This has been a cold, blustery week. Thanksgiving is coming up quickly. I’m pausing with Susanne and friends at Living to Tell the Story to reflect on some of the blessings of the week. If you’d like to join in or visit others who do this exercise, Susanne has a place to share a link to your post.
1. Operation Christmas Child. I love this concept of sending useful and fun supplies to children in another country. We turned our OCC boxes in this week. I heard of some families filling a box with their children to help turn their focus on others.
2. A production of A Christmas Carol. The Christian school associated with our church is doing Dickens’ Christmas story this year. They invited the church and home school community to their dress rehearsal before the regular performances start. There were a few chuckles over missed cues or prop malfunctions, but overall, everyone did a great job. I appreciate the school giving these young people an opportunity to hone their talents.
3. A quick dinner with Jason, Mittu, and Timothy. The play rehearsal was on a Wednesday afternoon, and went overtime–and we have children’s ministries and adult Bible studies Wednesday evenings. So we dashed out for a quick dinner at McAlister’s Deli in-between.
4. An artificial Christmas tree. After 40+ years of choosing a live tree every Christmas, we finally caved in and bought an artificial one. The prices of live trees were so exorbitant last year, we figured an artificial one will pay for itself in a couple of years. I’ll miss the excursion to choose just the right tree and the fragrance it brings. But we’re already looking forward to not having to string lights and water it. We haven’t put it up yet but hope to do so soon.
5. A gift card solution. I receive a lot of gift cards from my family. They fit in a pocket in my purse, but when I need one, I have to pull out the whole stack of loose ones and shuffle through them at the cash register. Then it dawned on me to look for a small credit card-type wallet to keep them in, and I found one here–on sale and pink!
To those of you in the US, I wish you a joyous Thanksgiving with those you love.
Stray Thoughts 
We have a small artificial tree for the grands to decorate. Then, our big artificial tree is in the livingroom. I love decorating for Christmas. Gift cards are wonderful. Thanks for sharing about the wallet. I’ll have to check into that. Have a blessed weekend! Happy Thanksgiving! 🙂
Love the Spurgeon quote!!
We’ve had an artificial tree ever since our oldest got to 9th grade…..mainly because we didn’t like the idea of living trees being cut and then tossed away and we have no room or the right soil to plant them. (we do have one pine tree in the back yard but here in suburbia we don’t have acres…just 1….) I gave away my 7 foot fake one last year to my cousin and bought a 3 ft tabletop one and LOVE LOVE LOVE that i can put it together all by myself. Saves on my back. I’ll decorate it Dec 1st when we return from Plymouth.
How fun to have Timothy involved inthe drama and to go out to dinner afterwards. I’ll bet the kids are doing a great job.
Happy Thanksgiving!
I already ordered the credit card holder! I need it for our trip to
Mexico City next month when I don’t want to take my huge wallet! Thanks
so much! I’ve been looking for something like that for 2 months!
How cool! Glad to be of service. 🙂
I’m glad you enjoyed the Christmas Carol rehearsal. I’ve been in lots of plays and cantatas, and they say a not great dress rehearsal means a good performance.
I wish our church will get involved with OCC. Maybe I’ll suggest it to our pastor’s wife who is in charge of the children’s department.
My tree will go up the day after Thanksgiving. Artificial trees can look so life like. I’ve enjoyed mine.
See you at lunch on Tuesday. Looking forward to it!
I love Operation Christmas Child! Turning in my boxes Sunday after church. I like the Christmas Carol story; I bet that helped get you into a Christmasy frame of mind! We’ve always had artificial trees. Definitely the budget choice. I remember from our days of live trees in my childhood, stepping on a dry needle while barefoot.
Isn’t it the smiles over misadventures the best part of these Christmas productions? Sounds like a fun evening.
Sigh, we went the artificial route with trees some years ago for the same reason. Plus, the nearest Christmas tree farm had sold to shoe-horn in more condos.
A wallet credit card type thing for your gift cards is super smart.
Happy Thanksgiving to you, too.
What a good idea to have an audience for the final rehearsal. It does help calm the nerves of the actors.
OCC is a wonderful program. I love seeing and hearing about ALL the boxes that are being gathered again this year. Can you imagine the delight and impact on the children who will receive them this year?
Have a good week and Happy Thanksgiving! Willow
Hi Barbara, We have had artificial trees for years. I have one slimline I keep up all year and I decorate it seasonally. That card holder is nice! I have a few. We turned are boxes a few weeks ago. Our church works at the distribution center. I love the Christmas Carol! Have a great weekend!
We had a real big tree until we got our 2nd cat who loved to climb on it and play with the balls. My son was a toddler and wanted to do the same, so we decided to buy a big fake one which looked great once decorated and no worries anymore !