It was such a nice Thanksgiving here. And it’s become such a familiar routine to get ready to host a houseful. Always a few special touches to the day as well. I mean, just take a look at those place cards Kayla made – with a little help from our friend Hadassah. Very special.

(The bittersweet is tied on with a tiny amount of thread, and the letters are individually stamped!)

All I did was request that place cards be made, and give Kayla and Coop some basic directions about where to find the bittersweet growing – on the bike trail where I run several mornings a week…

Park behind Whole Foods. Walk over to the bike trail and go right on the trail. 10-20 yards down and to the left, you’ll see it growing.

I’d been scoping it out for days, and also pondering the legality of snipping off a bit of it. Another reason for sending the kids. (just kidding. kinda)

Robert and Kayla did all of the table settings while I did all of the cooking. It’s one of only a couple of times a year that we pull out all of our wedding china, crystal glasses, and silver.

(As seen on the dining room table, not the living room table. The “china” on the living room table was a special deal at my local grocery store. $1.99 for a plate, cup, and saucer. I bought 14 sets about 16 years ago in a momentary vision of this very Thanksgiving scene!)I know I’ve mentioned it before, but we often have the privilege of having many nations represented around our table or in our living room, and it’s something that I treasure very much. This year we had four Smith College undergrad students from China, two PhD students from South Korea, one Vietnamese UMass grad student from New Jersey, another grad student from the DR Congo via South Africa, and another from Iran. My friend Izckra and her family are from Mexico originally.

Such a beautiful gathering of God’s children here on earth, which is only a small glimpse of what the new earth will look like. Definitely something to look forward to.

You know what I always think is a sign of a successful attempt at hospitality?

When people feel comfortable lingering…over coffee, dessert, conversation, and games.

It just makes me so happy, and it is exactly what happened this year. Even the teens stayed at the table playing highly competitive games of Scrabble and Taboo with the rest of the guests. (After they exhausted the Trivial Pursuit cards that were on each table.)Want to know what else makes me happy?

This little one.

Can you tell he likes to snuggle? And I like to tell myself that I’m his favorite person to snuggle with, but it’s really not true. He snuggled with Robert during our time of giving thanks and prayer, and then with me while reading books and playing together after lunch.And also with Kayla…

Kory stayed in Texas for Thanksgiving and spent it with Rebecca and her family. Rebecca’s mom was sweet to send me this adorable photo of them and to tell us what a great young man he is. Aren’t they cute? And that’s a gluten free pecan cheesecake pie they made together.

Friday was spent at a Friendsgiving at our friend, Allyson’s home. It’s always a fun reunion of people we work with at Crosswalk Camp and other regional, denominational conferences.

We didn’t leave enough time to get a tree on Friday, so we did it on Saturday – at our favorite local tree farm and with our typical trip to Starbucks afterward.

We watched Elf first and then The 12 Dates of Christmas after decorating, because ’tis the season for silly and romantic Christmas movies. Kayla and I have watched The 12 Dates of Christmas twice now, and it’s actually not a terrible movie. (I know some will disagree.) However, Merry Kissmas IS a pretty terribly made movie if you’re thinking of watching it. (But if you like to laugh at terrible movies, then it’s your go-to for sure.)

Kayla was sure it would be better than The Christmas Kiss which she stopped watching in the first five minutes, but let me just tell you that if you can survive the first 15-20 minutes of The Christmas Kiss (like Robert and I did on our getaway described below), it is WAY better than Merry Kissmas.

WAY. Take my word for it. And it takes place in Boston, so there’s that.
Sunday after church and lunch, Robert and I drove to northern Vermont for a three-night getaway which had been planned for weeks. It’s such a race to the holidays after the “fall launch” of our church year, that we know we need the downtime at least sometime during the end of the fall semester. (Learned the hard way.)

We went back to an Airbnb that we went to last year for Robert’s birthday, because we loved it so much. We did not go hiking.

But we did get one run in after the winter wonderland that we woke up to on Monday morning melted mostly away by Tuesday morning.And we also did a lot of this…And also a little watching of Blue Bloods and one Christmas movie – The Christmas Kiss, as mentioned above.

We slept until 8:30am two mornings in a row which hasn’t happened in at least a hundred years. It was just so cozy and quiet, and we were hours from home (and church) there was no agenda.

We came home Wednesday afternoon just a couple of hours before we each had a small group Bible study at church, and hit the ground running in all sorts of other ways with holiday parties to plan, travel agendas for family holidays, mission trip plans, meetings, and we’re even off to New Hampshire this afternoon for a marriage retreat that many couples from our church are participating in this weekend. We’ll come back just in time for church on Sunday.

I did manage to get the Advent bags stuffed and hung for my last little one at home. She’s a 17 year old senior in high school, but her brothers got to open Advent bags every day in December until they left home, and what teenager (or human) doesn’t want to wake up to a small gift every day until Christmas? I certainly don’t want to deprive my baby girl of any holiday celebrations before she leaves the nest, which is coming very, very fast!

The stockings are hung, and I just got word from my dad that he’ll be joining us this year from Texas along with my sister, Melinda, her husband Brent from Colorado. Kory gets the whole week off from work, so he’ll also be here from Texas. Cooper finishes final exams around the 20th. There are plans to ski on the 27th due to a Cyber Monday deal we took advantage of for Mt. Snow, and I can hardly wait for everyone to be back home!Happy beginning of Advent to you!