30 Birthday = 30 Acts of Kindness

I am so excited for this post! It is something I have been wanting to do for some time now and wanted to document it with the hopes of inspiring others. As my big 3-0 birthday approached back in August I kept getting asked what I wanted to do, or what I wanted. Well the more I thought about it, the more I realized I wanted to do for others. I had seen on Pinterest where people had done ROAK's or Random Acts of Kindness. Some where truly random, some were planned. I thought Yes! This is what I want to do. So I made my list and set out to do as many ROAK'S that I could the week of my birthday. Some were greeted with open arms, while others did not understand why on earth I would want to do something for others with nothing in return. Sadly the later was more common. I had to learn to be sneaky with some of my giving, received a lot of strange looks but in the end there were a few that were so grateful it would almost bring you to tears. I'm not going to lie, after doing all of these it really did give me the warm fuzzies inside.
Now to find out what items certain organizations needed I simply called or looked it up on their websites. Yes many of the things on this list did cost money, however there are many examples that do not cost anything but time. Also I went through the house to see if I had any items laying around that I could use. Some of the items seemed silly for me to even put on the list because to me they were common sense but a friend suggested it may not be to others and may inspire them to be a little kinder. There were many other ideas I wanted to do but did not get the chance. After completing this I will make sure to add them next time.
Well here's the list in no certain order. I tried to get as many pictures as I could but in my sneakiness had to be quick and did not get all of them.

RANDOM (PLANNED) ACTS OF KINDNESS
1. Left popcorn on the Redbox machine
2. Taped money to the vending machine at the hospital
3. Paid for the car behind me at Starbucks (these ladies were so excited, they flagged me down at the stop light to say thank you)
4-6. Mailed out handwritten cards to 3 of my very dear friends
7. Left a silly shark gift on a friends doorstep
8. Left a gift of chocolate and a drink on another friends doorstep after they mentioned they were craving it on Facebook
9. Left flowers on my moms car at work
10. Made a donation of food and towels to the Idaho Humane Society
11. Held the door open for a mother who was struggling with her stroller (also after a gentleman so rudely let it slam in her face)
12. Cleaned out my cupboards and made a donation to the Meridian Foodbank
13. Played coupon Fairy at Walmart and left random coupons through out the store
14. Made a hospital "survival kit" for a mom to be
15. Donated hygiene supplies to Mirror Image, which puts together hygiene supplies for teens in need at no charge to them
16. Dropped off coloring books, crayons, and word search puzzles to those staying at the Ronald McDonald house in Boise
17-18. Purchased two gift cards to Chic FilA. One I gave to the Ronald McDonald house to give to parents that are staying there. The other I took to the hospital and told the lady on the peds floor to give it to a patient she felt was "in need".
19. I purchased cookies and gave them to one of the nurses stations at the hospital
20. Held the elevator door open for a patient at the hospital
21. Made a donation to a friends Alzheimer's fundraiser page
22. Made my best attempt to be a polite driver, with all this construction going on
23. Leave post it "love notes" for the hubs around the house
24. Left quarters at the candy machines at the store
25. Helped out the inlaws by watching theirs boys while they welcomed a precious new addition to the family
26. Spent some good quality time with my Grandpa (which I don't do often enough) and helped dust his house.
27. Took grocery carts back inside the store instead of leaving them out in the parking lot corral
28. Held a friends baby while at lunch so she could enjoy her meal without wrestling the little one
29. Took my mama out to lunch
30. Donated bags of clothing to a great organization called The Closet. They are one of the few donation centers that I found that does not charge, in any way, for teens to come get clothes who are in need.