My Joy and My Great Thanksgiving

 

 

We spent our Thanksgiving break in Ohio with Tanner and Amanda’s family aka the Huntzinger’s. We first stayed at their house when we went to Cincinnati for the Quinn XCII concert back in August after we first moved out here and then we’ve seen them a couple of times since when they’ve come into town to visit Pittsburgh and go to the Blue October concert.

We packed up and headed to Dayton Wednesday morning. Amanda drove and I sat up front and was able to use my hotspot and sign onto calls and do a little bit of work and the boys sat in the back and studied and did homework together. As soon as my bum was getting sore from sitting we arrived and were back at the Huntzinger’s home (made it the full four hours without going stir crazy, my road trip endurance really has increased ten fold, I was such a wimp when it came to road trips before but that 27 hour road trip out here really toughened me up;). We went in and saw everyone and I was able to do a little bit more work before signing off for dinner and games and of course endless story time with Amanda’s parents.

Jaden played dozens of ping pong games with Amanda’s brother Luke and Amanda and I helped her mom Kate prep and make some of the pies for Thanksgiving the next day. I am a weirdo I know but I don’t like eating pie at all but I actually really do enjoy making it. Jaden absolutely loves pie so I figure I might as well learn how to make them and add to my recipe book wherever I go so that I can make pies for him and I’ll just eat the ice cream that often goes along with it, or just a straightforward chocolate chip cookie that's fine too. Better yet how about cheesecake? I think that is the elite pie form. But I was in charge of making the pumpkin pie, Amanda made key lime pie and Kate made a strawberry and raspberry pie. I don’t know if it was just because the pie dish I was given to make my pie in was too deep or there was something going on with the oven but mine seriously took double the time it should have to cook. I thought I had ruined Thanksgiving for everyone: the anti-pie girl ruins the pie. But all was well and it turned out fine and those that ate it said it was delicious. And I took their word for it! After pie making was over for the night we talked for hours with both Kate and Dustin and finally went to bed excited for Thanksgiving festivities the next day. 

Thursday morning we woke up and came upstairs and the girls got started cooking and the boys watched part of the parade before falling asleep for a few hours which was well deserved, they’ve so needed a break and a nap. Thanksgiving break is nice but also stressful because they have to go right back into the last week before finals immediately after break but luckily they were able to unplug and rest up for a few days so they could be rejuvenated for the home stretch of the semester.
 

Amanda and I were in charge of making the Lion House rolls. I was a little worried from the pie incident the night before and because I’ve only made homemade rolls a handful of times but the recipe really was straightforward and the rolls turned out great. Amanda thought it would be fun to roll them into crescent shapes and everyone was worried they wouldn’t be fluffy enough but we gave them plenty of time to rise while the turkey cooked and they were light and fluffy and everyone absolutely devoured them. Amanda also found a cute Pinterest turkey veggie tray so we put that together and helped with the green bean casserole (one of my all time favs) and some other essential dishes. 

 

We had Charlie Brown Thanksgiving on and did a puzzle while we waited for the turkey to finish cooking and then it was time to eat. As we sat around the table sharing a meal together we went around and shared what we were thankful for as well as what we wanted for Christmas (Dustin was fishing for gift ideas;) the first thing that came to my mind was that I was thankful for the ways Heavenly Father guides and allows our paths to cross with so many amazing people. I still can’t get over the fact that we are out here at school with Tanner and Amanda and their parents live relatively close and have ties to Kaysville. It really is so amazing how small the world can be when you recognize God’s hand in all the details. 

 

 

 

 

It reminds me of one of my favorite scriptures and the verse that I chose to be my “mission scripture” when I left on my mission (five years ago on the 22nd how crazy is that?!). It’s Alma 26:37 “Now my brethren we see that God is mindful of every people whatsoever land they may be in, yea he numbereth his people, and his bowels of mercy are over all the earth. Now this is my joy, and my great thanksgiving; yea, and I will give thanks unto my God forever. Amen”

I echo the words of Alma as I contemplate my own joy and great thanksgiving at the recognition that God truly is mindful of us and truly numbers us. No matter where we are in the world. He is mindful of me and Jaden in Pittsburgh and our families and friends back home in Utah and Bridger in Kentucky and everyone around and between and all over the earth. It really is awe-inspiring to think about.
 

My Christmas my wish was just as easy to come up with: to go home for Christmas and that we wouldn’t have any issues with our flights. And it’s coming up so soon! We can’t wait. Jaden said to me later that going to Ohio really made him even more excited to go home for Christmas and I couldn't agree more. It will be a holiday to remember. The song “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” rings a little bit different for us this year.
 

