Holidays Don’t Always Start Off Happy.
Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays but I knew right from the get-go that this holiday season would be less than ideal. Normally I can’t wait to dive into all the prepping that goes into Thanksgiving Dinner but this year was different. So was last year.
Last year our little family found itself in the ICU of the hospital Thanksgiving morning and that is where we sat all weekend. My son had gotten very sick and once admitted it was discovered that he was a type 1 diabetic. I had family members flooding in and out of the hospital and somehow we managed to have several makeshift turkey dinners but it wasn’t the same. We did the best with what we had and we were grateful that our son’s life had been spared.
This Thanksgiving…
I expected this year to be a little better but it certainly wasn’t going to be something we were used to. For the sake of our health and sanity we broke tradition. It would be the first time in 15 years that I would not be cooking. Even with all the chaos of last year I had managed to cook a turkey, but as I said before…this year was different.
This year I was tired.
There I was still recuperating from two months worth of strain on my body (you can read about that here). That in turn had left me with no time to grocery shop for all the fixings and dreading the idea of cooking all day.
Then comes my husband to the rescue…
He insisted on ordering a pre-made dinner from Mimi’s Cafe and I humbly accepted. This was waaaaaaay out of my comfort zone and I was skeptical, but I thought, “You know what? I’m going to trust that this is what God wants. He has put it on my husband’s heart so I’m going to go with it.”
Ladies, this decision took such a load off.
An all day cooking marathon was turned into a couple of hours of heating up delicious food and it was liberating. Our little family of four got to eat together, praise God together, and nap while attempting to watch Christmas movies. It was divine.
So while my Holiday didn’t ante up to what my image of an ideal Thanksgiving is, God showed me that if I trust, blessings can come from the most unexpected places.
Perfect Holidays are found in Jesus. You can always anticipate the best things from Him #SaltandLightLinkup Share on X
Perfect holidays are found hidden in Him. His glory and His provision.
God knew just what we needed as a family this year and it didn’t include all the bells and whistles. It included us.
Please make sure you read the featured post before linking up this week.
Hey, Natalie, it’s such an encouragement to find my story featured here today. Praying that it will be a blessing to those who are coming into the Christmas season with heaviness or ambivalence.
Thanks for all you do here!
Thank you so much Michele. It’s an honor to feature such a well versed piece and very much needed this time of year. God bless you.
Hospital holidays have a unique way of changing things. It sounds like your Thanksgiving this year was a beautiful, restful abiding. That’s certainly something to be thankful for!
Oh Becky, it was so nice to have the pressure off. God knew exactly what I needed. Hospital holidays certainly change our perspective on lots of things. I have so much more of an appreciation for family, friends, and the little moments.
Michele- I love this!
I can feel the tension rising already with the Christmas season starting. This morning I was overwhelmed as to when to make Christmas cookies and the thought popped into my head to just order Christmas cookies and be done with it.
This validates my decision, thank you 🙂
Christmas is about Jesus and I need to remember that!
Praise God! We have this incessant need as Americans to place all of these unnecessary burdens upon ourselves. Life is so much better when we let the little things go and sit at the feet of Jesus : )