A Little Sunshine

Ok, so I love books. I love to read them, check them out, buy them, give them, fill them up, and I also love to make them. A blank book makes me giddy. It is pure potential for what ever you want to put in it. A while back I made this book, coptic bound, and covered it with blue and green plaid flannel. At first I wasn't sure how many signatures to put in it so I started to stitch it together and then my sister kept saying, "Add more signatures!!!" On I went until I found myself with the blue and green plaid monstrosity. This thing is massive with 38 five sheet signatures. I had no idea what in the world to do with it until recently. I decided to make it a sort of happiness/gratitude journal. My aunt started one and I thought this could be very beneficial for me. Here is a little of what makes me happy!

• blank paper
• new pens and pencils
• a ball of yarn
• seeds
• new books
• crayons
• dirt- open a bag of fresh potting soil. It smells like heaven :)
• fall and winter
• chocolate ice cream
• plain fudge brownies
• the four cheese ravioli from Costco- w/out sauce. Good ravioli doesn't need it.
• time to myself
• seeing my friends
• finishing a project; any project, no matter how long ago I started it
• singing a solo in church with out my knees buckling or throwing up or crying out of sheer terror
• the mountains and streams and waterfalls
• progressing through a linear process. Step 1, step 2, step 3... this explains my love for things like knitting, reading, cooking, baking, and sewing.
• list making
• libraries
• walks in the park or the foothills
• camping
• the gumption to keep knitting even though the sleeves on this stupid sweater are going to give me an ulcer.
• putting my Heavenly Father first
• knitting, knitting, reading, knitting, reading, reading, reading, knitting, gardening and growing seeds, knitting...I see a pattern here...
• Art in the Park- some people are just way too talented for their own good.
• a really great story
• having a good place to live, rent free, with parents who are gracious and kind.
  
• being able to find things to be happy about even when I'm not feeling very happy.
• finding it is ok to do the things I love even with out a hope of ever doing them well- trust me, there are some people out there so good at knitting it would make you, ok maybe just me, cry like a baby.
• discovering that the obvious answer, though still an answer, may not be the best one. Sometimes the way that should not work, upon closer examination and trial, will prove to be the perfect choice.
• good friends that know way more about you than any one person should but like you anyway.
• being silly, humor, laughing
• listening to thunder and walking in the rain
• knowing that my mother, within the span of a year: survived breast cancer, a complete hysterectomy, menopause, no hormones, and the deaths of her mother, father, and her best friend's husband all around the time of my senior year of high school.
• me- the quiet, shy, people watcher... surviving those moments in my life when my (very large) bold streak (that sits in the back of my mind...observing), starts acting up. There are definitely times that I think about now that make me want to find out if it's possible for a person to spontaneously turn themselves inside out.

As you can see, I have a lot to be happy about!! I will post more happy things in the future, along with a photo of the giant plaid book.

Later,

Michele