But going back to our Thanksgiving we stayed two more days after Thursday. Friday we got up and had breakfast and then went to the shooting range with Dustin in the bitter and I mean BITTER cold!!! My good ol Browning coat kept me nice and warm but I was wishing I had some durawool lined pants as well because even though I wore leggings underneath my pants I still froze! It was still a lot of fun though we had a good time shooting clay pigeons and targets before deciding it was just too cold to shoot handguns so we packed up and headed home to thaw out.

 

 

 

 

Later that evening we went to see the new Ghostbusters movie and had the most interesting experience at the theater. I have never been in a movie where the audience was so vocal. I remember going to the Justin Bieber concert in junior high and everyone screamed when he did his famous hair flip and it was awesome. But this movie was so different. There were people singing and talking and commenting THE WHOLE TIME. The woman next to me was SO loud. I swear she commented every ten seconds and had no idea how to whisper. I really didn’t know what to do, she definitely seemed like the type of person who would not react well if I asked her to be quiet so I just tried to snuggle closer to Jaden and put more distance between us and laugh it off and chalk it up for another random turn of events. I about died though when I popped my gum once louder than I intended and she turned and looked over at me and I wanted to say "Oh really? I'm the one being disruptive here?!" but I didn't.
    
One of our favorite parts of our Ohio trip was when Dustin would randomly yell out the comment “OHIO IS AN AVERAGE STATE!” Luke told us he yells that at least once every day sometimes even in public. It’s probably a "you had to be there" joke but it has followed us back to PA and Jaden has been saying it especially when we are in the car behind horrible drivers (sorry Pittsburghers but you really need someone from Utah to teach you how to drive, there is no aggressiveness AT ALL it’s horrible, but that rant is for another day) Jaden will yell out “PENNSYLVANIA IS AN AVERAGE STATE!” It really is so funny, makes me laugh every time.

Saturday we got up and had a lazy morning of breakfast and hanging out. Luke and Jaden played one more round of ping pong and then we packed up and headed home in the mid afternoon. I did an online grocery store order from ALDI’s (even though Dustin informed me of dozens of different horror stories about purchasing food from there) it was supposed to be delivered when we got home and it was but unfortunately only half of it was stuff I ordered the other stuff I’m not sure whose it was. I was able to get a refund but they didn’t return the stuff luckily we could use most of it it just wasn’t what I was hoping for.

Sunday we went to Church and Zach spoke in our ward. He gave a great talk on remembering what we are grateful for and that doing so will show us specific blessings and that God truly is in the details of the details. And that we ultimately need to be thankful for Christ and the sacrifice of His Atonement. He challenged us to take time to write down 10 things we are grateful for and reflect on it often.

The list I came up with was
1. My Savior
2. For the opportunity to learn and become like Christ
3. My testimony
4. My family
5. My experiences that have given me perspective
6. Jaden
7. Good friends
8.  Challenging times that stretch me
9. My health
10. My desire to choose the right

I truly am grateful for this time of year when we can more fully contemplate our gratitude for things that are truly important and celebrate the light and joy of our Savior’s birth.


Peaches

• Realizing it had been five years on the 22nd that I went into the MTC (lucky number 22)
• Making Jaden’s family’s famous Chex mix and great harvest copycat pumpkin bread to take to the Huntzinger’s
• Putting up our Christmas decorations before we left so the house would be decorated when we came home
• Thanksgiving with the Huntzinger’s
• Laughing our guts out
• Talking with and learning from other families
• Playing Cover Your Assets and This That and Everything. Dustin’s tap dancing was awesome and so was Kate chiming in to answer for both teams when she was in the kitchen making food
• Going to the shooting range
• Actually going to a movie theater and the fact that the seats reclined and were heated
• People call carts buggies out here and it reminds me of the South. I went to the store with Jenna the other day and we heard someone call it a buggy and I didn’t think twice about it but she said “what did they just call it?” Love it!

Pits

• People being so disruptive in the movie (maybe we’re just spoiled from watching so many movies at home)
• The miserable cold
• Being a little rusty at shooting clay pigeons, I eventually got the feel back though
• Long car ride home the way there wasn’t so bad but I was so ready to get out of the car when we drove home
• Missing half of our grocery store order
• Mishaps in relief society and feeling overwhelmed about my calling all over again

Lessons Learned

• God really is oh so very mindful of us
• Gratitude changes attitude
• Watching movies at home is better unless the seats are heated