Thanksgiving is another opportunity for reflection and looking at life through a specific lens. A lens that helps us see both the enjoyable and the difficult, the sweet and the sour, for what they are. Understanding Thanksgiving correctly helps us see how the things we've experienced shape and grow us into the people we are.

Thanksgiving is also a time to spend with family - creating new memories and traditions together. I want my children to have special memories of the holidays. Memories of warm breakfasts around the table, meaningful conversations, and long-lasting traditions.

This year, we invited all of Calvin's immediate family to Louisville for Thanksgiving. In hopes of making the most of each day while everyone was here, I put together a Google Doc of the things that we wanted to do together. It’s so easy to default into activities that leave us wondering what we’ve actually done. So, we planned meals, questions to discuss together, and a daily readings to help stir thankfulness in each of our hearts.

Thursday morning began with baking two Simple Breakfast Quiches and watching the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade together. The kitchen was busy and full of family prepping their favorite dishes. Our neighbor across the street allowed us to use her kitchen to cook our turkey and some of the other bigger items. It was so much fun to walk outside and feel the brisk air and watch cars pulling up to neighbors’ houses with their own contributions to their own Thanksgiving meals.

When it was finally time to eat dinner we had all of Calvin’s family along with my sister, her husband, and their little boy. We set up tables on our back porch and all 14 of us gathered around the table. We read our daily reading together, blessed the food, and dug in. Halfway through the dinner, our strands of lights blew and we were left with the magical light of the candles on the table. As the meal progressed and we started going back for seconds, we all took turns answering questions included at our table setting. Calvin and I selected special questions for each person at the table and put them under their plates to help generate thoughts of thankfulness and get to know everyone in a deeper way. (You can check out some additional starter questions here) It was really sweet to hear everyone’s reflections and thoughts that we may not have otherwise known about one another.

This year has been the strangest mix of illness, setbacks, and lack of productivity. When taken at face value, it has felt like a very discouraging year. But below the surface are all of the valuable moments that I wouldn’t trade for the world: snuggling my sick boys on the couch, experiencing the grace of friends and family caring for us, growing in patience, learning more about the importance of gut health, and trusting in the Lord with the things I don’t understand. Every single thing that has happened this year has been ordained by the Lord and he’s using it to conform me to the image of Christ and teach our boys about his goodness. For these things I’m grateful and because of them, I look back on this year with genuine and deep thanksgiving.

| Credits: Author - Jacintha Payne; Photography - Jacintha & Calvin Payne |