needed out of life, wanting to be happy for me. College was no exception. In fact, my selfishness was fed by living on my own, always working and studying. I did good things with my time but I did it mainly for the benefit of myself.

In a class I took, we were discussing the women’s suffrage movement. We read and talked and in the end, watched a film. It was heart-wrenching and inspiring. I learned how they suffered, sacrificed, and endured; how many years, generations fought for the right to have a say in the world. At the end, my professor posed a question:

What in your life is worth all of this sacrifice?

What would you give everything for?

The images of Alice Paul and Lucy Burns and the other women who had fought so hard for something they believed in with their whole hearts lingered in my mind. I could not stop thinking of those questions that my professor had asked. What meant enough to me that I would go to prison, refusing to eat, and then being force fed just to be heard? To stand up for what I believed and felt?

I knew that I cared a great deal about women and women’s rights but would I give everything for that? Of course my family and good friends were on that list of who/what I would sacrifice for but was that all? Could that really be all I truly cared for?

These questions did not leave me for a long time. I spent a great deal of time rereading and rewatching, studying and thinking about Alice and Lucy and what they did. It was then that I truly realized the things that mattered most to me. My family, friends, my faith and my relationship to God. Eventually I would put all my personal goals and aspirations on hold for a year and a half, leave my family, friends, my style, music, and hobbies to go to a different country, learn a new language, and share the things that I hold most dear with people who didn’t always treat me kindly.

It was the first true sacrifice I had ever made. It was the first time I had truly been unselfish. And it was the first time I felt I could become a person who could actually have a positive impact on the world around me.

Those women did great deeds in pushing the suffrage movement along. But their contribution goes much deeper. They help us become good, contributing citizens. They help us find what really matters to us. They help shape us.

In honor of Women's History Month, tell us: who are the women who have helped shape you?

(Left-Lucy Burns and Right-Alice Paul)

danke schoen

I am grateful to be a woman.

I am grateful to be a mother.

I am grateful to be able to continually learn.

I am grateful to have good books to read.

I am grateful for music that makes me want to dance.

I am grateful for my sisters and sisters-in-law.

I am grateful to have good food to eat everyday, not just today.

I am grateful for our apple tree.

I am grateful to be able to write here and be so open with all of you, strangers and friends.

I am grateful for the smells of the holidays.

I am grateful for 44 cent avocados... and 3 dollar milkshakes

I am grateful for our amaryllis.