Thousand Gifts Thursday

A little while ago, I did a review on the One Thousand Gifts Devotional by Ann Voskamp.  Actually, I think it's the last post that I did, so scroll on down and read it quick.  It's a lovely book and I'm really enjoying it. No, I still haven't finished it.  But the parts that I have read have really inspired me to try being more conscious of the gifts that God has given in my own life.  So since the whole thing started out as a challenge that Ann took, I decided I'd try it too.

On her website, she calls it the Joy Dare - because it is a dare to find joy in the gifts around you.  She's got some great [free] resources that I'll be using throughout the dare.  You can read more about it here.  She really does a better job explaining it than I do!  My favorite little freebie is the Joy Dare Calendar.  It goes through and tells you what to look for each day.  I think it'll be much easier to go through and find joys when you know what you're looking for!  (You can download it near the bottom of this page.)

So here's my problem.  I suck at New Year's Resolutions.  MOST people would take this dare as a resolution and start it on January 1.  Well I never get around to even setting a resolution (when I bother to make one) until somewhere around January 17.  Because I like to see what resolutions everyone else is making before picking and declaring my own.  Not that it's a competition.  No - because that's how I get the best ideas!  I can never come up with something resolution-worthy on my own, so I wait until I hear something good and then resolve to do that too.  So now, here near the end of January, I've resolved to find 1,000 gifts before the end of the year.

I had planned on starting February 1 and doing 3 a day and having just a few over 1,000 by the end of December.  Yes, I did the math in my head and it works out.  But then I found that adorable calendar of prompts and it starts in January.  So now I'm 29 days behind schedule.  Crap.  Well, I figured I would alter the dare a smidgen to fit it into my procrastinating schedule.  So I'm still going to start on February 1.  In order to come out to an even 1,000 some of the days have a prompt to find three things and others just prompt for one.  On the days that have one, I'll do one from January too, thereby completing all 1,000 in the year.  YAY!

Ok, now, my favorite part.  The journal.  I decided that I would actually physically write down my joys every day.  Mostly because that way a) I can keep them to myself if they are private and b) it will be easier to do right before bed than grab a computer and try to come up with some clever blog post about them.  Because let's face it, I'm not the most awesome at getting around to blogging on a regular basis.  I've got pictures from a trip to the botanical gardens, several Christmas celebrations, and Ellie's birthday that I need to post one of these days.  I'm not going to be blogging my joy list every single day.  BUT I do hope to do a weekly wrap-up on Thursdays (because I just had to do that blogger alliteration thing) to let you know a few of my joys from the week.  Nothing fancy, just another motivation to keep me going.

So anyway, I went to Target and thought I'd just get a cheapo little pocket calendar for the dare.  It's small, pre-dated, and cheap.  And then I walked into the journal aisle and found this beauty.  

And I couldn't leave it on the shelf.  So I shelled out much more money than I should have for a book of paper and brought it home.  I figured maybe if the journal is prettier I'll be more motivated to stick with it all year long.  Maybe?  Let's hope so.  Anyway, this was, again, before I bothered to look at the website and saw all the cute printables that you can get to make any plain old journal pretty.  (Side note: this whole thing has a super cute bird theme that I'm totally digging, so maybe that'll help me stick with it too!)  I tell you all of this so that if you decide you want to hop on board and take your own Joy Dare, first don't think that it's too late and you have to wait until next year.  And second, look for free things before you go to Target.  Because that is the place where budgets go to die.

So there you have it.  1 year - 1,000 gifts.  It seems like a lot.  But I'm really excited.  Will you join me in taking the Joy Dare?  If so, let me know and we can encourage each other to stick with it to the end!  I can't wait to see what happens!