Monday.  The second one of the new year.  Last week slipped by, still a holiday.  Today tries to get away as well.

Sick this morning with a stomach bug generously shared by my beloved (he’s a giver!), I didn’t get up early and the whole day has felt behind and as I look again and again at the to do list on my phone I feel heavy and frustrated that so little has been accomplished.  And my spirit reminds me of my desire to yield this year, to put my own agenda aside and trust Him with my days and my to dos and some things will just have to wait.

But He still gives generously, even when the task list runs long and daunting and the stomach turns and discouragement threatens nearby.  So in these few moments before dinner, before ballet and gymnastics, and a couple of hours in the car, I begin again to list the gifts.  I pick up where I left off, but I take Ann’s challenge to list 1000 in a year. A new journal, fresh pages to list the love gifts, both laughter-filled and cried over, because if the easy things He gives are gifts, aren’t the hard things too?

 

 

1496.  a week of slow

1497.  crafts

1498.  baking

1499.  movies

1500.  girls afternoon out with Grandpa

1501.  impromptu dinner date with the hubs

1502.  working iPhone

1503.  Christmas weekend – so many good gifts!

1504.  a slower week

1505.   he’s 35!

1506.  celebrating the gift he is to me

1507.  home office, 3.0

1508.   quiet New Year’s Eve at home

1509.  the end of a wonderfully long, much-needed break

1510.  one month until I meet her

1511.  four days without a computer; realizing how much time it eats

**1512.  a new year, a new list

1513.  the challenge to count 1000 gifts in one year

1514.  an afternoon out with the oldest

1515.  Sunday

1516.  thing checked off instead of put  off

1517.  sick on a Monday

1518.  continually yielding my schedule to His

Will you join me this year in counting the gifts?  Will you take the challenge to count 1000 before the curtain closes on 2012?  It’s not hard.  His gifts are all around us, if we will only open our eyes to see them.

For His Glory ~

~ Sara