A Happy and Successful Thanksgiving

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving! 

For the last few years, my sister, my sister-in-law, and I have taken turns doing the cooking and hosting of the three major winter celebration holidays of Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year's Day.  It makes it easier on everyone to only host one big meal, and we all really enjoy the one we each do.  My sister-in-law does Thanksgiving dinner at her house, which really helped me stay on track this weekend.  I didn't do any of the cooking, which meant no temptations to sample the goodies while they were being prepared, and it also meant no leftovers staring at me from my fridge the next day.  I call that a win-win situation! 

I had planned a few weeks ago to allow myself to go up to maintenance calories instead of my loss level on Thanksgiving Day, because 1300 calories was just not enough for a holiday!  I stayed true to my plan, and had a healthy breakfast, followed by some turkey, dressing, and mashed potatoes, and had lots of good veggies like green beans (plain, not a casserole!), steamed broccoli, and carrots, and topped it all off with a small slice of pumpkin pie for our big lunch.  At dinner/leftovers time, I had a little more turkey and a spoonful of pasta and called it a day!  I was full and content, but did not overeat or make myself miserable as I admit I have done in years past.

My favorite part of the day came after lunch.  Before we began eating, my sister-in-law asked each of us to go around the table taking turns offering the prayer and giving thanks for whatever was on our heart.  Our boys didn't want to participate, and we didn't force them to.  After the meal, I could not resist the urge to get up and move!  I decided to go out for a long walk around the neighborhood, and the boys gladly came with me.  As we walked, I suggested we play the "thanks game" and each take turns saying things we were thankful for and why, and they were so excited to play, that their lists were endless!  We walked and talked for 30 minutes, covering 1.5 miles (distance recorded thanks to my mapping app I actually remembered to turn on when we started), and we were still naming things as we finished the walk.  Some of the things the boys named were pretty deep considering they're only 6 and 7, while others were just plain fun!  Some of my favorites included:

Thankful for toys, because they keep us from being bored
Thankful for Jesus dying on the cross to forgive us
Thankful for shoes, so we don't hurt our feet when we're outside
Thankful that Daddy didn't die when he was sick and in the hospital
Thankful for our family, so we don't have to be alone
Thankful for candy, because our mouths like it
Thankful for our dog, Happy, because we love him
Thankful for sunshine, because it feels good on our skin
Thankful for crayons because we like all the different colors God made for us

The rest of the weekend was spent doing things like putting up the Christmas tree, watching movies, doing a little Christmas shopping (I skipped the Black Friday crazy hours and still got everything on my list quickly and easily and without the shopping drama!), and just hanging out together.  Beautiful days, indeed!

Oh...by the way...I also got to move DOWN a size in my jeans this weekend!  There's a certain brand and style that I really like, and when I caught them on a fantastic sale a couple of months ago, I bought 3 pair in each of the next 4 sizes down.  It was a great deal, and that way, I've got the smaller sizes on hand for inspiration, and am also ready for when the time comes that I lose enough to fit into each of them.  Two weeks ago, I tried on the next size down, and couldn't get them over my hips.  This weekend, not only did they fit, they fit well enough I wore them for our annual family photo with Santa!  Being confident enough in a garment to wear it purposely for a photo says a lot for me! 

All in all, it truly was a happy and successful Thanksgiving!