A Month of Thanks II

Friends who visit (and those who are near!)
Last weekend, one of my wonderful roommates from college, Jennifer, came to visit me all the way from sunny San Diego.  Even though the trip was a whirlwind and we packed in a bunch o’ stuff, it was a treat to have my very first visitor.  We traveled down to Colorado Springs so she could visit some old friends while I went to a baby shower, went to my favorite bakery, and got stuck in traffic due to almost all of downtown having road closures because of a parade.  The next day, Jen suffered through an hour and a half at church (being born and raised a Lutheran, she’s used to in-and-out services that only take an hour).  She made it through without too much fidgeting.   Finish that off with a short outdoor adventure and a stop at The Chocolate Therapist for chocolate (duh) and coffee, her trip was almost over and I took her to the airport.  I am thankful that I live in a cool enough place that friends want to visit. 

Also, I am thankful for dear new friends who are nearby.  And those who let me invite myself to their Thanksgiving festivities (that’s a shout out to you, Brandon & Val).  And those who so warmly invited me into their communities and adopted a strange girl from NorCal  (the lovely Kerns et. al., Melissa, and Randi, to name a few).  I am thankful for my friends from far away and those who are near.

Health

This may be a no-brainer, but seriously.  I am SO thankful for my health. Why, you ask?  Well because I caught the plague last week and was a big baby.  And by the plague I mean the flu.  But honestly, if I go to a baby shower the weekend before and 8+ women come down with it, does that not constitute as a plague?  Anyway, I spend two and a half days migrating from my bed to the bathroom so I could throw up, then to the guest bed in our loft (in the super-logical state of my fever-racked mind the first night of illness, I realized that heat rises and that the loft would be warmer than my bedroom.  And that there would be two extra blankets up there that I could add to my count of two).  I also spent a record amount of time on the couch, sleeping, watching trashy TV, and also finding some comfort in my favorite Disney movie, Alice in Wonderland.  I am thankful that I no longer have to have a trashcan near me at all times and that I can sleep without waking up to vomit.  I am thankful for my health.

Bobby Pins

I seriously don’t know how I would handle my hair without these God-given contraptions.   I am thankful for bobby pins.

Cheap Flights

Being an adult sometimes sucks.  Because when the holidays come around, you don’t get a full week off at Thanksgiving.  Nor do you get two off at Christmas.  What a travesty!  No, instead of two weeks, I get five days (although I realize that is quite a blessing in and of itself).  The flight home for Christmas was not cheap at all, and I’m fairly certain I was a victim of highway robbery. But on the other hand, Southwest bought its way back into my affections by having flights in January and February 40% off if you flew on a Tuesday or a Wednesday.  Five more days spent at home with family and friends?  Yes please.  I am thankful for cheap flights.

Aaaaand my Bible.

Even though it is true, I felt a little redundant putting my church on the list two weeks in a row.   But I am super-thankful for my Bible, a wonderfully worn-out dirt brown Revised Standard Version printed in the 70’s.  A gift of my sister Kate on my 17^th birthday.  Missing the awful, cheesy caricatures of a white Jesus (I cut them out—last time I checked Jesus was from the Middle East and didn’t have blue eyes and sandy brown hair).  But still full of wisdom, peace, grace, justice, and conviction.  I am thankful for my Bible and the ways it shows me a bigger picture of God.

Psalm 34:8
O taste and see that the LORD is good; How blessed is the man who takes refuge in Him!

November, A Month of Thanks

Not only is November fabulous because it means turkey and pumpkins galore, in Colorado it also means snow!  October brought us two snowy days, and hopefully we will be getting more soon.  I told one of my co-workers last time it snowed that this is how I imagined Narnia to look like (well, minus all the roads, cars, and buildings).

Also, it is the month with one of my favorite holidays--Thanksgiving!  In light of this fact, I want to be more intentional and reflective of what I am thankful for each week, the big and the little.

Here are some things I have been thankful for recently:

-It's Friday, people!  And to make things even better, my boss is giving us a new options for schedules.  If we want to take half an hour for lunch for four days a week instead of the usual 1 hour, we can get done at 3PM on Fridays.  Yes please.  It makes me feel more excited than Rebecca Black on a Friday.

-I was at the thrift store shopping for my Halloween costume and decided to peruse through some of the records.  I found one of my all-time favorite jazz albums in perfect condition.  I immediately bought it.

-Even through all this dumb election mail (okay, the election is not dumb, I just can't stand all the ads that I get as a new voter in a swing state; although I am very excited that my vote actually counts for something here), I have gotten some pretty good mail recently:  a letter from my dad, a card from Bethany, my subscription to The Economist, and also a bunch of nerdy bookmarks from Mental Floss.

-Last Sunday at church, our pastor gave a sermon in our series of Ephesians that kicked my butt.  I went straight home, packed a backpack and grabbed the dog, and then drove out to Jefferson County for some quiet and contemplative hiking.  Not only did I get exercise, but also got to see some pretty country and work through some good/hard stuff.  It was a great way to spend a Sunday afternoon.