I recently returned from a glorious 7 day cruise aboard the amazing Regal Princess ship. I’ve always been a fan of cruising and really believe it is the best way to vacation! With that being said, I noticed something while I was on my 7 day vacation… I was extremely happy.

I know what you are thinking…”Well, duh, Kristen. Of course you were happy… you were on a CRUISE vacation, spending time in the sunshine, eating amazing food, and getting away from this hellish winter weather.” OK, you’ve got me there, but despite the obvious reasons for my happiness, I noticed while away little things that the cruise staff did or even the cruise line itself had in place that increased my happiness.

As I was cruising along, I kept thinking (each time I’d feel that little jolt of happiness) what can I learn from this Princess cruise about happiness? What are some things I can incorporate into my daily life back home that will give me more of this kind of happiness? And so, I started to take note… and now I’m sharing with you!

Here are some of the top things I learned about happiness from my most awesome vacation….

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Hi friends! I hope you all are well and are ready to have a great weekend! The girls and I are headed to Oklahoma City for the weekend to hang out with my sister and to celebrate her youngest daughter turning 18. I may have cried on my nieces birthday… what does that mean I’ll be like when my own kids turn 18? I can answer that for you… a big, teary, mess!

Anyway, I thought it would be a great idea to start the weekend off with a little bit of happiness. How’s that sound? Great! Let’s do it!…

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Hi Friends!

I hope you all had a wonderful week recuperating from all the pie and turkey eating last week.

We had an amazing Thanksgiving with my brother and his family…but I ate way too much pie. And turkey. And broccoli cheese casserole. Good stuff!

We played lots of games (Monopoly and Chicken Foot!), and my sister-in-law helped me sew my Kindness Elf. I think she turned out to be such a cutie, don’t you? Of course, now I have the sewing felt stuffed things bug and came home and bought about 10 more patterns from this adorable Etsy store! Apparently my plan is to sew the month away. Sounds good to me!

Shall we talk about what else is making me happy lately?

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Happy Happiness Report Day, everyone! The photo you see above is of Leah this past spring at Ella’s first communion. I found it while I was looking for an old photo of a recipe I needed and it made me realize how much I miss sharing my Project 365 photos. This photo along with the ones below would most likely suffer the fate of sitting on my external hard drive, never to be seen and enjoyed by anyone. What’s the point of that?

To rectify the situation, I’m starting a “no-rules” Project 365 project for myself. No rules meaning… if I accidentally skip a day of taking a photo, I’ll say oops and move on. If my photo is taken with my camera phone instead of my DSLR, I’ll say oops and carry on. No rules meaning I’m not waiting until January 1st to start. I’m going to start on December 1st…or if I feel like it, tomorrow or whenever. No rules is not within my comfort zone, but the thought of a no rules photography project makes me very happy! I actually think I’m going to call it just that “The No Rules Photography Project”. Sounds easy enough, right?

Here are a few of the photos that I saved from external hard drive purgatory……

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This was the first time with NaBloPoMo where it became late at night and I still had nothing to post. But then I remembered why I was doing this challenge…so I could feel ok just writing, without even a purpose sometimes.

Yesterday…on a morning where my kids were being extra challenging,  I anonymously bought the coffee of the person in the drive through behind me at Starbucks. And it made me happy to do so. Sometimes I am completely selfish in my giving to others… I want to do something special for someone else to yes, make them happy, but also because I need a little bolster of happiness. That simple act of doing something for someone else gave me enough of a little happiness bolster to get me out of being in a crabby mood….

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Hi friends!

I hope you all have had a great week! Are you ready to share some happy things? Let’s do this happiness report thing!…

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So, with that, let me share with you what’s been making me happy lately!…

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I’ve been feeling like such a bad blogger because I absolutely know that now is the time I should be doling out gift guide posts and SEO rich cookie and treat recipes, and Christmas crafting ideas but I’m just not feeling it. Honestly, when you are trying to lose weight, creating unnecessary treats just for a pinteresting blog is kind of counter productive. Even though I know you all would love to see some of that stuff, I hope you don’t mind if it comes at a slower pace than the other on the ball blogs. Just know, I’m not on the ball right now, but you know what I definitely am? HAPPY! I’ve had such a feeling of overwhelming happiness lately… and maybe that’s because I’ve stepped back and disconnected a little more. I don’t know, but I like it!

So, with that, I thought it was the perfect time to share my 25th Happiness Report with you! Below are some of the things that have been making me happy lately.

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