finding the happy in the everyday little things
Hello lovelies and Happy May!
If you’d like to join me in spreading a little kindness this month, here’s my Kindness Calendar for May 2018:
To download your free copy, please click on this link:
(Please note if you subscribe to my blog and are receiving this post by email, please click here to come through to the main site and you can download it easily from there.)
Have an MAGICAL May and thank you so much for spreading a little kindness.
Love+hugs, Helen Xxx
Over the last year, I’ve been hearing from big-hearted teachers who’ve been using my monthly Kindness Calendars in their classrooms and saying how much the children enjoy following them. So I thought that this year I’d create a special Kindness Advent Calendar for Kids, as well as my usual one for grown ups.
A couple of weeks ago, I contacted the headteacher at my nephews’ school – Edgewood Primary and Nursery School – to see if they’d be interested in teaming up and using my calendar in the classrooms… and received a resounding YES!
Then he invited me into the school to help launch this kindness initiative at their School Assembly on 1st December.
I haven’t spoken about kindness in front of an audience before, not counting my radio/TV interviews, but this was to be standing in front of 300 children aged between 4 and 11 years.
And I was really hoping they wouldn’t be a tough crowd 🙂
Feeling more and more nervous as the big day approached, I can honestly say that it couldn’t have gone any better – it was absolutely brilliant and my heart is fit to burst.
Headteacher Mr Seeley’s passion and enthusiasm for the school, the children, and focusing on the gift of kindness for the month of December, shines through and the school is such a friendly and welcoming place to be.
Before Assembly began, I was treated to a tour of the school, including a walk through the classrooms with some children preparing for their Christmas Faye or writing a Christmas story, while others were rehearsing for their Christmas Performance.
And then all of a sudden, it was time: I was standing in front of 300 pairs of inquisitive eyes and it was my turn to talk.
After wondering if my talk would engage the children, I was deeply heartened to see that after every single question I invited them to answer (Who likes Christmas? Who has an Advent Calendar at home? What did you get for Day 1? What is kindness to you?) a sea of hands shot up in the air, everyone eager to share their answer.
After sharing my story and introducing the Kindness Advent Calendar for Kids, the headteacher and I talked about Day 1’s Kindness Act to ‘Share this Calendar with friends to spread kindness’.
This weekend, every child will go home with a copy of the weekly newsletter which includes an explanation about my Kindness Advent Calendar and has the calendar printed on the back:
And again, when asked who they can share the calendar with, a sea of hands shot up to tell us they will share it with friends, cousins, parents, aunties and uncles…
We then practiced for Day 2’s Kindness Act to ‘Smile all day’, and it was such a pleasure to see 300 big beautiful smiles and hear the chorus of hellos and consequent giggles.
I honestly couldn’t have been any happier and am excited to see how they find, and hopefully have fun with, the rest of the kindness acts on the calendar.
Then it was time for the week’s Achievers to come up to the stage and receive their Achiever Certificates and a round of applause from their peers and teachers alike.
This week’s theme being kindness, the children read out why they’d been awarded this prestigious accolade, such as being kind and caring to other children, being helpful, and having a big smile for everyone.
My smile couldn’t have got any bigger, nor my clapping any louder 🙂
The children then filed out of the hall to the tune of Heather Small’s Proud with the apt lyrics “What have you done today to make me feel proud.”.
Later that day, headteacher Mr Seeley emailed to tell me there’s a buzz going around the school about the Kindness Advent Calendar for Kids, which is just brilliant. I’m really looking forward to popping back in a couple of weeks to see how it’s all going.
And in the meantime, kindness advocates Radio Nottingham are visiting the school next week to chat to the pupils about kindness. It will be played on Mark Dennison’s morning show one day soon – I hope to post the audio here once it goes out.
Unsurprisingly, I’m now back on bed-rest with a CFS symptom flare up and need to take a few quiet days to rest, restore and recuperate from all the excitement and exertion of launching my Kindness Advent Calendars – but of course, it’s all absolutely completely worth it.
☆♡☆
If you’d like to share my Kindness Advent Calendar for Kids with your school, you can download it here for free – just scroll past the one for grown ups! And please do let me know how it goes in the comments below, I always love to hear from you…
It’s been two years since I took a big deep breath and clicked ‘publish’ on my first ever post.
The butterflies were dancing around in my tummy as I finally let myself start this exciting new chapter in my healing journey.
And I could not have imagined how brilliant a journey it’s been so far.
I started writing maketodayhappy.co.uk to do just that by finding the happy in the everyday little things.
Of course, it’s not always easy: there are times when I feel too crap to care. But I gently and kindly let myself feel whatever I’m feeling, knowing that this too shall pass. And then when I’m ready to pick myself up and start again, I look for the little things in my everyday life to be happy about – usually starting with the bed I’m lying in, the curtains that keep the light out, my lovely mum for bringing me cups of tea.
