100 Happy Days - Days 23 & 24

Day 23

My daughters birthday.  Family and close friends together.  Balloons, streamers, cake and presents. Laughter, fun and lots of giggles, the perfect recipe for happiness.

Day 24
Happiness today is an electric heated throw rug, it's stormy and freezing and I love being warm.

100 Happy Days - Day 22

Thanks to my friend for sharing a link on anxiety where I read the following:

Mindfulness is both a set of practices and a way of thinking about life that is based on Buddhist traditions that are 3,000 years old. Being mindful means having a gentle, open and accepting attitude toward your own experiences and surroundings, whatever those may be. As Eckhart Tolle, a writer and spiritual teacher, once stated: “Whatever the present moment contains, accept it as if you had chosen it.” Meditating, focusing on your breath, or taking a nature walk and focusing on the sights, smells, and sounds are good ways to learn how to be mindful. Mindfulness creates a spaciousness of mind that allows emotions to be there without clinging to them.

 

 

A wonderful reminder, thank you.

100 Happy Days - Day 21

Time alone with my husband. 

 

As working parents you can be guilty of failing to find the time to be alone together.  Daily life is filled with the fun and excitable chatter of children, the rush to get ready for school and work, the end of day routine, making tea, reading school readers etc etc.

 

Today I was lucky enough to have some time alone with my husband and it was nice.

100 Happy Days - Days 19 & 20

Day 19 

Mr Willy Wag Tail.  We have a lovely little Willy Wag Tail that lives in our front garden. He's adorable and flits around from tree to tree, sits on our front fence and happily wags his little tail to and fro.  I love to sit in the lounge and look out our big front window and watch him fly about.

Day 20 

19 load and excitable little children having a blast at a birthday party. Busy and crazy, but so much fun.

100 Happy Days - Day 18

Happiness today, it's Friday, end of the working week, enough said :)

100 Happy Days - Days 14, 15, 16 & 17

Day 14 - The pleasure and warmth of a fantastic heater on such a cold day.

Day 15 - A room with a view.  Today I  attended a workshop on the second level of our building. This is a room that I don't visit quite to often and have to say that I was pleasantly surprised with its interesting view.  Early morning with the sun still rising, gentle rays of light spreading across roof tops was a calm and peaceful way to start my workshop. 

Day 16 - A catered lunch and it was delicious.  Sometimes we forget how nice it is to enjoy the simple pleasures of nice food.

Day 17 - Snowflakes.  Do you remember as a child, folding paper over and over again and then cutting shapes out with scissors to make snowflakes.  My young daughter has just learnt this little treasure and it is so much fun watching her make these.  Childhood innocence and happiness is such a joy to share.

100 Happy Days - Day 13

Today's moment of happiness was shared with my son.  

We were walking along our foreshore and I said to him "stop and listen, can you hear that".  He stopped, he listened and he heard the wonderful sound of the waves crashing against the beach. 

"That", I told him "is my favourite sound" and with that he smiled and nodded his head in understanding.  Then I smiled, listened and instantly felt relaxed and happy.

100 Happy Days - Day 12

I have been quite time poor lately and haven't seen some of my friends as much as I would like.  Today I had some spare time and was fortunate enough to find that one of my close friends also had some time up her sleeve.  So a quick visit was had.  A delicious coffee, a bite to eat and a wonderful catch up, had me leaving my friends house feeling extremely happy and also very lucky to count her as one of my close friends.

My dear friend Miss S accepts me exactly as I am, she never judges and even though we may not have seen each other for quite awhile, our relationship is one that simply falls into place immediately.  It's relaxing, uncomplicated and supportive, so I am very lucky because it's true friendship indeed.

Love you Miss S xxx

100 Happy Days - Days 8, 9, 10 & 11

Day 8 - The Running Lady.....everyday a lady goes past our house on her daily run.  It's become a little ritual in our family, who ever sees her first comments  "there goes the running lady" and the rest of us all tend to stop what we are doing and watch her run by.  A simple little ritual that we all enjoy and one of that reminds us to not be self absorbed and wrapped up in our own world.  Take notice of what is happening around you, reflect and be happy.

Day 9 - The most freezing day ever!.....Parking the car and walking to work the air was freezing. It is very easy to just feel miserable in this weather, but I like to try and turn this around.  The air although cold, had a nice crisp freshness to it.  Breath it in, enjoy and remind yourself you're alive!

Day 10 - A loving kiss good night and a big bed time hug from my children.

Day 11 - A girls night in......great cheese, delicious wine and fun company.  Lots of giggles and laughter with friends.

100 Happy Days - Day 7

Today was lunch with a view, oceanside overlooking our beautiful beach and harbour. Crisp, salty, fresh breeze. Seagulls calling out and the sound of the waves crashing against the shore. All this plus some great laughs with friends.

My senses nurtured today and happiness is bliss.

100 Happy Days - Day 6

A lazy old Sunday today, a time to relax and recharge the batteries.  

This week has been crazy, rushed and busy.  Today's happiness comes in the form of having the luxury of not having one single thing to do.  No big checklist and work priorities to complete. Today was my choice, and I chose slow and relaxed.

An afternoon well spent with my two children and some friends at the swimming pool, a lazy Sunday night tea and then a snuggle together on the couch watching one of our favourite shows,  I think is a fantastic way to finish of the week.

100 Happy Days - Day 5

Exciting news today.....my new couch has arrived.

I recently bought a couch, only to find that the material I had chosen was on back order and would cause a delay with the arrival time.

