A grateful spirit makes you awesome.

Yes, you may quote me on that.

Why I started a life of gratitude:

It was a familiar New Year’s Resolution…that usually died by mid-March.
I realized how much someone’s quick word of “thanks” to ME bolstered my mood
An unexpected coaching opportunity moved my husband across the state 3 days before school started, and I stayed behind.

Living apart for a year is hard. We have 2 kids – at the time they were going into 6th and 8th grade. We couldn’t sell our home and buy a new one in 3 days. And I didn’t have a job with the new school.

Add in the fact that I knew I was having major surgery in 2 months.

And a popular TV host challenged the world to write down 5 things they were grateful for each day.

Some days were hard. One of my “go-to” items was “I didn’t feel like throwing up today.” (Spend a year where this is a daily symptom, and it really becomes a big deal to be nausea-free. But I filled a small notebook with my GRACELETS that year.

What’s a GRACELET?

I have a dear friend who introduced me to this word around the same time. It is a gift of GRACE in the form of a BLESSING. Think of it as a DROPLET of God’s Grace to you. They are small. You have to really look for them sometimes. But there are days when they pop up everywhere around you.

That was 2004. It’s been a decade.

How has it changed me?

I speak to cashiers and servers by name and thank them for specifics of their service.
I brag on exceptional service whenever possible to someone else on staff.
I ask strangers how I can pray for them.
I tell co-workers specific ways they have impacted my life or the lives of the children we work with.
I can ALMOST ALWAYS find a GRACELET in any situation.

So, when I got the flu and couldn’t travel to see Daughter for Christmas, I saw an opportunity for An Appointment with God. Read about it here.

Over the years, I’ve tracked my GRACELETS in various ways: a small journal, my calendar and this year on monthly tags. I love looking back and re-reading them on the tougher days. It’s so nice to see how Faithful God is year after year.

My art continues my Growing Gratitude theme. I had to go to a single-page entry this week because of my unexpected adventure with the theme page. (You can read about that here.) I’m aiming to finish the year AND my TMD notebook at the same time. My gesso misadventure cost me some pages, so it may be close.

How do you track YOUR blessings? Share a photo!