Week In Review - Ten Things Of Thankful (77)

I feel as if things are slowly going back to normal again. I managed to get out of bed this week, I managed to keep track of the various appointments, I managed to do some holiday shopping and ran some necessary errands, and all despite the various illnesses having their firm grasp on our family. I've been at the pediatrician on 3 out of 5 days this week, once for Calvin's shots that he couldn't get at his 3-4 month appointment due to - right - being sick, once with Lily for a stomach bug, and finally with Violet for her lasting cough, which may be related to an allergy. Yes, this poor girl seems to not be getting a break. Still, this week has been a great one, for many things. My top ten this week:

1. Violet's occupational therapist. She is such a wonderful person, with a heart of gold. the way she works with the children, how she knows how to deal with every individual personality, calm the over-stimulated kids and encourages the shy ones. She always takes a lot of time to talk to the parents after the sessions and gave me a bunch of material to better understand Violet's world and show me ways to work with her.

2. Candles.  Instead of a traditional advent wreath with four candles that mark the four Sundays before Christmas, I made an arrangement with five candles, symbolizing the five of us. As Atheists, we're not celebrating Christmas but rather, as the winter solstice and with it the longest night of the years draws closer, focus on all of good things our family got to experience, the people in our lives, and our thankfulness of getting to celebrate this time of the year without worries, in safety, and with everyone of us more or less healthy.

3. The smell of sugar cookies charring baking in the oven.

4. Our wonderful neighbors. Our dryer somewhat died on us today (definite burning smell when I came home; I unscrewed the back and cleaned quite some stuff out of there, but we're still not trusting it), and our new dryer won't be delivered for another couple of weeks, so they offered to use theirs until we have our new one. With a family of 5 with a new house that doesn't do well with the added humidity of clothes drying on a rack, being dryer-less could develop into quite a problem.

5. The first flurries of snow!!!! Yes, we've had some snow!! Lily was so excited seeing the little bit of white on the roofs, and Violet couldn't help herself and ate some snow she scratched off a stone wall (yes, I know, it's gross, but it's her way of experiencing). This morning walk definitely made me happy.

6. Hubby being absolutely sweet and buying me a poppy-seed danish for breakfast. Yum!

7. Paper tissues, butt paste, and nose spray. Yes, the sickness caught up to me, too, but I get to live in a world where all the things mentioned above are readily available to get rid off the gross stuff, keep my nose from getting red and raw, and helping me to be able to breath enough to sleep at night.

8. Sharing cinnamon hot chocolate with the girls in the afternoon.

9. Getting to dress up (somewhat) and attend our friends' holiday party with all the kids. It was a lot of fun for all of us, meeting new people and people we didn't know our friends knew as well  :-)  We did lose the bottle of hard cider towards the end of the white elephant game (yes, I know, who would be heartless enough to steal the booze from a mother of three??), but enjoyed ourselves so much, ate good food, drank some great mulled wine and fruit punch. Perfect evening!

10. My cousin getting to celebrate another birthday. Yes, his birthday is St. Nicholas Day, which always meant a certain visit during his birthday when we were children. Oh dear memories!


I wish you all a wonderful weekend and some time for yourself to reflect on the many thankfuls in your lives!