For me not too much of a big deal, what will be will be, but still a bit of double handling on my behalf. We are moving into a new house and I am trying to co-ordinate the delivery of new furniture as well as the donation and delivery of old furniture.   A delay with my new couch would have meant a slight inconvenience,  the old couch would need to be moved to the new house, then removed and delivered elsewhere once the new one arrived, not a huge problem really in the scale of things.

Imagine my surprise when the store called and said that everything had worked out and my couch will be ready on time, happy days!

Here's to hassle free moving.

100 Happy Days - Day 4

Today was a grumpy day.  

Today was a stressful day.

Today was a busy day.

Today was the sort of day where one can easily forget happiness.  

Today was the sort of day where one can easily become overburdened by the stress of it all.

Today was the sort of day where one can easily let their worries get the better of them.

Today is the sort of day that makes the 100 Happy Days Challenge important.

Today's happy moment came in the form of a surprise morning tea for a colleague who is leaving. It was lovely to stop for a moment, take time out and help make someone else feel happy, special and cared for.

The choice is there.  You can either finish your day letting grumpiness, stress and worries be your main memory of how your day was, or you can finish on a high note and let the happy moment be the winner.

The 100 Happy Days Challenge has worked a treat today and I feel better already!

100 Days of Happiness - Day 3

There is nothing sweeter than childhood innocence and the wonder and awe that goes with it. 

Today my young daughter received an early birthday card in the mail.  When she opened the envelope we could see that it was a nicely decorated, homemade card covered with lots of stickers. I could see that this card had been made by a child and assumed that one of my daughters friends had made the card for her.  We eagerly read the card to see who had sent it to her.  Written inside in sprawling childlike handwriting was the following:  

Dear H

Have a very happy birthday

I hope you get lots of nice presents

Love The Fairy xxx

My daughter, like most young girls adores fairies and was so very excited to receive her own special card from the fairies.   She kept saying to me  "I can't believe the fairies sent me a card" with the biggest smile plastered across her face.

A wonderful, thoughtful card made by one of her kind friends, or who knows maybe it really was the fairies, either way today it made us all happy.

100 Happy Days - Day 1

Yesterday while on facebook I noticed a friend of mine had posted this link:

             http://100happydays.com/

           

Curiosity got the better of me, I visited the site and saw the following written:

            "The ability to appreciate the moment, the environment and yourself in it,          is the base for the bridge towards long term happiness of any human being."

and this was enough of a nudge to entice me to do my own 100 Happy Days Challenge here on my blog. I haven't written too many posts so far, so the thought of completing 1 a day for 100 Days feels a tad daunting, but strangely at the same time quite exciting.  Unlike the above web page, I won't be posting a photo everyday (due to a not so technical phone).....but my mission is simple:  100 days where I post my happy moment(s) for the day. 

Now lets get the show on the road.

Day 1:

On our way back from Portland today, as we were driving past Tower Hill, just as the sun was setting we saw the beautiful sight of over 30 kangaroos grazing in a paddock in front of a house.  The three of us were so excited to see them and my young son exclaimed, "oh wow I would love to live in that house, imagine being able to watch those kangaroos every night, how lucky would you be!". 

Not only did the sight of  the kangaroos make me happy, but most of all it was my son's uncomplicated, unmaterialistic view of life as well as he and his sister's  enjoyment of a simple pleasure that also brought true happiness today.

1 down, 99  to go :)

100 Happy Days -Day 2

Today it's cold, wet and dreary and it has rained almost constantly.  The sky has been a less than cheerful grey for most of the day, but for one short moment the sun came out.

What happens when rain and sun mixed, one of nature's most wonderful gifts - a rainbow and you can't help being anything but happy when you see a rainbow.

Overcoming Anxiety

This week I did something, that to most is probably not such a big deal or that out of the ordinary, I attended a childrens festival with my children and survived!

 

During my life I have lived with anxiety and whilst I can say that usually I am on top of it, there have unfortunately been times where anxiety has gotten the better of me, it has taken over and become my worst enemy.

 

Anxiety raises it's head in many forms, sometimes it's a quickening of the heart beat, a shortening of ones breath, sweaty palms, a feeling of nervousness, right up to full blown heart palpitations, a feeling of desperation and confusion, thumping headaches and suffering from nausea.

 

Not long after my second child was born, I fell into the anxiety hole and at it's worst  I ended up using avoidance to help me cope, I would simply try my best to avoid situations and events that could trigger an anxiety attack.  At first this was a wonderful tactic in helping me gain my inner strength to win the battle, but it was not always practical and left me feeling that in it's own way anxiety was still ruling the situation.  With the help of a great counsellor, wonderful family and friends as well as a very dedicated and supportive husband coping strategies and techniques were learnt and put into place.  Today that old "anxiety hole" is more like a shallow dip in the ground.

 

Armed with a new and stronger sense of inner strength, peace and harmony it was time I stopped avoiding a situation that I have long been holding on to:  Fun For Kids!

 

This is a childrens festival held in my local town and truth be told the whole event has filled me with dread from the day it first came into existence.  Lots of screaming noisy kids in one huge enclosed space, a sensory overload, lots of noise, heaps of background chatter (an anxiety sufferer's worst nightmare) and all too much for me. 

 

But not this year.....

 

My two children and I went along for the day, it was loud, it was noisy and there were heaps of kids (not all screaming) and apart from having sweaty palms at the entrance gate, all went well, I survived and most importantly my children had a wonderful time with a calm and relaxed mummy.

 

Partaking in an ordinary event that to me had seemed anything but ordinary and to walk out of it having felt no forms of anxiety at all....is just well, plain ordinary, unassuming and simple which is all an anxiety sufferer ever wants.

 

Take that anxiety - I kicked your butt!!