Anywho, moving right along. I’ve had so many thoughts on gratitude whizzing and whirring around in my head over the past week that it’s hard to single out what to put down in words here on Don’t Worry, Be Grateful. On the back of my last post, I really am excited to have started this blog. It was almost as much as a surprise for me as it was for you. There was no vision, no plan, just a niggling feeling that I should do something. I’ve received so many kind messages, comments and words of support. It’s a little bit rad really. Thank you!

But the best part has been discovering things here, there and everywhere, which I’ve never really stopped and acknowledged that I’m grateful for. Much of my gratisfaction (yes, it’s an entirely made up word – you can borrow it if you like) has come from the little things, just as I suspected, but there are some big things that keep popping up time and time again. I feel like I can’t really move onto the little things just yet without giving the big things the spotlight they deserve.

So for now Don’t Worry, Be Grateful is a bit of a sounding board for the D&Ms playing out in my head but I think you’ll find that as time goes on it will become more fun, there’ll be pretty pictures to entertain you, and you might even pick up an idea or two.

There’s a little quote I stumbled across this week that I think sums up the Don’t Worry, Be Grateful ethos perfectly, “Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it.” Like that time I bought my friend a Nelly Furtado CD for her birthday and forgot to give it to her…

Now we don’t want unopened pressies laying around everywhere peeps, Santa might decide his job is done. So tell us, what is helping you get your gratisfaction on today?

Today I am grateful for the special time I shared with my grandpa and the opportunity to say goodbye. I know you’ll be dancing and humming along from your happy place Grandpa.

You see, I have these ideas and I start tinkering away at them but I always come to a point where I can’t go any further without the assistance of a techno whiz who can help make my blog, well, perfect. It’s got a lot to do with the fact that I’m in marketing. I know the value of a brand and good design.

Anyhow, this week something changed for me. I met a young woman, Hailey, in my search for the perfect (there’s that word again) photographer to capture my Happily Ever After (this is what I like to call our wedding day now, thanks Katy) in pictures. It must be said that I’ve stalked every photographer in Brisbane’s blog over the past few weeks, and Hailey’s was no exception. Hailey was the loveliest of photographers but it was her project 365 Grateful that I just couldn’t stop thinking about.

Back in 2008, when Hailey was feeling down she started a photographic project called 365 Grateful where she took one Polaroid a day of something she felt grateful for. The discipline of having to look for the good things, the little things every day changed her life in many ways and, has since changed the lives of others too who set out on their own 365 Grateful journeys.

Now, I’m not promising to write here every day for the next 365 days and I’m at a point in my life where I feel completely fulfilled and happy but there are so many things for which I am grateful and I think they’re worth acknowledging. Sometimes life just kicks into accelerator mode and it takes something, something like this here blog, to make you slow down and appreciate the little things.

This blog is a work in progress. It’s not perfect. There’s no pretty theme, no quirky logo, no enticing pictures but today I am grateful for the fact that I have started it. It’s only a small step but a giant leap at the same time.

If you like the idea, then please kick off your shoes, get comfortable and come on this journey with me. I’d love to hear what you’re grateful for, what’s making you happy today and any other positive ramblings you’d like to get off your chest.

Jas x