Give Thanks

I love Christmas SOOOOOOO much, but I also love Thanksgiving. I don't like how Halloween gets such a big deal made about it and Thanksgiving seems to get skipped over. I think it is important to remember what we have and how blessed we really are. So as much as I am dying to pull out the Christmas stuff, we are spending the next few weeks remembering to be thankful and celebrate all the neat things Thanksgiving was created to let us remember.

This past week, we were all pretty sick and miserable. I was REALLY thankful for cold medicine and bedtime. :)

I saw this beautiful "Thankful Garland" on a craft blog. http://tatertotsandjello.blogspot.com/2010/10/thanksgiving-project-make-thankful.html

Isn't that a gorgeous idea? I hope to buy all the supplies after Thanksgiving when fall stuff is on clearance and make a much more elaborate one next year. This year, I used what I already had and put something simple together. Very simple, but it still gets the idea across with the girls.

I hung up an orange ribbon across the doorway into the kitchen. I cut leaves out of pretty scrapbook paper and got some small clothespins. Every day, the girls get to tell us something they are thankful for and we write it on the leaves, with their names and the date, and then attach them to the ribbon.

We had a little 2 year old confusion, because the girls became obsessed with the pretty colors on the paper and kept telling me what color leaf they wanted and not what they were thankful for. It sounded something like this....

Me: Lexi, what are you thankful for? What is a blessing you want to remember?

Lexi: Blue and Brown, Mommy!

Me: Yes, those are the colors of the leaves and I'm glad you like the colors, but what are you thankful for other than those colors?

Lexi: Blue, Mommy!

We went ahead and wrote down that they were thankful for those colors. :)

My friend, Miranda, also had a great idea. She is putting her leaves up on a big wreath. It looks beautiful!

We were also finally successful in selling the purple couch and Eric's giant tv. I love the new open look of the living room. When you first walk in, you see the whole room and not just the back of that huge tv and the side of a purple couch. Much better! We got a killer deal on a new tv, which was mine and Eric's Christmas and birthday presents. :) Gotta love a good deal!