gratitude

oh, thanksgiving, you wonderful holiday. it's nice to experience gratitude together, as a family, community, as a country. it's nice to exercise our thankfulness muscles by naming our joys, our blessings, our luck, our gifts, our love. with so many negative vibes spewing out of radios and tvs and internets and our mouths, it's refreshing to practice saying nice things. thanksgiving gives us a bit of time off of work, a bit of time with people we love, and a gentle reminder to reflect on the past and look to the future with gratitude.

ramona put this together at school. it makes me happy.


i've always been grateful for a capable body and mind that allows me to do good work in a profession i love dearly, even if it means working on holidays and weekends. HOWEVER, this year, i didn't have to work the day after thanksgiving (for the first time in a long long time [except for last year, when i didn't, either] [but all the other years, i swear i always had to work]). we zipped down to florida from tuesday to saturday, and saw nana and papa at their winter home. it was a lovely visit.

early early morning departure from chicago, and these kids were total troopers the whole time. so i'm pretty thankful for them.

 

you can't stop these two from getting into the pool immediately upon arrival.


i couldn't even keep them out of the hot tub, so at least we convinced them to float atop the hot tub.


but don't worry, we all went to the pool, and brought sandwiches. this was a pretty great picnic with some pretty great lunch dates.

on thanksgiving, we spent some time in the white sandy city beach in naples,


building sand mountains to leap off of,


eating sandy pb&j sandwiches in lounge chairs with nana,


and finally seeking shelter from the sun under giant beach towels. florida kids, they are not.


we talked about the turkey-eating heritage of early colonists and native americans, and then tied it all together by pointing out the turkey on the manhole covers in town.

later, these two awesome hosts carved some turkey and served up a feast.


two tired, pool-weary sun-kissed kids, ready for thanksgiving dinner.



my cat catches mice and rabbits. florida cat catches lizards. (well, watches lizards, then lightly pats them with her paw, then gets bored...).

and when all the air travel was done, we hopped on the interstate to head home home home. but first, we stopped at the belvidere oasis and ate sbarro pizza over the road with our new beanie boos. it all makes sense.

it was a wonderful visit, and filled us all with gratitude for those that we love.