ATTITUDE OF GRATITUDE

Nothing is more honorable than a grateful heart.

~ Seneca

Back in November, the month we celebrate thanksgiving for our blessings, I kept hearing the long list of all of my children's wants for Christmas. My children have been blessed to have what they need and most of what they want provided for them. I decided I needed to make sure they understood what the true blessings in life were and how important it is to be grateful for what we have. So, I made a chart with 26 pockets, decorated to match the theme of Thanksgiving. Each day, all 6 of us, had to write down on a slip of paper, something that we were grateful for. We had to write something different each day. The Monday after Thanksgiving, we had a Family Home Evening Lesson about Gratitude. First, we counted our blessings as we pulled the slips from each pocket and read what we had written. Some of us had written the same things, some were blessings the others had not thought of. Then we read a story about little orphans who had no shoes and received handed-down shoes for Christmas. The orphans were so excited to receive shoes even though they weren't new. We talked about a cousin who is serving his mission in Mexico and shared some of the poverty and distress that this cousin has seen while there and the sacrifices he has made to make the lives of those her serves a little easier. We talked about the Savior and how we need to be grateful for the gift that he gave us~ the gift of His life so that we may be an eternal family, repent of our sins, and live with Him someday. By the end of the lesson, we were all in tears, and needless to say, my kids had more of an attitude of gratitude as we approached Christmas.