Total Contentment

Happy Saturday Everyone!

I am prayerful that all that read this are happy, thankful and as content as I am this morning.  I hope that you had a wonderful Thanksgiving.  Did you have any food mishaps? I did but they ended up being unimportant because everything is being gobbled up.  I love to cook.  I love to see satisfied happy faces when they eat my food.  I had my favorite Thanksgiving ever.  We decided to stay to ourselves.  I cooked happily all day Wednesday.  I feel so relaxed when I am cooking.  Do you ever feel that way?  We had Will's Mom over and enjoyed the visit. I think we have found a new Thanksgiving tradition.  This is the first Thanksgiving that I have ever stayed home and I loved it.  I made all of my desserts sugar free with the use of Stevia and Splenda.  They were yummy.  I will always do that as I love that I do not feel gross and sugar-loaded after indulging. 

I believe perspective about my life is so important to my being content.  Counting all the things that I feel blessed to experience and have is so much more productive than worrying about the things that are not in my life.  Everything is given to me by God and He knows all things.  Who am I to want more when I have all that He intends for me to have?

Perspective.......blessed or wanting, it really is a choice.  I recently hired the sweetest Philippine woman to work at the store.  She was telling me yesterday while we worked that conditions in her country are deplorable.  She said that there are not any jobs and that she sends what she earns back there to help her family.  She came here four months ago as a mail order bride.  She is 49 and her husband is probably 70 or 80.  She is so happy to be able to be working.  She had her first Thanksgiving Thursday.  She said, "I eat Turkey for first time, it good.  My husband say 'No Philippine food', but I have to have my rice and my fruit salad.  She said she is blessed that her husband is kind to her and his children are kind to her.  We all love her so much.  She is a sweet Christian.  She takes nothing for granted.  She LOVES Christmas.  She has had her Christmas tree and Christmas lights up for weeks.  She has been singing Christmas carols for a month or more.  She said that she has not ever seen snow except on television and that she is so excited to see it snow. I remember when I came for Christmas one year here to Oklahoma and I had not ever had snow at Christmas.  The weather man had predicted snow on Christmas Eve.  I was so excited.  I got up in the morning and came into the living room and looked out the window.  NO SNOW! Boo! I told my Mom that the weather man was on crack and came back into the bedroom to get dressed.  Ten minutes later Mom said, "Trace.....come see", I walked into the living room and outside giant fluffy snowflakes were floating down.  It was so beautiful.  We decided that we would have a day of watching the snow.  I built a huge fire in the fireplace, we turned the chairs around to sit and watch the snow.  She made a pot of beans. We stayed in our pajamas all day and watched old movies and gloried at the snow.

My Mom had a flower shop in the store.  I sadly am not talented at arranging flowers and so I have not been doing very much with the flower shop.  Yesterday, she asked me if she could decorate the store for Christmas using the things in the flower shop.  She said artistic people would be so thankful for all of the ribbon, baskets, flowers, etc., that are in the flower shop.  I told her she can play learning arranging and making gift baskets.  I told her that I will bring a stereo and Christmas music so that it can be playing in the store all month.  It is funny how someone's childlike joy can inspire me to be thankful and excited about Christmas.

I hope you have a wonderful Saturday.  Enjoy and remember no matter what you are blessed.  Focus on what is great in your life and you will be amazed at how much God loves you.

Blessings

Tracy