The best things in life...

are FREE

I got inspired to write this after I read my friend Mandi's blog. She posted about taking a walk with her kid and laying on the ground to watch the leaves fall from the trees. It was beautifully simple and contrasted sharply with the trip I took to Toys-R-Us last Saturday. The store was jammed with Christmas shoppers, with carts piled high with toys, and kids making their Christmas list. The whole experience was crazy and surreal. If you have so much stuff that you don't know what you want and have to walk up and down the rows of a toy store to get ideas for more stuff that you might want...How did a beautiful tradition evolve into this? I can imagine the pure joy of waking up on Christmas morning and getting the one thing that you wanted with all your might, the doll that you wanted so bad you dreamed of it at night, the train, the book, the ONE thing that you really really wanted. And probably the one new "frivolous"thing you got all year.

So to clear my head from the trauma of early Christmas shoppers, I am focusing on the beautifully simple and simply beautiful FREE things in life.

1. Cuddling up with a good book from the library.

2. Taking a walk

3. Having a clean house (not much in life is more satisfying)

4. Watching the sunrise

5. Playing Board games (that you already have)

6. Lounging in bed on a Sunday morning

7. Watching birds eat from the bird feeder

Happiness..is more like a decision than a condition. It is a decision anyone can make, anywhere at any time. For it is not the enjoyableness of objects or activities or opportunities that make us happy or unhappy; rather our happiness, rooted in our relationships, make objects and activities enjoyable. Things, events and opportunities have no value in and of themselves; they get their value from the significant part they play in our key relationships with others-

Bonds That Make Us Free pg 54