Lenten Challenge: Cookies, Spinkles, Coffee, OH MY!

Day 2 - I got Coop and his nanny some cookie dough to bake cookies valentine's night. In Coop's valentine's basket he got a variety of heart/red&blue items including a tub of blue and red heart "spinkles". When I filled his basket, I got the sprinkles in hopes that he and I would bake cookies together. Coop really doesn't like eating the cookies, but he loves getting his hands dirty and eating sprinkles so this seemed like the perfect activity for us. The act of kindness wasn't getting the dough for he and his nanny, but instead giving his nanny the activity I had hoped to do with him, true bonding that I knew he would love, something that I am not usually very good at sharing.

Day 3 - I bought a guy coffee today. He was behind me in line at Starbucks and looked like he was having a not so great morning... you know as much as I could assess from my side view mirror. He may just be one of those people who doesn't smile at rest, or maybe he had a bad morning. Whatever it was, I hope his free coffee made his morning, if at least for a moment and that he was able to extend some kindness to someone else. 

But frankly, I am not sure it was him that received the kindness, though. The guy who worked at Starbucks was pretty stoked. It was interesting to watch the reactions of the 3 or 4 people working the drive-thru and line (is that what its called at a coffee bar??). It seemed they were the true recipients of my $4.00 act of kindness. They seemed to smile a little brighter, too. I think the best part was watching the kindness move in a direction I didn't expect. I thought I was impacting the guy in the car behind me, but it was the staff that seemed the most moved.

Lenten Challenge 2013

Lenten Challenge: Day 1 - Turning rain into sunshine!

Being a good mother to Cooper has always been an extremely high priority of mine. There are a lot of people out there whose path does not include being a parent even if that is something that they want. I believe that is a big part of why I put so much pressure on myself to make good decisions and take time to raise Cooper to be polite and sweet and thoughtful. He is a gift from God and with that comes a great responsibility.

I really enjoyed our 30 days of thanks. I may even make that a thing we do every year. So for Lent this year, we wanted to do something similar. The Kindness Project seemed like just the ticket! What better way to reflect on what it is like to be like Jesus than to do nice things for people and expect nothing in return.

Don't get me wrong, I totally get that Cooper isn't even 3. Does he even get it? Probably not, but I do think we will have stories and evidence to show him next year and the year after, so the sooner we start the better off he will be. I don't really think he got his pleases and thank yous when he was signing them, long before he could talk, but Rick and I are told what great manners he has, almost every day. Ya know, so something has worked!

So last night, all of my free time was spent gathering ideas of things we could do as random acts for kindness, like baking cookies for the postman and sending random "I love you's" to aunts and uncles. So I pinned a bunch of stuff and intended to make a list of all the things we would do.

Then, today Coop got sick, which turned into a day of this momma feeling sorry for the both of us because a 102 fever equals no Yo Gabba Gabba Live! Which is where we would've been right now instead of sick on the couch. My self-loathing took my focus away and I ended up being pretty down, completely forgetting our Lenten promise.

When I finally made the call that our evening plans needed to be canceled, my first thought was to try to find someone to give the tickets to, not to sell but to give. The tickets were a gift to Cooper and we should give that gift on to someone who was going to have as much fun as we would.

So I called one of Cooper's buddy's moms and she was thrilled. I know they are having a blast and that makes me really happy, makes me forget the sadness I felt that Coop and I weren't going to get this night together. [In fact, we got a text while I was writing this that said just that!]

So I was driving home tonight and realized I completely forgot about our Lenten promise. I didn't make my list of random acts of kindness nor did I even complete one. How could I fail the first day??

But then I realized sharing the tickets was a random act of kindness. It was done for no other reason than to be sure a family we love, had a good time. How could a fever on a rainy day turn into such a bright ray of sunshine? Well, that is just the way God works. Let go and let God and listen with an open heart!

And I realized that should be the point of our kindness project... We shouldn't plan a bunch of additional activities but instead search for opportunities to be kind to others each day. I think what may end up happening is that we will end up doing way more than 1 act a day. And maybe, just maybe changing, even if just a bit, to be a little more like Jesus. I am pretty sure that is the point of Lent.