The picture above fails to show how much fun Peter was having with the swing. He was discovering that if he pushed it away it would come back. He laughed and giggled. Moments like these are fun to watch as a parent. When your kids are able to find joy in the simplest gifts from our Heavenly Father.
Today we were blessed to have both sets of grandparents over for Thanksgiving dinner. What an unusual blessing that is. The food was lovingly prepared by many hands and it was delicious. The kids seemed to have grown in maturity since last year. They seemed more willing to try new foods. This has been a source of tears in the past but not today. This may have come, in part, from an unconscious choice that Heidi and I made. Rather than give them something of everything and obliging them to eat it, we gave them foods we knew they liked and the option to try others. As a result some of the kids surprised us by requesting to try the new foods (and finding they liked them). This may have lead other kids to be brave enough to try the unfamiliar (to them) Thanksgiving dishes. So, another simple thing to be grateful for, a Thanksgiving meal with no memorable crying.
Our blessings are, of course many. We are blessed to have family nearby. In addition to the grand parents and Becca B both Heather and Matt (and some of the kids) stopped by for visits. We were blessed with time, I'm sure that many people had to work yesterday. We were blessed to all be healthy. So many times during the holidays we have taken turns being sick. You never know when that might happen but today it did not. Another small mercy is that Peter did not fall off he playground. You may remember from an earlier Facebook post from Heidi that Peter taught himself to climb up the 5 foot tall climbing wall on our play set by himself. That doesn't mean he isn't still very wobbly once up there or that he doesn't give me a heart attack when he sneaks outside and climbs up with no grown up nearby to catch him. That happened today. Happily he was fine and loved it. I was the only one who seemed worried that he would fall. He surely was not. I could go on and on about things to be grateful for but I think this post is long enough. If anyone is reading this feel free to post something you are grateful in the comments.
The inspirational prophet Gordon B. Hinckley taught that we should "be grateful" for all of the blessings large and small in our lives. Pres Monson teaches that we should have "an attitude of gratitude ". Every night as we say our evening prayers we try to recall what happened that day that we are thankful for. Yesterday we remembered the blessing of being with your family for that special day.
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