After A Week Long Send Off, My Round the World Trip kicked off with eight days in Maui visiting my sister Sarah who has split her time between Hawaii and Alaska for many years. What an epic way to start this adventure! There was mist falling when my sister greeted me at the Kahului airport on Maui a week ago, so she teased me about bringing the rain from the mainland. We headed straight for Paia where she presented me with a young coconut and a lei, accompanied by the chant for the gifting-of-a-lei.
A number of circumstances collided recently to compel me to move the Lucky Penny to my property in Walla Walla where I have a ground bound small house called Valencia Cottage. So on Tuesday trusted tiny house movers Linh and Stephanie Pham helped me move the Lucky Penny safely from Portland to my place in Walla Walla.
As I packed up recently in preparation to travel cross country in my Honda Fit, I did some downsizing… It was harder than it had been during my last couple of moves because this time I had more stuff. I’d been living in a bigger space…My apartment was a studio, but it was still about 6 times bigger than the Lucky Penny! I talked with several people about the experience and a handful of them said “oh my goodness, I need to do more of that!” So I’ve decided to offer a 6-week Downsizing Tune Up…
I realized this morning when I woke up with four (mostly) unscheduled days ahead of me that a Thanksgiving blog post has become a bit of a tradition for me… I know for many people around the world this has been an extremely challenging year… And yet, I strongly believe that gratitude can be transformed into generosity and dedication to the wellbeing of our planet and its people. So let’s be grateful for what we can be and dedicated to creating more to be grateful for.
Gratitude is a habit of mine anyhow. I note my gratitudes in a journal and when we sit down to eat we all say something we're grateful for. Science shows that people who are grateful are more happy. I can attest that that's true for me. And I love this day that is dedicated to being appreciative of the people, experiences, and things that make our lives better.
This time last year I was Giving Thanks for the Little Life. The year before I was planning ways to Unstuff Your Holidays. (By the way, I’m teaching a Downsizing E-Course in January, so if you’re interested, you can join us!) The year before that I was thinking about how most of my stuff is Just Stuff. And the year before that, when I had first moved into a tiny house on wheels, it was just a simple Thanksgiving!
Gratitude has become more of a habit for me over the past year. It’s becoming easier to count my gratitudes.
I’m keeping a 5 Minute Journal. And although I like a paper journal for my morning sip, sit, and jot, I like the electronic version of the 5 Minute Journal because it has a little notification that reminds me to complete it in the morning to record gratitudes and set intentions and in the evening to reflect on gratitudes, accomplishments, and serendipities and think about how I could make the day better.
On the nights that I cook Community Dinner at Simply Home Community, I ask everyone to say something they’re grateful for to kick off the meal. Mind you, we don’t let the food get cold while we say thanks. We dig right into our dinner and go around the table to hear what everyone is thankful for. Usually it sparks other conversation as people have follow up questions.
This year I spent Thanksgiving at my fairy godparents house with my sweetie, The Guy Next Door. It was a fabulous visit with people near and dear. Between carbo-loading with a Bread Bake-Off on Wednesday night and our Thanksgiving day feast on Thursday it was a very rich and delicious couple of days! Fortunately, we also enjoyed a hot sauna, a chilly run, several mugs of tea, catch up conversations, and a hilarious party game.
To add to all that goodness, Isha and I also spent time on our drive to and from Corvallis comparing notes from our Tiny House Considerations Challenges as we scheme our tiny house for two. As we rolled back into Portland we were wrapping up a conversation about the objects we own and looking forward to the Downsizing E-Course I’ll be teaching this January and February.
While we were making breakfast this morning, Isha said “We have soooo much to be grateful for!” I completely agree. We really do.
Here are just a few of the many, many things I'm thankful for today:
