3 years ago we started filling up a gratitude jar. I fell in love with the idea of teaching kids to be grateful and at the same time I found it a great reminder to myself to be thankful for little things in life.

But there was a problem. A problem that repeated 2 years in a row…

Right after the Holidays we forgot the Gratitude Jar. And it was sitting there until the next November. Since the jar taught us a lot of lessons, brought us a lot of happiness I decided we had to put more effort in using it all through the year. But first, let make a gratitude jar!

How to make a Gratitude Jar 

You will need:

• A jar of your choice
• Paper cut in strips. Preferably of various colors for each family member.
• glue stick
• pen
• inspirational cut outs from the newspaper to decorate the jar
• hook to hang the paper
• hole punch

1. Glue the words and letters on the jar.
2. Hang the hook on the jar.
3. Punch the holes in the paper slips and hang them on the hook.

Use Gratitude Jar all through the year…

I am sharing few tips that helped us stick with the jar and write grateful notes 12 months in a year.

1. Keep the gratitude jar at visible place in your house. We have ours on the kitchen counter. That way I see it everyday and it’s a perfect reminder.
2. Have a set time when you write the notes and fill the jar. For us, it’s dinner time. During dinner we talk about our day and find the good things that happened. After our meal is finished we right the notes and put them in the jar. It became a must do activity right after dinner.
3. Make it easy, by always keeping the pen inside the jar. The hook that we attached also helps, because we don’t need to go and look for the paper every single time.
4. Let each family member pick their color and always write on that color of paper. It will feel more personal.
5. Open the jar and read the notes once in a while. That’s the reason we call it happiness jar.

Teaching kids to be grateful

If you are just starting out and have small children it’s best to show them an example of things that YOU are thankful for.

I wrote down 20 things to be thankful for and one of them was: “Thank you for telling me that my freckles are beautiful”. This particular example taught my daughter to appreciate compliments that aren’t her favorite ones.

Want more ideas? See these darling Printable Thank You Notes for kids!