Thankful Thursdays

I'm taking on a challenge of a different sort this year... I found it via this blog post. Each month we try to work on one trait. This month the focus is on 'Gratitude'.

Each Thursday I will write a post, hopefully with pictures to accompany it, about the things for which I am grateful. This week, I was reminded how lucky I am to have my family any my friends.

 My family is absolutely awesome. Now, I am the first to admit that they/we have our quirks, and yeah, there are times they drive me a little nuts. I think everyone can say that at times, though. . Just this week, my mom came over and spent the a copule hours with me, doing some meal prep for  the month - we put some hamburger patties together and made some spaghetti sauce.  She's camera shy, so no pics of that. This is my brother and his wife at the Christmas party I host every year. It's a way to get our entire extended family together, which is something that's important to me - it's a big part of what Christmas is abo

My fantastic cousin R an her daughteer J. I am so blessed to be able to play such a big role in J's life... she means the world to me, and I am so glad we've maintained a close relationship, even as she is becoming a teenager and getting more interested in hanging out with her friends...

I was especially happy to see how good she was with our newest family member, baby C (the daughter of another cousin). Baby C was definitely the most popular guest at Christmas dinnner... I think we spent more time focussed on oohing and awwwing over her than we did on the food  - and that's quite an accomplishment for us Eastern Europeans. We love our food.

  This is me with my friend Santa. He came and spent some time with the kids at the school where I volunteer in mid December. We had a Christmas Breakfast  that was put on for us by the Knights of Columbus.