Bluebird of Happiness

September 24 was Bluebird of Happiness Day.

 

I found it. I found the bluebird of happiness. 

And isn't it so cute?

Total coincidence that he wore so much blue that day. He even had a blue shirt under his jacket.

This little bluebird is happy visiting a local library.

 

This little bluebird went for a walk around the neighborhood where we heard several scrub jays, which are blue birds.

This bluebird is happy when he's helping.

Another recipe from A Season of Family Meal Plans by Jordan page while doing Shelftember.

Honey Mustard Pork Chops

Used pork chops from the freezer, lettuce (which my bluebird helped with) for salad before it went bad, homemade dough sitting in the fridge to make garlic rolls.

Another Day Off?

Since my day off didn't really work on Lazy Mom's Day, I decided I was going to try it again on Friday, September 24, Bluebird of Happiness Day. That ended up more of a lazy mom's day.

I had such plans for that day. Once we dropped kids off at school, Jet went back to sleep, though, so I couldn't do what was on the plan. I could have gotten so much done while he slept with cleaning and organizing but I watched a TV show instead and got nothing productive done (lazy mom).

After the kids got home from school, they knew they were in charge of dinner again, so Jet and I headed off to do at least something I was planning to do. I guess I was chasing that bluebird of happiness with a day off.

We went for a walk at Powell Lake but Jet didn't want to ride in the stroller and didn't always want to stay right by the stroller so there was a lot of running after him to keep him from falling down an embankment. I'd say the majority of the time was chasing after him so he'd be safe. 

 

At one point it wasn't worth trying to make it all the way around the pond so we headed back. I didn't get a chance to look at the birds much. No bluebird of happiness. It took quite a bit of effort to get Jet back to the van and get him in and buckled and etc. etc. etc. Sigh.

We've had better outings. But hey, at least we got a few cute pictures in the van.

We drove home by way of driving around the lake. Jet fell asleep then woke up when we were about as far away from home as possible and was unhappy for a while. Plus we got stuck in construction traffic so it took even longer to get home with a poor uncomfortable baby. Sigh.

I found no bluebird of happiness while I was out. When I got home the kids were watching "Muppets Most Wanted" because September 24 was also Jim Henson's birthday. Nichole had her puppets out as well.

When Jeremy got home I went up to help him bring things in and we chatted with the neighbor for a little while until I saw something in the sky? "What are those?" They looked like something on fire. The neighbor looked up and said, "Oh, those are lanterns." We called the kids up and we all got to see floating lanterns in the sky. We got to see quite a few before they burned out/burned up. They must have been sending them off somewhere nearby for us to be able to see them so well, but for what purpose? I don't know.

So no bluebird of happiness but we saw floating lanterns at home. The End.

Count Your Blessings

It's National Bluebird of Happiness Day again, September 24.  It is a good time to count our blessings.  Throughout the day, we would mention things that were blessings.  It was great.  While the older kids were at school, Jeremy had a meeting at Thanksgiving Point.  Jr. Jr. and I took the opportunity to go with him. 

The three of us had a picnic together then while Jeremy went to his meeting, Jr. Jr. and I went to the North American Museum of Ancient Life, the "dinosaur museum."
Jr. Jr. had some hands on fun in the "Tinkering" exhibit.  

When Jeremy was done with his meeting, he met us there then we spent some time in the main part of the museum.  Jr. Jr. wanted to go through the "star room" (a very very dark room with tiny lights all over depicting the Earth's beginning) over and over and over.  He also had fun with some of the hands on exhibits.  

The museum has a spot where you can see people doing actual work on bones, getting them out of rock, etc.  You're on one side of the glass and you can see into the room where they're working.  There was a man working on some vertebrae of a long-necked dinosaur.  He took time to stop and point out several bones in the room for us and pointed to where they would be located on a little toy long-necked dinosaur.  That was fun.
After Thanksgiving Point, we stopped by the Orem Library to drop off and pick up a few things.  This morning, Jr. asked if we were going to watch The Blue Bird movie like we did last year for the holiday.  The library didn't have the Shirley Temple version, but they had another version that was a silent film.  We checked that one out and the kids and I watched part of it tonight.  We'll finish it later.

And at dinner, the kids didn't complain at all.  That's a blessing right there.  Jr. even made a portrait of me out of some of his food.  What a sweetheart.

We really do have so much to be grateful for, so many blessings.  Sure, there are some things we don't have, some things that other people have that we have to do without at this point, but looking at what we do have, we have so much.  And we don't have to look elsewhere to find those blessings.  The bluebird of happiness is right here in our own family, in our own home, in our own Utah County.

National Bluebird of Happiness Day 2012

September 24th is National Bluebird of Happiness Day.  I had the question, "What is the bluebird of happiness?" when this day started.  I'd heard references to it before.  "Where happy little bluebirds fly beyond the rainbow..." from the Wizard of Oz is one of those.

Even though we didn't let Jr. watch the Wizard of Oz today, he did get to look and sing along with a musical Wizard of Oz book.

But I still didn't know what the bluebird of happiness was.  Enter the internet.  Wikipedia gave me an idea and actually directed us to a movie we checked out of the library to watch for our Family Home Evening activity.
A 1940 Shirley Temple film called, "The Blue Bird."  In it, a little girl is unhappy.  She's not rich, yet she has two loving parents and a little brother, a dog, and a cat, a roof over her head and food to eat.  But she thinks it's not enough.  She complains about the things she doesn't have.  She and her little brother go searching for the blue bird because the blue bird means happiness.  They search all over, but don't find it.  Even in the "land of luxury" where there are all the things she used to wish for, the little girl doesn't find true happiness.  She misses all the good things she has at home, how her daddy would read to her and give her bedtime kisses.  When the children return home, they find that the blue bird was there the whole time.  And that is where the little girl learned to look for happiness.
 
Hey, we would have gotten the same message if we had watched the Wizard of Oz after all.

A good message.  And what did my children learn?
(paraphrasing)
Jr.: I would like a blue bird for a pet.
Nichole: I'd like a hummingbird.

Actually, I think they get it.  We talk a lot in our family about being happy and grateful for things we have.  And our kids are good at getting excited about things.
For example:

Nichole was so excited because of the holiday to show me that one of her spelling words this week is "bird."

And now that the older kids are in bed, Jeremy and I are going to celebrate National Punctuation Day (also September 24) by watching Victor Borge's routine, "Phonetic Punctuation," where he reads a paragraph from a book and every punctuation mark he comes to he emphasizes it with a sound.