Giving Thanks: The Spur of the Moment

This week, I've been really thinking about what I'm most thankful for, and I realized, again, that I am so thankful for spur of the moment things...things that don't take a lot of planning...little things that just happen or fall into place. Last week, Steve threw a rake in the back of the car, we both picked up the girls from daycare, and we headed to a local park to jump in the leaves. It wasn't planned and we weren't really dressed for it. If you look closely, Ellie is wearing a nightgown and a pair of dress shoes (which she calls tap dance shoes). It was "crazy day" at her daycare, and that's what she wanted to wear. But here's the important part...some of the very best moments just happen at the spur of the moment. Note: If you look closely in the picture above, Kate is trying to stuff the leaves into her pocket. She wanted to take them home with her. My sweet little girl is a hoarder, I'm afraid, and may one day be featured on a TLC documentary. Ha! Gotta love that girl!The next day, we decided that we needed a bigger pile of leaves. So we headed to my parents house, raked their front yard, and jumped in the leaves for over an hour. This time, the girls didn't get to have all the fun. They had to share the leaf pile with us!
Note: I'm sure that my butt did get off the ground a little more than pictured above (I mean, I was a cheerleader with a seriously mean toe touch back in the day). I think Steve just didn't capture me at the peak of my jump. Let's blame it on his photography skills (or lack thereof), shall we?



Look at those smiles. That's what I'm most thankful for!

And I'm also thankful that Steve has a job with great hours that allow him to be home with us more than a lot of other dads/husbands. I take it for granted that Steve will be home by 4:30 p.m. each day (and some days, when I'm home with two screaming, crying, cranky kids, it feels like 4:30 p.m. cannot come soon enough). But I know that there are many women who wait until much, much later in the evening to see their husbands. I take it for granted that Steve never travels for work and that he rarely gets called in late at night. Without his great work schedule, I know that a lot of the spur of the moment, fun things that we do just wouldn't happen. And so his schedule is definitely something that I am thankful for this year!