I have been working really hard to prepare for our impending holiday party and the arrival of our family for Christmas. While I was busily chipping away at my to-do list yesterday I found myself staring at all of the holiday cards we have received so far this year. It was humbling to step back and see all of the people who care enough about us to take the time to send us a holiday card. The holidays have a way of making me more sentimental than usual, but I just felt a overwhelming sense of gratitude for the many friends and family we have in our lives.
Alex and I are positively floored by the number of “yes” RSVPs to our holiday party. Six years ago we probably could count on one hand the number of friends who would have come to our party, but today we need more than both of our hands together to count our Seattle friends and family who are going to be celebrating the holidays with us in our home. I am just feeling so blessed and thankful for the wonderful people we have in our lives.
We also know it was a lot to ask our families to come out and spend Christmas in the mountains here. Both Alex and I are so thankful that we both still have our parents and siblings and that they are able and willing to travel across the country, putting aside their differences and their own families, to spend it together, as a merged family. I will be greatly missing the presence of my brother, who is unable to join us, but am so grateful that our friendship has improved a lot over the last few months.
This year one thing Alex and I decided to do to spread our love bit was to bake cookies for our neighbors. I really overdid it {easy cookies next year!}, but we have packaged up 13 boxes of cookies to take to the neighbors on our block as a way to pass along some neighborly holiday cheer. We did this last year with a few neighbors we know better than others and we were overcome with their gratitude for us thinking of them.
We certainly have a lot to be thankful for this holiday season, and my heart is full and very warm knowing that we are spreading our holiday cheer.
