Thanksgiving Day

Thanksgiving for us started on Wednesday afternoon when my friend, Don Wilcox, and I made 22 pounds of Swedish Potato Sausage using my dad's recipe that he used when he was the propriotor of Swanson's Grocery in Gladstone Michigan. Because the recipe is a family treasure I was going to have Donny help me wearing a blindfold, but he forgot to go to Walgreens for his memory medication so it all worked out.

On Thanksgiving Day friends and family arrived with their appetites in tact...and were not disappointed. Liz's brother, Rick from California, was there. Daughter Kacey and her husband Erik, our friend from Moab, Harold Wong drove in. Swens and Libby, Rick Murphy and his two beautiful children--Laurel and Justin, along with a number of others. The food was great (special kudos for Liz's gravy, Rich Loterhos' smoked pork tenderloin and Libby's Pecan Pie) and the conversation stimulating.

After dessert, Brenda Loterhos broke out her fiddle and Irish stepdancing. Does it get better than this? In our family we have so much to be thankful for--Jeff, who returned from a year and Iraq, two wonderful daughter-in-laws, a great son-in-law, a precious grandson with a granddaughter on the way (Andy and Natalie are in the states to have a baby in the next week or so), the opportunity to be closely involved in what God is doing in the world. We are thankful to God for his blessings.