An extended Thanksgiving

I'm stealing this idea from my friend's blog, who stole it from her friend's blog, who stole it from his friend's blog, and you are welcome to steal it for your own blog as well. And due to the abundance of blessings (clothes and toys scattered throughout my house and dirty dishes clogging the sink food and a kid in preschool for the next 2 hours) that I am thankful for, I don't actually have time to write my own blog, so I'm pretty much just copying and pasting from her blog and modifying some of the examples.

The Thanksgiving holiday is one of my favorites... gatherings of family and friends; the cool, fall air; and, of course, the food... especially the food. But, originally, it was meant to be a day to pause and give authentic thanks to God. Unfortunately, for many, including myself, thanksgiving is more of a one-day holiday than a way of life. I don't know about you, but I've been blessed beyond comprehension, and even in the unwelcome moments of life, I have so much to be thankful for.

What would it look like if I ONLY spoke words of gratitude the entire week of Thanksgiving? If I went so far as to look at a pile of laundered clothes that awaits my folding and putting up, a task I normally quite dislike, and instead think and speak out loud, “God, thank you for these clothes, for providing covering.” Or when my boys voice their grumpiness, say, “God, thank you that they have a voice, and thank you for shaping their own unique personalities.”

So, starting this Monday morning and going through this Sunday evening, I'm challenging myself to live an entire week full of thanksgiving.

Let there be no filthiness nor foolish talk nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving.
(Ephesians 5:4 ESV)

Anytime I'm tempted to think/say/do something negative (filthy, foolish, crude, or otherwise un-thankful), I will instead choose, in that very moment, to give thanks to God for His blessing in my life.

If you'd like to join me, please leave a comment saying so AND repost this (in our own words, if you'd like... no need to link me) on your blog, twitter, facebook, etc., and challenge your friends to do the same. Even if you're not reading this until after Monday morning, it's never too late to take up a good challenge. And, keep in mind that nobody who takes this challenge is going to make it an entire week without missing the mark, so when that happens to you, just pick yourself back up and start again!

O Christmas Tree...

For many people, the day after Thanksgiving is all about crazy shopping and great sales.  In our family, the day after Thanksgiving marks the beginning of the Christmas season!  Casey and I both love Christmas and we don't see any point of delaying the decorations and the music for later in December.  And this year Thanksgiving was real early, so our Christmas season is even longer!!!!

Bikers!

We celebrated a warm Thanksgiving at my brother's home.  We all had a great time and the kids loved being able to play together.  The temperature was in the 70s, so the kids could play outside - bikes were the favorite activity.  Dinner was delicious.  Casey made the turkey and mashed potatoes (Thanks to Cook's Country for the recipes).  Nathan made the stuffing.  Kristine made sweet potatoes, wild rice, green beans.  I contributed a pumpkin pie (Thanks to Libby's pie mix in a can!).  Yum, I love all the traditional Turkey Day foods!

The next day, we left my brother's house and headed towards the mountains for our 2nd annual Christmas Tree Hunting Expedition.  It's so Norman Rockwell to go to the mountains as a family and pick out your tree - and we love all that sappy family stuff.  We even sang Christmas songs in the car together!  Don't tell anyone.

 

Please forgive me if I don't blog frequently.  Casey is in the process of interviewing for jobs, so we're in the middle of a pretty big decision that will change our lives forever.  Plus it's Christmas time, so we've a lot of extra stuff going on too.

 

***** Update on the project for the school in Kenya - The school would like to buy sweaters for each of the students.  Aside from providing the basic need of warmth for the children, I think it also helps them to feel proud about their school and their hard work and develops a sense of community among the students (all the sweaters will be the same, like a school uniform, which is pretty important in many cultures).  In all, the teachers estimate that it will cost $300 to buy all the sweaters.  So all funds raised will go towards this sweater project.

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