I know it may sound a bit cheesy, but writing this blog has truly been life changing.
Writing about being grateful inspires me to be more grateful. It helps me to notice all the wonderful things I have to be grateful for, even if I’ve had to spend the day in bed because of a symptom flare-up.
Writing about being mindful helps me stay in the present moment more often (it’s still a work-in-progress, but I’m getting better and better at it). It helps me to not get so caught up in my symptoms or the uncertainty around my health and future.
And writing about being kind inspires me to keep spreading a little more kindness whenever and wherever I can. I had no idea how much being a little kinder would have a positive impact on how I feel: kindness really does help the giver as much as the receiver in my experience.
I also had absolutely no idea that my Kindness Calendars would reach so many beautiful people, all around our beautiful planet. My Kindness Advent Calendar post has received an astonishing 1.3 million visitors, which is mind-blowingly fantastic! I would have been on cloud nine just to know I’ve helped inspired one person to do one extra act of kindness! Thinking about everyone who took part – and continues to do so with my monthly Kindness Calendars – fills my heart with such gratitude. You truly are AMAZING.
Some of my most popular posts over these last two years are:
1. My Kindness Calendar posts
2. Act of kindness #23: World Kindness Day Goody Bags
3. 100 Days of Happy: Day 4: Soul stroll
4. 100 Days of Happy: Day 71: Yoga every damn day!
5. 100 Days of Happy: Day 87: You’ve been RACK’ed!
6. More Days of Happy: Hello Summer, is that you?
7. More Days of Happy: ME/CFS Awareness Day
Two years on and the butterflies are still there when I click ‘publish’. And to be honest, I never want them to go away, as it shows how much I still care. I love the excitement and trepidation I feel when I write and publish a post.
I’ve really missed writing the last couple of months due to the debilating vertigo and headaches. And I really can’t wait to start writing more posts once I’m well enough.
Finally, I’d like to say a huge THANK YOU to you for reading my posts. I love hearing from you and truly, madly, deeply appreciate each and every one of your kind comments – they really do inspire me to keep going. Thank you for being the lovely person that you are.
See you soon,
Love and hugs, Helen Xxx
Today is my birthday, hooray!
And to celebrate, I’m giving away 3 copies of ‘The Kindness Diaries: One Man’s Quest to Ignite Goodwill and Transform Lives Around The World’* by Leon Logothetis.
It’s also my little way of saying a big THANK YOU for all your kindness and support, it really means a lot.
For your chance to win, simply comment on this post.
That’s it 🙂
To double your chances and get TWO entries, finish this sentence in the comments:
“Kindness is __________”
The winners – one each from here, my ‘Spreading a little kindness’ Facebook community page, and on Twitter – will be chosen at random on Friday and posted in the comments below.
Please make sure you’ve subscribed to my blog, so I can contact you if you’re a winner.
Good luck my lovelies.
☆♡☆
* The Kindness Diaries is an inspiring true story of how Leon Logothetis “circumnavigated the globe on his vintage yellow motorbike Kindness One, giving life changing gifts along the way to unsuspecting good Samaritans. All of this whilst relying on the kindness of strangers. The Kindness Diaries will introduce you to a world of adventure, renew your faith in the bonds that connect people, and inspire you to accept and generate kindness in your own life.”
Does anyone else feel like we’re galloping though this year? While I try to live in the present moment, I can’t help but feel a tad taken aback that March is already here!
But I’m very happy as March is one of my favourite months of the year.
I’m especially delighted that it means winter is almost behind us and spring is on its way. I’ve been hunting for signs of spring on my soul strolls for a while now, and am rejoicing at seeing the daffs and the crocuses brightening up my neighbourhood.
I’m also thankful the days are becoming lighter and longer. It’s lovely waking up to see some pretty stunning sunrises, as I can now see the early morning sun rising from the comfort on my very own bed.
Yes, there’s definitely a sense of spring in the air and everyone seems to have a little more spring in their step.
Hooray!
And I also love that March is my birthday month. I’m a self-confessed Birthday Princess – and urge everyone else to be one too (or a Birthday Prince of course!).
After all, aren’t we worth celebrating!
I love having birthday adventures and enjoy plotting how I can celebrate being on our beautiful Earth for another year. My most memorable birthday adventures include a helicopter ride over the awe-inspiring Grand Canyon, being on a yoga retreat in spiritual Bali, and turning thirty in New York City was pretty special too.
But obviously with the limitations that having Chronic Fatigue Syndrome brings, my birthdays have been a lot more low key recently, but no less enjoyable – just in a different way. And nothing really beats having my young munchkin nephews gleefully singing Happy Birthday and then “helping” me blow out all the candles 🙂
And so with this new month approaching, I’ve been busily working on March’s Kindness Calendar over the last few days. And I’m pretty excited to include a few ideas from some wonderful folk from my ‘spreading a little kindness’ Facebook community.
