I haven’t had a very good few days…
It hasn’t been spectacularly bad or anything, but certain circumstances arose {*ahem children up all night for no apparent good reason & therefore were VERY whingy & prone to tears at the drop of a hat} which put me on the back foot and made me tired and grumbly {or prone to tears at the drop of a hat}.
It’s easy to take two steps back when days like that happen…
To put on grimy grumpy glasses and generally be at odds with the world!
I don’t want that so I thought instead I would give myself an exercise on gratitude this morning…
Because I strongly believe that where the mind goes the heart will follow and I want to change my mindset.
Here goes…
For every grumble I’m feeling this morning I’m going to make myself think of at least two things about that situation that I’m grateful for so that I can change my attitude…
1) Grumble: My husband works away and I miss him. The kids miss him. None of us like the situation very much.
Grateful For:
** But it’s NO MORE sleeps until he comes home and we couldn’t be more excited. Counting down the hours not days until his home coming woo hoo.
** At least we don’t get an opportunity to take each other for granted.
** Sooooo grateful that he wasn’t one of the 100 guys on his crew that were given 1 weeks notice of their redundancy this week. Instead he got given flights through until the end of February… A less than perfect job is much better than no job at all!!!!!!!
2) Grumble: My washing machine broke & I got soooo very behind in my washing. I feel like this has put me on the back burner for getting the rest of my house in order too. I also really didn’t want to pay $200 to get it fixed!!
Grateful For:
** I am grateful that we had the money to get it fixed and that it only really took a few days.
** I am extremely grateful that it could be repaired. The cost of a new machine was far more than the cost of repairs.
** For that matter I am so lucky to be living in a country where I’m blessed to even have a washing machine.
** Lastly the huge pile of washing indicates that my children and I are blessed to have nice clothes. We do not want for anything. And most of the clothes my children wear, have all been gifts.
** I’ve just made myself finish off the job this morning so I can breath a happy sigh of relief that I’m finally up to date.
3) Grumble: I did not get much sleep this weekend. Which meant that I had to miss watching the wedding ceremony of a friend from church because we weren’t feeling well. My girls have also been waking up very early (between 5am and 5.30am) because it’s now light so early and the birds are so noisy.
Grateful For:
** However, I had a great month of getting sleep prior to that – which means that my girls have both been healthy & not suffering from nightmares. I am thankful for that good month of sleep.
** But we have a lot of beautiful trees and bird life around our house.
4) Grumble: I have a rent inspection again on Wednesday and I have absolutely no desire to scrub my house from top to bottom (to the point of having to dust the ceiling fans – seriously what normal person does that every 3 months and why is it on the list!) so that we can pass the inspection.
Grateful For:
** We are really lucky to have a beautiful home to live in with very nice & accommodating landlords.
** I do like a tidy/clean house, so it will be nice once it’s done.
** At least Mr Flutter will be home to help. (Bet that wouldn’t be on his grateful list 😉 ) LOL
5) Grumble: There are stickers and sand all over my house. Two of my pet hates and at the moment they exist in abundance. I dislike stickers because they are hard to remove from the floor & the surfaces & they tend to ruin clothes when they go through the wash. I’m pretty sure it’s obvious why I dislike sand in my house & car.
Grateful For:
** Grateful that shoes full of sand in the house means that Summer is coming and we’ve spent more time at the beach & park.
** We are really lucky to live so close to the beach.
** My children are having a fun childhood.
** Stickers all over the house mean that my children are eating a lot of apples & oranges. This can only be a good thing for their health surely.
Turning my grumbles into gratitude just made me feel so much better!!!
I don’t want to deny that the grumbles were/are there. But at least this way I can see that the positives from the situation far out weigh the negatives.
Lastly I’m so grateful for all the lovely people who commented on my post a few days ago. I’ve only had a chance to reply to some so far, but I just wanted to let you know that you really made my day and I really appreciate it!!
Here’s to a week for you to see more gratitude’s as you week unfolds. x
The best bit in all this – Neil is home tonight AND he will help with the rent inspection. Have a wonderful time welcoming him home you three.
Oh you are good!
Photo of Neil on a step ladder, feather duster in hand, please!
What a lovely way to get over the grumbles and get happy because there are so many lovely things around you! I hope you can enjoy your family live now that your husband is back and he gives you a helping hand so you can take a deep breath!
what a great idea – i’ve been having a pretty crappy weekend myself and stressing and snapping at boyfriend for things that now… don’t seem as important as I initially though.. thank you for putting things in perspective for me!
Good job in thinking of this to help you get past the grumbles. Yay that Mr. Flutter is home in minutes!
As to the stickers…maybe you could make some kind of sticker board for the girls to stick them onto? If you used a cardboard or foamcore board, you could toss it away if it got to be tooooo stickery! I don’t know if that would work, but it popped into my mind. 😀
(And thanks for the help with my mosaic – I got it done & posted! I also have my FQ-worth of scraps in a baggie already too! heehee)
I love the idea of balancing the grumps with at least 2 gratefuls. Great idea! :o)
Yay for Neil being home in time to dust the ceiling fans. That was a great bit of timing! :oD
The list luckily has far more positives than negatives. Keep going 🙂
Glad man is on his way home soon, especially to help with the cleaning! lol
I think we should all take a step back at times and be grateful for what is good rather than getting bogged down with what is bad.
Great post. It reminds me to be cheerful too.
Such a nice list, I am so happy to see that you are grumbling about ordinary things – nothing serious at all. And think of how clean your house will be soon, no one I know ever dusts the ceiling fans more than once a year, just before it is the season to turn them on.
How great that I read your post before taking the grand girls to school and daycare. My husband got a speeding ticket on the way to work, and when I saw the reflection of my car in the daycare window I realized that my front light was out. Could have let things slip into a bad day but decided to be thankful that I didn’t get a ticket for driving in the dark with only one headlight; thankful that we have a friend who is an honest mechanic and he got me in and fixed in about 1/2 an hour; and most of all thankful that God has blessed us with the means to pay for the ticket and mechanics bill. Keep on seeing God’s hand in all you do.
Your post reminded me of a ‘poem’ that I saw as a child.
‘thank God for dirty dishes,
they have a tale to tell,
whilst others may go hungry,
we are eating really well’
It may be trite, but has a lot of truth in it!
And your grumbles are not really grumbles, they are the sand in the shoes of our lives! so keep the grumbles coming!
This is an exercise that I should indulge in more often. I am trying to be grateful instead of grumpy but it takes discipline. Good for you for turning it all around.
Oh my those tiny little feet!!!
Those alone could get me out of the grumplestiltskins!!
great post Kat, turning the negatives into positives. We should all do that more often
What a beautiful post and a lovely way to turn your attitude around. Sorry I didn’t see this earlier. I was having a pity party over the weekend and had to do a gratitude post as well. 🙂 🙂
Hope you’re having a great week!
PS – We have rent inspections every six months. We just moved in at the beginning of July so haven’t had our first yet but I’m a bit nervous as we’ve never had inspections before.