When was the last time you made a list of things that make you smile? For me, it’s been almost two years. I used to do a list of “Happy Thoughts” pretty regularly here, but then I graduated, had a baby, moved across the country, yada yada yada, and it feel to the wayside.

Last night, I heard about Project Smile from my friend Kristi. Project Smile is a monthly meme run by Alicia of the blog A Beautiful Mess: Project Alicia. It’s easy to participate…you just write a blog post about things that make you smile and then link up. This month’s linky is open until Wed. Oct. 6th.

Things That Make Me Smile

Fall: It’s the season for pumpkin patches and apple cider and Halloween costumes and hay rides and corn mazes and, if I still lived in Ohio, the leaves turning colors. I love this time of year, and it’s going to be so fun watching the Menininho enjoying it too!

My husband: He is so excited to be “actually winning games” on the platinum level of Starcraft 2. I think he’s ranked like 7,000 out of over 1 million players right now or something. I don’t understand the game at all, but it’s important to him and so it makes me happy.

Christmas shopping: With a baby due in 10 weeks, I can’t afford to put off Christmas shopping till Thanksgiving like I usually do. I LOVE Christmas shopping for family and friends and I’m really excited about a couple of things I’ve picked out for my boys.

The Menininho’s kisses: Now, you have to understand some background with this. Back when M. was developing normally, he learned to give kisses…big, sloppy, baby kisses where it was like he was eating your cheek right off your face. And then, at about 11 months of age, he stopped kissing, just as he stopped learning new sounds, stopped clapping, stopped waving…stopped his verbal and social development. In the past week or two he’s learned to kiss again (he’s almost 20 months). It’s a little weird b/c he doesn’t make eye contact or express any emotion when he does it, but from time to time he’ll grab both my cheeks in his hands, pull my face, and plant a little toddler kiss right on my lips. It’s a miracle. I didn’t think I’d be getting kisses from him again, at least not for any time soon. If that’s not a reason to smile, I don’t know what is.

So now it’s your turn: what brings a smile to your lips?