Sunday Leftovers...the results

Earlier this week I told you about the ugly jar and our attempt to be a more uplifting and encouraging family. Well the results are in: Chris wins by a landslide. He had a total of 7 complaints this week. Steven came in at the bottom with 48 complaints. And the girls brought up the middle with 15, 13, and 12. We've learned a lot about ourselves this week.

• Chris abides by several bible verses and is slow to speak, therefore gaining victory. I realized this week that he really doesn't say a lot. I knew he was quiet but I guess I didn't realize how quiet until compared to the rest of us.
• If you aren't a morning person, you really shouldn't speak until you're fully awake. 5 of Chris' 7, and several of mine, were earned in the early morning. Neither of us are morning people. However, the other three in the family are, so they always want to chat. Chris and I have started to give in, but obviously we aren't nice during this time, so we are going back to not speaking to anyone until a good hour after we wake up.
• If calling a bank or other such organization, in which you'll be passed from one representative to another, is part of your to do list just start the phone call by putting 5 names in the ugly jar.
• Steven is not normally a 48 complaints a week man. He spent a lot of time this week on the phone with the aforementioned banks.
  
• The girls are passionate or dramatic or female. You pick. Never once did they earn one at a time. The often earned five at a time because if they are going to complain about one thing, they are most certainly going to let you know everything else they don't like as well.
• Most of the time, I'm like Chris. I don't speak a lot. But when I do complain, I'm like the girls and I also put 5 at a time in the jar. We're just women who know what we want, and woe to those who don't give it to us. Pray for Chris and Steven.
• We are all very sarcastic.
• We complain a lot about the world around us, but not a lot about each other. That's good, right? No, I guess not. We've got to work on that whole loving others thing.
  
• We are all very competitive, because we actually tried to beat each other. That's right. That means that in a normal week we all complain a lot more!
  

We did so poorly this week that we have decided to start over. We're going to do it for another week, and this time it's not about who wins. We're each competing against ourselves. We had a big talk this morning over breakfast about how blessed we are. Our number of complaints shows that we don't live like we know that.
Every year a few weeks before Thanksgiving I put up a Thanksgiving tree and each year we add new leaves to it. On each leaf is something that we're thankful for. I think spending more time this week on what we're thankful for will help us to see that our complaints are silly and wrong. Our hearts need adjusting. We are blessed. God is good. We need to start using our words to proclaim it.