A big thank you to everyone who’s contributed. I’ve saved a couple for next month, so keep an eye out if you can’t spot yours in this month’s calendar! Please do keep them coming as I’m always delighted to hear your ideas, suggestions and any favourites you may have.
Ok, here’s my Kindness Calendar for March 2017:
And you can download it for free here:
You may want to mix it up and swap the acts around, adapt the acts to suit you, or even create your own kindness acts. And don’t worry if you can’t do an act of kindness every single day, sometimes it’s just not possible as I know too well with the nature of my CFS flare ups.
But even if every one of us manages to do just one kindness act on one day this month – imagine how amazing that would be!
Again, it would be really brilliant and deeply appreciated if you could share this with family, friends, work colleagues, classmates… and share all over social media. 🙂
Every single extra act of kindness counts, together we are making the world a kinder place. So let’s get as many people as we can involved.
And don’t forget to join me on my kindness community page on Facebook, or Twitter and if you post about your kindness act, please use the hashtag #KindnessCalendar so we can all keep track of all the wonderful kindness we are sharing.
Let’s have fun, and let’s remember to be kinder to ourselves as well, we are definitely worth it!
Have a Magnificent March and thank you so much for your kindness.
☆♡☆
A Little Note to my Lovely Email Subscribers:
I’m so sorry the link to download the calendar on my email didn’t work. Eeeek!! I’m trying a new download tool and for some reason, it didn’t want to be included in the email! And I didn’t know until it was too late. I’ll hopefully be able to work out the problem for next month’s calendar. Thank you for your patience and understanding ♡
Today, I wanted to do something a little bit more special, while still taking into consideration the limitations of my Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (ME/CFS).
And so I decided to hand out a few chocolate bars to strangers in the street!
As my budget is also very limited, I thought I’d email a few of the larger confectionary companies to see if they’d be happy to help me by donating a few bars.
Unfortunately, I still haven’t heard back from them… but I imagine they must receive lots of requests like mine.
I also asked my kind-hearted local Co-op Foods as they’ve given members of our local community – including lucky ole me!- goody bags filled with lovely things around Christmas-time.
I was thrilled when they said YES!
And I was over-the-moon when they delivered 88 bars of their yummy chocolate (and it really is yummy if you haven’t already discovered it!).
Then a big-hearted friend said she would donate £50 of her own hard-earned cash to buy chocolate bars with. And on behalf of RAK Day, I simply couldn’t refuse her kind offer. (THANK YOU my lovely!)
And believe me when I tell you I had a LOT Of fun choosing which choccies to buy and couldn’t believe my eyes when I loaded up my trolley with 205 bars – thanks to a brilliant offer on at the supermarket!
This makes an incredible, grand total of 300 chocolate bars for my RAK Day giveaway.
WooHoooo!!
I wanted to attach one of my kindness cards to each bar, explaining what the give-away was all about. And I’m so thankful for my lovely mum for helping me write them and then attach them to the bars.
We couldn’t believe it when we filled up the rucksack-on-wheels my sis lent me for the occasion. And then filled up half a carrier bag too!!
This morning, I recruited the much-needed and deeply appreciated help of my lovely mum and 8 yr-old nephew Callum, and we all headed down to our city’s Old Market Square.
And they were such kindness superstars. (THANK YOU mum and Callum ♡)
At first Callum was a little too shy to hand out any bars with us, but it wasn’t long before he joined in the fun and then really got into the spirit of it, which was really heart-warming to see.
My mum was absolutely brilliant and was happy to go into some of the city centre shops to hand out bars to the hand-working staff.
As we stood in the Old Market Square offering bars of chocolates to passersby, some people practically ran away from us. Some people were a little suspicious at first, but then seemed happy to accept a chocolate bar once we explained what we were doing. And some people happily accepted straight away.
We got a few hugs, lots of thank yous, and oodles of big smiles.
Hooray 🙂
We were even joined by our city’s newspaper, the Nottingham Post, who’d come along to capture the choc-fest fun! Click here to see what they wrote.
With only a few bars left, we were feeling rather hungry and headed for a celebratory lunch. Then after giving all the staff a chocolate bar, we slipped into a city centre car park and popped the rest onto cars so that their owners can enjoy a sweet surprise when they return after a hard day’s shopping.
And now as I’m utterly wiped out after all this RAK Week fun, I’m heading to bed for a few days to recover.
But I do so with a happy heart and the hope that we’ve made a few people smile this week, and brightened up a few people’s days.
