Our Family Joy List

Do you have a running collection of things that light your heart on fire? Feed your spirit and your soul?

For most people the answer is no. We tend to move at warp speed through life–managing the never ending to do list–so that we don’t actually dedicate time to single out things just for the sake of contentment, happiness or joy. What’s even crazier? We’ve been taught to believe that if something doesn’t make us money, or impact the world, or go viral on Tik Tok, that it doesn’t have value.

That’s simply not true.

You can (and should!) plot and schedule your week to include elements from your joy list.

You can plan for joy.

Planning for a good life is a great way to not only bring more joy into your days, but also help to curate a more sustainable and balanced life for yourself. If you’ve already created your joy list (and have it readily available!), it is so much easier to reach for and implement. It’s much easier to reach for something tried and tested, something that you know will make you smile. Even if that something doesn’t make sense to anyone but you!

Creating a joy list is also a great way to pause reflect and think about your life and all of the things you’re grateful for.  A joy list can allow you to examine your life. Did you struggle to write things down? Did the items flow in abundance? Use this as an opportunity to spend some time curating your life. Finally, the best thing about a joy list – it doesn’t have to stay the same. It can change and grow and shrink and it can be shaped by the way YOU change and grow.

Sharing 20 of the things that fill us with PURE JOY (and challenging you to build your own list!):

1. A Dunkin Donuts run.  Our order of choice?  A pink sprinkle donut for Callie, an iced latte add butter pecan for me, and cocoa mocha iced latte for James.
2. Going to the ranch. There is just something about getting out of the city and out into the country that’s good for our souls.
3. Travel.  This one isn’t always feasible on a whim due to budget but most of the time we are able to schedule 1-2 trips a year.  When we are in-between trips, we will watch travel shows, check out travel books from the library, and “travel” to new areas in our local area.  We went to a local elephant sanctuary and absolutely loved it!! Currently on our dream list–Ireland and Iceland.
4. A movie night–bonus points if it’s an extra cheesy movie from the 90s.  We just watched Cliffhanger with Callie and she LOVED it.
5. Bringing home stacks of books from the library.
6. Making colorful smoothies.  Bonus points if the fruit is from the farmers market!
7. Sunset walks with Jack.
8. The sound of windchimes.
9. Fresh flowers.  I love splitting big bouquets of flowers into mini bouquets and spreading them out all over the house.
10. Trying a new recipe.
11. Leaving the back door open so a cool fall breeze can dance through the house.
12. Cool notebooks and pens.
13. Breakfast for dinner.
14. A summer thunderstorm.
15. A soft and cozy blanket.
16. A family hike.
17. Dancing in the kitchen to country music.
18. Finding a new anime series to watch–we are loving “The Shield Hero.”
19. The changing of the seasons.
20. Laughing so hard we pee our pants.

Now it’s your turn–create your own joy list!!!