Monday - Here We Go! becomes Starting with a Thankful Heart!

We took our first vacation in ages last weekend - 4 full days in Palo Alto, CA with my husband's brother's family. It was a fantastic, sunny adventure filled with trips to multiple parks, the Santa Cruz Boardwalk and lots of walks through the streets of Palo Alto - just lovely. The beach photo is from our stop at the beach before finding lunch and rides on the boardwalk.


As you can see from the photo of my daughter (dressed in her big brother's shorts over the top of her own - oh, and those are his shoes, too), we had a great time and everything was fun and smiles! I just had to include this photo - it cracks me up because it captures her personality so well. She's a ham!

We returned home late last night to find that we missed a heat wave in Seattle - 3 days in the 90s. Today is cool and rainy, which is fine by me. We're getting unpacked, doing laundry, and falling back into our normal routine. No worries about the outdoors calling to us to come and play. I can just dig in and get things off that pesky to-do list!

In all of my organization for my new blog daily topics, it didn't dawn on me that my Sunday and Monday plans were quite similar. SO, I've decided to change Mondays from "Here We Go!" to "Starting with a Thankful Heart!" Mondays can get bogged down with negativity as people leave the carefree fun of weekends behind to return to work and obligations (like that post-vacation to-do list!). Maybe if we can start Monday with a sunny outlook (there's my yellow hat again!), Monday won't seem so blah.

This new topic makes me think back to my elementary days when I was going through a negative patch. My mom was fed up with my black hat and wanted to help me discover the good things in my life (of which there were many). Before bed I had to write a list of 10 good things that happened that day. Some nights I would have much prefered just going to bed (which is crazy for a kid, right?!), but I made my way through the negativity and cranked out 10 good things. And really it wasn't too long before I found it easy to stretch the list beyond the mandatory 10 things - sometimes even making it to 20.


I'll keep things simple and list out 5 things I'm thankful for on my Mondays. In your comment (PLEASE COMMENT!!!), you can feel free to list anything you'd like to share - big or small, simple or complex.


Today my heart is thankful for:

5. A safe trip back and forth from California
4. The warm greeting from our dog, Albus, upon our return (dogs are great, aren't they?!)
3. The kindness of my parents for the taxi service to and from the airport and for letting Albus bunk at their place for 4 days
2. The plethora of public parks (and that my kids' fabulous Aunt & Uncle knew how to find the best ones!) available to kids in the Palo Alto area (and one kickin' water play park in Redwood, CA)
1. The partnerships and friendships that develop between fellow authors/small publishers

BONUS gratitude for the readers of the 75 books ordered today!!!

I'm feeling sunny already (despite the rain, which really does feel nice). How about you? What makes you thankful today?