A Month Full of Thanks...

My most favorite holiday of the year is Thanksgiving. I love everything that comes with it...the turkey, the stuffing, the potatoes, the gravy...everything! But one of the reasons I love Thanksgiving so much is because of the many opportunities it gives me to think about those things in my life for which I'm most grateful.

We had an interesting month...with good days and not so good days. But with every single event that happened, we were shown and given incredible blessings from our Heavenly Father. Just thinking about how some things could have turned out overwhelms me with the knowledge of the love Heavenly Father has for me and for my family. That He is very aware of us. That we matter. That He hears and answers prayers.

I'm just going to list a few of the things that went on in our family during the month of November that helped me to understand even better how truly blessed I am. While you may not think they're very significant...they made all the difference in the world to me.

1. Tim took his Medical Laboratory Science certification test and passed! After months of studying, planning, preparing, and then studying some more...his hard work and diligence paid off. I know it was a huge relief to him. Especially with everything else he has on his plate with work, research, volunteering, medical school applications, church callings, and family...this was one thing he could check off and move on.

2. We found out we're adding a baby boy to our family...but most importantly...that everything seems to be developing the way it should with his little body. He looks healthy and strong...and didn't stop wiggling around the entire time.

3. Tim found out fairly early one morning that his debit card information had been compromised and nearly $800 had been stolen from our account. Our bank was wonderful though. Within 24 hours, everything had been sorted out. It could have been so much worse if our bank didn't work so quickly to notice that suspicious activity had occurred and taken action. It was not a fun 24 hours...but it was only 24 hours. I've heard horror stories of things like this happening to people with so much more being stolen and then having to spend months and months trying to get things figured out. It was truly a blessing that we didn't have to go through that.

4. We renewed our temple recommends. I have a friend that is currently in Missouri right now with her husband attending a medical school. A few months ago, they planned a temple trip. Instead of just hopping in the car, and driving down the road for fifteen minutes or so...they had to make a weekend out of it by driving to St. Louis and getting a hotel. Not only do I have one temple within about 20 miles from my house...but six temples that I could easily drive to, attend a session, and return home within just a couple hours. I'm grateful for the example of my friend. There's a great possibility that Tim and I could end up out of state for medical school and not have the blessing of having a temple so close. So, for right now, I'm going to try and take advantage of having so many to choose from.

5. After about a month and a half of not hearing anything back from any medical schools after sending in Tim's primary applications, we received an email on November 18th letting us know that Tim's forms had finally been processed. This may not seem like that big of a deal...but considering the fact that Tim had everything submitted on October 10th and that 2 of the schools had deadlines for October 21st, and eleven schools had deadlines for November 17th...we were a bit worried. Because we received that email on November 18th, that meant that we had missed the deadlines for 13 of the fifteen schools, eleven of which by just one day. However...after many prayers, and worrying about what the heck we were going to do, we received a small miracle by suddenly receiving several secondary application requests within just a couple days. Yet again, Heavenly Father was showing us that He does hear and answer us, and that He is aware of our concerns, our heartaches, and our needs. That was another huge blessing.

6. Emmy turned 18 months! Everyday I look at this little girl that is the complete and utter joy of our lives and think how incredible it is that she grew in my tummy. That Tim and I created her. It amazes me. I am so grateful to be a Mommy. From her smile, to her giggle, to even her little tantrums that she throws...I'm grateful for it all.

7. I got into a car accident the Saturday before Thanksgiving. I'm grateful for this because it could have been so much worse. It was a very minor accident. While yielding at a merging point to an on-ramp on the freeway, a car behind me ran into the back of my car. I had Emmy with me, who wasn't fazed at all...making me also grateful for carseats and seatbelts. Everyday I pray for safety for my family and for me. Heavenly Father was watching out for me that day. I am so thankful for that.

We truly had a month full of events that could have been so much worse, but in the end turned out to be huge blessings in our lives. I have so many things to be thankful for. Each day is a blessing. I need to remind myself of that more often. Hope your month of November was just as blessed as ours was!