☆♡☆
ps if you have received one of chocolate bars – thank you for visiting! I’d really LOVE to hear from you in the comments below (and if you’d prefer me not to publish your comment on the blog, please do let me know).
pps Huuuuuuge thanks again to both the big-hearted Kerry at Co-Op Foods Hucknall, and my kind-hearted friend who wishes to remain anonymous. Today wouldn’t have been possible without your kind donations ♡
ppps please forgive any mistakes as I’m super-duper tired whilst writing this, but I wanted to post before I zonk out! Night, night!!
What a perfect opportunity to spread some love-filled kindness.
As it’s the school holidays, I have the sweetest little helper in the form of my 4-year-old nephew, Thomas.
Could this day get any better!
And as it’s Valentine’s Day, I thought it would be a lovely idea to give a few flowers to strangers to show them some love and make them smile.
Last week, I approached our local florist, Kerry’s Florist, to see if they would be interested in donating a few flowers for the occasion.
And even though it’s most probably their busiest day of the year, they said YES!
WooHooo!!
So, yesterday I collected 20 gorgeous red roses, and was really touched to see that the lovely Kerry and Shania had wrapped every single rose beautifully.
I attached one of my Kindness Cards to each rose with the message: “Happy Valentine’s Day: You are AMAZING. Kindly donated by ‘Kerry’s Florist’ to celebrate RAK Week.”
Earlier this morning, my little helper and I happily made our way down to our local GP surgery. Here’s a little video I made of us.
And we had the loveliest time placing our Valentine’s surprises on car windscreens.
We even had the chance to give a few people coming out of the doctor’s surgery a Valentine’s rose in person.
It was touching to see Thomas happily handing each person a red rose, and most of the recipients seemed really touched. One lady in particular had tears in her eyes, and it was clear we’d really made her day. We both gave her a big hug.
We hope that the flowers are a LOVEly surprise for all the car owners when they return to their vehicles after their Doctor’s appointment.
And we really hope our little act of kindness will make them smile and feel a little bit better and brighter, especially on this love-filled day.
☆♡☆
ps if you have received one of our Valentine’s red roses, I’d really LOVE to hear from you in the comments below (and if you’d prefer me not to publish your comment on the blog, please do let me know).
pps Huge thanks again to the big-hearted Kerry and Shania at Kerry’s Florist for generously donating the roses and wrapping them so beautifully. You are both AMAZING.
Hello kindness warriors!
I hope you all enjoyed a wonderful January and remembered to be kind to yourself as well as to others.
An incredible 12,000 kind folk downloaded January’s Kindness Calendar, which equates to a potential 300,000 acts of kindness. Which is pretty amazing, especially during a month where a lot of people suffer from the January blues – so a huge THANK YOU for making a difference and for making so many people smile.
My heart is so full of gratitude for all the kindness you are spreading all over the world.
I’m happy to report that I’m feeling much better after my quiet and restful month. I’m grateful for the reminder that I need to go gently and slowly. So while I might not be online as much as I’d like to be, I am always, always, cheering you on from my bed!
And now we’re into February ♡
As you’ll see, I couldn’t resist the ‘love’ theme seeing as it’s Valentine’s Day and all. And what a perfect opportunity to show those we love how much we love them – partners, friends, family, children and pets alike!
But most of all, please don’t forget to show yourself some BIG love this month too!
It’s also Random Act of Kindness Week from 12th-18th February and Random Act of Kindness Day on Friday 17th. Yay 🙂 So let’s make an even bigger impact by spreading a little more kindness and making even more folk smile.
Please do let me know if you’re planning anything – you can post on my ‘Spreading A Little Kindness’ facebook community page. I love to hear what you’re getting up to, and I know everyone else does too.
So here’s February’s Kindness Calendar:
To download your free copy, please click on this link:
Kindness-Calendar-February-2017.pdf (10211 downloads)
As always, I try to make the acts on my Kindness Calendars quick, easy and cheap (well, mostly free actually). So anyone and everyone can join in.
You may want to mix it up and swap the acts around, adapt the acts to suit you, or even create your own kindness acts. And don’t worry if you can’t do an act of kindness every single day, sometimes it’s just not possible as I know too well with the nature of my CFS flare ups.
But even if every one of us manages to do just one kindness act on one day this month – imagine how amazing that would be!
Again, it would be really brilliant and deeply appreciated if you could share this with family, friends, work colleagues, classmates… and share all over social media. 🙂
Every single extra act of kindness counts, together we are making the world a kinder place. So let’s get as many people as we can involved.
And don’t forget to join me on my kindness community page on Facebook, or Twitter and don’t forget to use the hashtag #KindnessCalendar.
Let’s have fun, and let’s remember to be kinder to ourselves as well, we are definitely worth it!
Thank you so much.
☆♡☆
To download your free copy of February’s Kindness Calendar, please click on this link:
Kindness-Calendar-February-2017.pdf (10211 downloads)
