Belated Giving of Thanks

This year I am thankful for:

My sweet family. Our kids are rotten, my husband is a goofball, but every day I am thankful for them. The tinkle of the little ones laughter when they are getting along and plotting world domination in the back room. The occassional softening in my oldest's eyes when he looks in my direction and offers up a playful hug or joke. The steady knowledge that no matter what the situation, when I look to see who has my back and is there to catch me when I fall, I see Ted.

Community: While it is true that the NBC show is fetching and I really enjoy it, I am actually referring to the wonderful network of friends and acquaintances developed over years and years. To have such a diverse and rich group of people to weave into the fabric of our lives (Did I just hear a cotton commercial... perhaps...) is more than I could have thought to ask for and I am immensely grateful to have it.

History: I am fortunate enough to have a deep well of memories with the people that I love. Anytime and anywhere, something reminds me of something that happened with someone and it makes me smile. Usually.

Joy and Laughter: Even though I am an untamed heathen, I believe that there are gifts in our lives. When I was very young, for whatever reason, it occurred to me to be happy. Just to be happy. Nothing earthshaking. But each time life has taken me down a dark and windy road and I have had to make a choice about which fork in the road to travel, a little tiny bit of me remembers just to be happy. Being happy doesn't fix anything, doesn't make all the woes disappear, but by golly, it makes crawling back out of the muck more palatable.

Happy Birthday

Today was my husband's birthday. That makes him older than my by two years for the next couple of months, but that hardly matters when I reach for my ID at the liquor store and no one bothers to ask for it. And before you ask, I certainly do not frequent the liquor store. After our weekend away, I started wondering if I could make a decent daquiri at home that didn't require a second mortgage. At present, the answer to that question is no. I digress, back to Ted's birthday. After wishing him a happy birthday and all that nonsense, I made sure to call his parents and thank them for creating him and raising him to be who he is. While I am sarcastic and full of jokes about my Ted, he is by far and away the sweetest, most devoted, loving, honest, decent man in the world. He would have to be to have married me and continued that silliness for over ten years. He my rock, the one that stands behind me even when I am wrong, takes my crap and gives it back in just the right doses. We've been able to laugh and work our way through our life together, so that the bad times don't seem so bad and certainly don't appear to have been numerous. I could ask for nothing more...

Happy Birthday, Ted. I love you and I am so glad we found each other and made this life. This blog will self destruct in five seconds, so savor it.

Cinnamon

I love the smell of cinnamon. I love the taste of cinnamon. Walking down the aisles of the various stores between Halloween and Christmas and smelling all the spices (especially cinnamon) makes me all warm and fuzzy inside. So why is it that I cannot find any cinnamon mints? There used to be a lovely selection when you were in the checkout line. Now there are fruit flavored, spearmint, peppermint, but no cinnamon.... The only option is Big Red... occassionally a little Dentyne... but no breath mints...Has anyone else experienced this? Does anyone have a logical explanation? Personally, I believe there is a conspiracy at hand, but I have yet to settle on the responsible parties... Aliens or Ann Coulter?