A Few of My Favorite Things

One of the ideas I heard at the writing project this summer involved students writing lists of things that made them happy - 100, to be exact.  I thought that seemed like a high number, but I wanted to see if it could be done.  I did place some restrictions on myself - no 'good fortune' items - health insurance, employment, shelter, etc.  Not that I'm not grateful for those things, because I am, but it would be too easy to just start listing them.  I also decided it would be too easy to start listing specific books, music, and movies. I could do lists of 100 of each of those probably.  Or at least 50.  No inventions that make my life easier - sorry Internet, dishwasher, and car.  I also wanted to keep the list items short - no time wasted on lengthy explanations of why something made me happy.  Those restrictions did make things a little more complicated.  I was going strong for the first 40, then took a break to think, and completed the list in increments of 20.  Of course as soon as I was done, I kept thinking of other things, but I went with my first instinct.  Also, my own restrictions make it look like I'm really addicted to beauty products, which is only partially true.  I'm only sort of vain.  Here it is, in alphabetical order:

100 Things that make me happy:

(Besides raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens)

1.     A clean house

2.     A new haircut

3.     Accessories

4.     Alliteration

5.     Amazon.com

6.     Autumn leaves

7.     Babies and children that aren’t mine

8.     Baking

9.     Barbecues

10. Birthdays

11. Bookstores

12. Brunch

13. Candles

14. Cardigans

15. Celebrating New Year in late August

16. Christmas shopping

17. Comfortable and cute shoes

18. Crossword puzzles

19. Cute planners

20. Diet Dr. Pepper

21. Dogs (especially mine)

22. Doing something well

23. Epic music while driving

24. Family

25. Farmer’s markets

26. Finding a good deal

27. Football

28. Friends

29. Giving cards that are hilariously (I think) inappropriate

30. Good talks

31. Guilty pleasure magazines

32. Hand written letters, mostly from my grandma

33. Historical fiction

34. Hot Chocolate

35. Hugs

36.  Ice cream

37. Kindergarten food – chicken tenders and macaroni and cheese

38. Kindred spirits

39. Laughing

40. Learning

41. Lemon trees

42. Libraries

43. Lingering dinners out

44. London

45. Looking for home furnishings

46. Lush brand body products

47. Make-up, even if I’m not wearing it

48. March Madness, when I’m doing well

49. Marching bands

50. Matt

51. Memoirs

52. Mizzou

53. Movie marathons

54. Museums

55. Music

56. My bed

57. Netflix

58. New school supplies

59. No line at the photo copier

60. Obscure sports

61. Old movies

62. Old photographs

63. Organizing closets

64. Our new house

65. Pedicures

66. Peonies, roses, sweet peas, and tulips (pink)

67. Perfume

68. Planning future travel

69. Playing games

70. Puns

71. Reading

72. Reminiscing

73. Ridiculous YouTube videos

74. Road trips, except for most of the driving

75. Sagas – film or literary

76. Seeing live shows

77. Seeing movies in the theater

78. Shakespeare in the Park

79. Sitting on the deck

80. Sleeping in

81. Snow days

82. Snuggles with Puggle

83. Solving a mystery in a novel before the character

84. Sporcle

85. Sprawling

86. Starry skies

87. Successful new recipes

88. Sunroofs

89. Swimming

90. Swinging in a hammock

91. Target

92. Teaching

93. The beach

94. The holidays

95. The Olympics

96. Visiting Columbia

97. Weddings

98. When summer turns into fall

99. When winter turns into spring

100.  Writing

Please leave a comment and tell me something that makes you happy!