Today is National Random Act of Kindness Day, or so the National Day Alert account that I follow on Instagram tells me. It seems a bit more worthwhile of a day than celebrating National Cabbage Day, which is also today. Then again, those Cabbage Patch Kids didn't fall from the sky.

Because I like to stress myself out, I started thinking of all of the grand things I could do to celebrate Random Acts of Kindness today. I could make large poster signs and hang them all over the city. I could bake up a bunch of cookies and deliver them to all of my neighbors. Maybe I should stand at a busy street corner and hand out free hugs and suckers.

Then I remembered, I'm busy. Not in the "I'm too busy for kindness" way, but more in the "I'm busy giving random kindness to my kids and spouse in between all of the other things I do every day" way. Maybe as a parent, we don't give ourselves enough credit for all of the times we were exceptionally kind when we could have been exceptionally justified in exasperation. Today I am going to give myself some kindness--quite randomly, since I didn't think about it until now--by realizing that I am doing a decent, maybe even a good, job at this child-raising business.

Why, just this week, I:

Didn't lose my cool when the kids asked what was for dinner, and when I told them, they loudly moaned and said, "Not again!"
Let my kids keep the pillow and blanket fort up in the family room one day longer than we agreed, even though it looks like a disaster.
Took my kids skiing, and didn't yell "LIKEWISE" when the little ones berated me from their frustration by yelling (quite often), "I hate you, Mom!" I even kept my voice calm, knowing that they didn't mean it, but they don't quite possess the language skills to express frustration yet. (We had a talk about it later, don't you worry.)
Picked up the kids' towels after the shower instead of yelling outside for them to come do it.
Told an extra story at bedtime, even though the call of my own bed was so enticing.
Laughed at their jokes, gave hugs when they were overreacting, expressed how much I love them, encouraged their schoolwork, patted their bums on the way to school.
Let them make their own breakfasts. I'm also randomly teaching self-reliance!
Shared my Valentine's candy with them. (This is huge, by the way.)
Listened to their school stories.
Made banana muffins.
Said I was sorry when I did lose my cool.

I still might go and pay for someone's soda--randomly, of course--when I go get my own fill of caffeine today. But for the most part, I know random acts of kindness are happening every day. They aren't huge or celebrated or Instagram-photo-worthy, but hopefully they are helping to create better humans out of my children and a better human of me.