Thanksgiving Week Plans

My simple Thanksgiving dinner for the two of us has transformed into a full-blown holiday with about 15 other people. Our friends asked if I would be willing to cook Thanksgiving dinner for all of us, and they'll pay for the groceries. We'll be celebrating on Saturday since Ryan and the others have class all day Thursday. I'm very excited to have a chance to cook a real Thanksgiving dinner. And I am immensely grateful that my parents have taught me well! Tomorrow I will be heading back to the grocery store for the third time this week, and I hope to have all the shopping done by then. Fortunately, our friends live in a big house with three separate kitchens, so I will not be lacking in oven space or refrigerator space.

This Thanksgiving, I am especially thankful to be living in a country where I can still buy the food we are used to eating. Although it's not home, there are so many places in the world where there is much, much less. God has been very good to us this year.

I'm not sure yet how I feel about spending the actual Thanksgiving Day alone. More than likely, I'll be at the pool with some friends for a couple hours which will make it seem even more unlike a holiday. But I do plan to watch football all afternoon. Ironically, this is one of the few years that my team is playing on Thanksgiving, and I'll miss watching it with my family.

We're also getting to the point where I need to start taking an inventory of our toiletries and make a list of what needs to be purchased over the break. Then starts the process of deciding what clothes to bring home. That will be especially easy this time seeing as how we'll be coming from 85 degree weather and heading towards 30 and 40 degrees. I am now starting to think about using up the food we have on hand and buying as little as possible. This always makes meal preparation interesting. But I know that if we can make it through the next two and a half weeks, we will be greeted with plates of Christmas cookies, amazing snacks, and delicious meals back at home. We're almost there!