Happiness Project: Reading over lunch

As I mentioned in my previous post, I'm well into the book The Happiness Project. 

I'm learning that I am quite similar to the author and find many of her comments sound like something I would say.  She mused in the chapter I read while eating my lunch today titled "Be Serious about Play" that when she was eleven, she would sit on the floor in her room, poring over magazines with her scissors and glue stick, cutting, clipping, copying inspiring tidbits and colating them all together in her little Blank Books.  I look back at my piles of these same kinds of books, giggling at the things I too, cut out and pasted diligently on the pages.  Super models, flowers, fortune cookie fortunes, recipes (what 11 year old cuts out recipes?), craft ideas, sketches for future logos, poems about journeys, the Eiffel tower and red headed children. 

The author then questions, why isn't she still doing these same activities for fun, as she once did?  She writes, "Too often, I'd give up fun in order to work.  I often felt so over whelmed by tasks that I'd think, "The most fun would be to cross some items off my to-do list,  I'd feel so much better if I could get something accomplished."" 

This is my daily struggle, now that I'm not working.  While the kids are at school and my husband is at work, my to-do list is pages-long and full of tasks to do to get our house ready, to prepare for the upcoming trip, to get caught up on all the tasks I've put off while I've been working.  Amidst this time, I love being able to check things off, to feel like I'm accomplishing things, but when do I start to find time for the Blank Books of my life now?

And you?  What are you doing for fun?  I'm going to go play outside with my kids on this lovely fall day.  And count this as day two blogging again.  I've missed being here.  Glad to be back.

p.s.  And my lunch? It is ratatouille I made recently for a dinner party.  I'm the only one in the house that likes all the deep, velvety flavors melting together, so I get all the leftovers.  Eating this alone reminds me of the semester I spent in Paris on a budget.  I would buy a can of ratatouille and a can of kidney beans, mix them together and serve on top of white rice.  Cheap, filling and yummy for a college kid on a budget in a city full of fancy delights.  I saved my money for desserts.  Always dessert.

A little trip

This little family of ours is about to embark upon a big journey.  The journey began this weekend as we made the cross country trek from Minneapolis to Chicago to take care of a few details before we depart. 

Within the coming weeks and months you'll begin to learn more as the details unfold of our adventure on the horizon.  Will you follow along with us?

In the meantime, I'm reading The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin for my book club.  The theme is so timely, given the place we are in our lives here.  The book brings up a lot of interesting points about living a purposefully happy lives, not taking happiness for granted, and ensuring that we are doing the most we can to make every day a happy, adventure and song filled day for ourselves, our families and the world around us.  Have you read it?