Archive for November 28th, 2008

I meant to post this on Thanksgiving Day, but we’re without Internet at our new place until next week, so I had to wait until I could get access elsewhere today.

I count my blessings everyday, but Thanksgiving just seems to be the day we all set aside to express our thanks.  This year….Wow. This year has been both a whirlwind of life changes and also a year my heart is overflowing with thanks.  I can’t even begin to list them all, but I feel that I should at least publicly share 3 of the most important ones:

1. Marriage.  My husband. I love him so much.  And while we can be so different in our unique personalities, I can’t imagine my life without him. Certainly there are times of struggle and stress, but the joyful times and experiencing married life together are far more significant.  It is a bit odd to think that at this time last year, we weren’t even engaged, and now here we are enjoying our 76^th day of marital bliss.

2. God.  I was baptized this year on Easter, and we are so blessed to have a wonderful support system in our church, especially our young adult small group.  We’ve developed honest & caring friendships with so many of them.  And while I still have lots of spiritual growth, I feel like I’m finally at a point in my life with God where I’m not struggling to keep my head above water, but I’m swimming with the current and living in Jesus’ love.

3. Family & Friends.  For their continued love, support, and overall health.  I can’t fathom as to where I would be in my life without every single relative, friend, and most importantly my parents, brother and sister (in-law).  I am who I am because of my wonderful family.  I don’t express my thanks for them as much as I should.  And friends from all stages of my life, all different from each other, but each one important to me in their own special way.  New friends close by and old friends far away.

This year for Thanksgiving, Todd & I stayed here to enjoy a quiet day together. Our first Thanksgiving as husband and wife, just the two of us.  While spending it with our families would’ve been ideal, that wasn’t possible this year so we made the most of our holiday in our new home.  I told him not to have very high expectations.  I couldn’t easily convince myself of the same thing—my memories of Thanksgiving with my family are filled with love, fun, and lots of delicious food.  I had very high expectations of myself for my first Thanksgiving dinner attempt as a wife. 

A turkey would’ve been too big for the two of us, so I stuffed a whole chicken with veggies and finished off the meal with my own version of green bean casserole (homemade crispy onions on top too- none of that unhealthy French’s canned stuff), mashed potatoes, and gravy.  I finished the feast with yummy pumpkin pie and real whipped cream.  I wanted to do as much of the food from scratch and with fresh ingredients as I could find. 

A Homemade Harris Thanksgiving

Disclaimer: the pie crust and canned pumpkin were from Whole Foods and the gravy came premade from Trader Joe’s, but other than that….all homemade.  I’m not brave enough to attempt gravy just quite yet.

I think I exceeded my own expectations. 

thanks for the flowers Mom & Dad!

We tried a new Washington wine— Holy Cow Riesling— to go with the meal and decided that if we couldn’t be with our family and friends, how better to spend the evening than watching every FRIENDS Thanksgiving episode?  Oddly, season 2 didn’t have a Thanksgiving episode, but we laughed our way through the other 9 seasons.

Today we woke up early to walk downtown for the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade (Seattle’s day after version) and came back home for some buttermilk waffles and Home Alone.  

Here comes Seattle Santa!

A nap sounds good, but we have to finish moving a couple last items out of our old apartment and do a final cleaning.  Great way to burn off the past 24 hours of yumminess.