Last Week

This Thanksgiving I neglected to even post about the things that I am grateful for, shame on me! We always go around our dinner table on Thanksgiving and share what we are thankful for – My husband is always particular about no one repeating something that has already been said too. You should hear how we try to get around that one! Kind of fun actually because by the time you get nine people to share 2-5 things they are thankful for all the basics are gone.

So as I was working this morning, my thoughts began to wonder as they often do and I thought about our busy weekend (11th-12th now), traveling in the storm down to Chicago…I couldn’t help but be thankful for my husband. We had paid to attend the Green Holiday Fair at the Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum to feature Cornucopia Health Scents. A friend had even volunteered to “man” our table so we could attend church as a family and arrive at the fair by 1:00pm. The weather changed all that since my friend lives 45 minutes north of us. Her husband wasn’t comfortable with the weather situation so she called me on Friday night to let me know. We were disappointed, of course, but completely understood.

If you knew my husband you’d probably think he was quietly reserved and depending on what he wants you to see, you may discover his wonderfully quirky sense of humor and teasing nature. He’s my hero, as this weekend I witnessed another one of his heroic acts on behalf of our family. We had already planned to set up our table with the event coordinator so we went down on Saturday night to set up. He wasn’t deterred by the weather forecast at all. I was left wondering if we were going to make it down at all, while he quietly kept observing the forecast.

Sunday morning arrived with us sleeping later than we intended (that seems to be a Sunday morning habit around here), mostly due to Sir Eats Alot having me up before 4 o’clock and falling back to sleep, not wanting to get up with the alarm. My husband gets up, goes for a drive to see how our 15 passenger van does on the roads and in the wind on the highway. He comes back to say that it really wasn’t that bad out. Almost everyone is ready, but we decide that only the girls will go with him to the city since we were running late. It turns out that they had to come back not only once, but twice because of needful items being forgotten. Then as I thought about it, I was the only one not ready, so why don’t we all go since we were already late anyways? So what do I do? I call him back a third time. He was a little exasperated but saw my point when I said we were already going to be late and all I had to do was get dress and brush my hair.

He did a wonderful job of driving into the city. We hit snow, rain and snow again; in that order. Then he managed to keep the children occupied at the nature museum most of the day with us trading off a little bit, but the older girls and I manned our table and one of my client’s had a table, so our oldest was privileged to help her out for a time.

The day was slow visitor wise, which was another disappointment as this was our first event for our essential oils business. But we had a wonderful time with only minor mishaps (things like children running off to the next exhibit without informing anyone of where they were going or asking permission to do so). So I am thankful the museum was not terribly busy for that reason and even though the children were more “wild” than we’d like them to be in that sense, we could easily guess where they were – at the water playing with boats and damming up water or at the play area on either floor.

I am grateful for a husband who believes in my ideas even when I don’t. Oh we both have our times, but he is still very supportive and helps out a lot as we try to fulfill our vision of having a family business that enables him to work from home – yes that is our ultimate goal. So be careful what you pray for. We prayed for Robert to come home to work and he lost his job! Nearly three years ago now and thankfully he is back to work, doing a job he likes and has great hours. However, his heart isn’t there, it’s at home.

I am grateful for a husband who is brave. Driving didn’t bother him at all on Sunday, oh he wanted us to be quiet during the traffic and messy spots, not that the roads were terrible because they weren’t bad at all and our Behemoth handled better than we could have hoped. He just wanted to give his full attention to driving.

I am thankful the Lord kept us safe.

This Week

This week we have much to be grateful for again, even though we have had five children down with the stomach flu over the past seven days, even though our washing machine’s transmission went and even though our hot water heater is ready to blow. We can be grateful for neighbors who delivered us a full turkey dinner! (Now that was a huge surprise that left my husband standing speechless at the door!) For the unexpected Christmas bonus from one of my clients, for the offer of help from our church, for the offer of our long-time friend of nearly 20 years to come down from Wisconsin to help my husband put in the new hot water heater tonight, giving of himself and time.

I am grateful for a white Christmas – we have plenty of snow that should last unless it warms up and rains!

No matter the difficulties or troubles we may face, there’s always a silver lining somewhere amidst the debris. Sometimes it is just harder to locate when our view is blurred by circumstances beyond our control.

A grateful heart is a merry, contented one.