Day 34 - Giving Thanks

I told our kids last night that I was going to enter them in manners boot camp.  Oh the wiggling and talking with food in the mouth and yelling and elbows on the table.  Argh!!!

Then I had a revelation that I probably needed to go to spouse manners boot camp.  Dear Husband worked his heiny off on tearing the house apart and by 9:00 PM, I had uttered nary a thanks.

Saying thank you is sometimes really hard to do, especially when you feel like the person should be doing it anyway or if you feel that you haven't been thanked for the countless things you do.  It seems that saying thank you is as hard if not harder than saying sorry.

What kind of world are we living in!?

It should be easy for me to say thank you to DH for all the wonderful things he does for our family and around the house, big and small.  It can be hard to conjure up those items when one is in the thick of being pissed off about something but, nevertheless, we need to thank our spouses.  Gratitude works both ways.

So I brainstormed a list of things I can be thankful to DH about:

Providing a wonderful life for our family by working three jobs
Sacrificing a year of his life (our lives) overseas
Marrying me (this should be daily)
Having kids with me (again - daily)
Being so ready to jump into home improvement projects and getting excited about them
Having the vision of the projects
Going with me on my crazy ideas (for the most part)
Pushing me to make our bed
Keeping me accountable for soooo many things in life
All the effort it takes to try to steady my emotional ship
Being willing to get dirty to a) play with the kids b) play with the dog c) take care of our house
Mowing the yard
Shoveling the snow
     (sometimes both in the same week!)
Coaching Tball
Being the driver in the family on long trips...or short ones
Playing with the kids
Being rational with me about money (ie the kitchen remodel)
Being irrational with me about money (ie the truck)
Taking care of the majority of bedtimes
Washing Little Miss's hair
Styling Little Miss's hair!
Keeping in shape so he can haul the heavy stuff in our lives
Being a good leader - of players, soldiers, students, and our family
Keeping a calm head in scary situations
Buying a gun cabinet
Giving up part of the garage but letting me park in it
Scraping my car off when I don't park in the garage
Knowing me so well that it annoys the heck out of me sometimes!
Being irresistible
Laughing (giggling?) at our shows
Remembering what shows we have on what nights
When he makes popcorn and shares with me
Being a man of his word
Being a good man period.

There's more I could add to the list but this is a good starter.

Start your own for your spouse or significant other!  It's easy to get bogged down in the daily minutia and forget about all we can be grateful for.   Some people keep a journal, some verbally list their blessings, etc.

Write a note and leave it on your special person's pillow so they see it before they go to bed or sneak one into their lunch...or on their napkin at dinner time.  It's important for our kids to see us showing gratitude.  How else will they learn it?

Now I'm off to write up drills for kids' manners boot camp.  Ha!  Just kidding.  I'm off to give DH a big hug and kiss to thank him for all the work and muck he dealt with today.

Cheers,
Megs