There is no charge for Awesomeness...

photo evidence of a Random Act of Chocolate. A pb cup the size of my hand.

In the annals of my personal whatever, this has been A Week.

Yes, it’s only Wednesday. Yes, we’ve had weeks with brain surgery and epic yikes. We haven’t been THERE this week, but... this week just hasn’t been Super Dee Duper (sorry, Barney).

So I decided to blatantly borrow from a recent Gretchen Rubin post on her Happiness Project facebook page, in which she talks about little bits of awesome. You know, those little things that just make you inordinately happy. Here is some of my list:

• A flower growing and blooming in a sidewalk crack.
• Being barely awake in the a.m. and hearing the chug chug chug of ye olde Farberware, indicating my spouse Made the Coffee!
• Forgetting to eat breakfast and finding it is Someone’s Festal Day at school, so there’s crumb cake in the teachers’ room!
• The first night I see fireflies in June.
• Veterans riding in open cars at parades.
• Finding a favorite out of print childhood book at a rummage sale (remember Seven Alone, anyone?)
• Anything with a wild 60s pattern on it.
• Sticking my hand into the pocket of a jacket and finding $2 I forgot about.
• Having this moment happen just as I realize I am approaching a Dunkin Donuts with a drive-through.
• Any time a stranger or person at a store just randomly smiles at me.
• Going to the library for ME books.
• Having the perfect comeback when someone is being a cheerful pain in the neck.
• Perennials.
• Seeing my son get a hit in baseball as I’m praying “God, I know it’s not a big deal in the larger picture of life, but if A could get a hit right now that would be awesome.”
• Seeing the aforementioned son be a nice big brother and join his 8 year old sister in a rousing version of Just Dance’s Spice Girls number.
• Little random countdowns from my 8 year old written on any surface she can find. Today’s countdowns include Mom’s Birthday, My Birthday, and Daddy’s Baptism Day.
• Hearing my middle child laugh in her explosive giggle.
• Laughing with my sisters.
• Laughing about wildly inappropriate things with my sisters.
• Ok, any time with my sisters.
• Having my godson run to me and give me a hug.
• A Random Act of Chocolate.
• Potatoes.
• French fries (aka happy potatoes).
• Watching clouds float by.
• Seeing a ridiculously large bird like a heron or turkey up super close in my yard.
• Puzzles.
• Sticks furniture at my favorite gallery in Lambertville. Or anywhere, Sticks is happiness for me.
• Anything drawn by Tomie DePaola.
• Finding a book by Tomie DePaola at a rummage sale.
• The moment when a student says,bubbling with excitement, “So we were at this nursing home in DC, and I realized the lady I was talking to was old enough to remember the Civil Rights movement, so I asked her if she had been to the march, had she met Dr. King, and she said YES!” right after our unit on the Civil Rights movement.
• The moment the overture begins at a musical theater show. I always get ferklempt at the beauty and anticipation contained in those first notes.

Once you get going, it’s hard to stop. My list of awesome doesn’t fix all the ugh of this week in progress, but it does help. What would you add? What are your moments of awesome?

I have to run the dancing son to physical therapy and feed the hungry girls...real life beckons. But I’d love to hear YOUR awesomes.