Happy Thanksgiving to all!

I hope your day was filled with the joys of family & friends!

We had a relatively quiet day, compared to other years. We had only 7 here for dinner compared to 20 or 30 in the past. Amy & Andrew are in So Cal, Kevin is in the Middle East, my sister, Sharon is in Kuwait, Ashley & Russell were at Ashley's parent's house, Lisa was with the Strattons and Hope & Steve were with Steve's family.

So dinner time was Terry and I, my mom, Diane, Pat, Sharon's boyfriend-Steve and Sharon's son, Dustin. It was a nice group. Dustin was kind to put up with us older folks with no other young people around. He's growing up to be quite a handsome young man (see below). He's in ROTC right now and wants to be a pilot someday.

Steve was so sweet to bring Diane and I early Christmas presents (which he didn't need to do) but he's going to be out of town at Christmas and said he wanted to. He got us each beautiful serving dishes that we can use for entertaining. I can already picture when I'm going to use mine. Steve's so thoughtful. Sharon finally has a great guy! He's the one in the blue shirt talking on the phone. I wanted to get a picture of him on the phone to send to Sharon so she can see what he looks like when she's talking with him.

There are also pics here of Mom, Diane & Pat.

We were thrilled to get a phone call from Kevin early in the day too!!! We had been trying to figure out a way to connect with him, but weren't sure that it was going to happen. We had a chance to talk to him for a half hour. It was so great to hear his voice! We got to find out a little bit about what it's like there, although he can't tell us what he's doing. He says he might be moving to a different location, so he doesn't want us to send anything for Christmas until he knows his new address. I may send a few things anyway, just on the chance that he'll get them at Christmas. I'd hate for him to be without anything to open. We miss him.

Sharon called too and I got to talk to her for just a few minutes. She's a bit homesick and wanted us to take lots of pictures and send them to her. I'll be printing out some of these and others from our day together and sending them to her. We missed having her here with us.

We tried to call Amy & Andrew, but only were able to connect with them for a few minutes. We missed them too!

Ron & Bunny stopped by for a little while in the evening and we got to catch up a little bit on them and the family. It was great to see them.

Here's a picture of our nearly 24 pound turkey. I have this amazing recipe where it cooks overnight and turns out delicious...and it was!

This Grandma Perkins Pumpkin Patch sign always reminds me of Thanksgivings with my own Grandma Perkins and the extended family in Ohio. We would have tables and tables of people and food and homemade pies. I had so many cousins that I really barely knew many of them, but we'd all get together on Thanksgiving at my grandma's house for dinner and visiting. My uncle would sometimes go out and hunt rabbits after dinner (poor rabbits) and the cousins would all hang out together outside while the aunts and uncles would catch up on the latest family news.

I'm so thankful for all the blessings that God has bestowed on me thru-out my life and especially what he's sent our way this year. I trust that you're able to consider all the big and little things that God has allowed to happen or has protected you from in 2008 and thank him for his loving care. We serve a gracious God! Happy Thanksgiving!