Thanksgiving in France

This year we were graciously invited to a Thanksgiving feast by our lovely American friends, Rick and Lisa. We had thought that this holiday would just simply go unnoticed in our new country, but not to be. We are so blessed to have so many wonderful friends. They invited Abigail and I as well as our new French friends, Laurent, Nathalie, Laure and Fanny...it was to be their first Thanksgiving.

We arrived a tad early to see if there was anything to help with as it is such an undertaking especially with the small French kitchens. I had not been there but a few minutes and the evening was off to a rocky start...Rick shattered their coffee pot...notice his expression here. Later in the evening it was funny, but not at this moment.


So off I scurried to get out of the way, as I was of no use in the tiny kitchen. I was told by Irie that the family tradition is to write down 3-5 things that we were grateful for, to fold it up nicely and then at the table we would pick one out of the bowl and try to guess who had written it. The difference this year was to be that it should be written in French. So here were my 5 things to which I am grateful for:

1. Thank you Lord for the 16 years that I was blessed to have Devan in my life.

2. Thank you Lord for the chance to follow my dream to live in France

3. Thank you Lord my beautiful little girl, Abigail

4. Thank you Lord for my new friends

5. Thank you Lord for all that you did for me on the Cross

This beautiful bowl that Lisa painted contains the gratitude of nine people. I hope that we always remember to be thankful for what we are given in life, no matter how hard it is at times. Well needless to say everyone figured out it was me who had written these thank yous...I thought perhaps Devan's name would be the give away, but no....it was that I was thanking the Lord. Everyone was able to guess who had written what fairly easy by what they were thankful for and it was a fun game to play.

Now on to the food! Oh it was delicious! We had chicken as there was no turkey to be had in all of France as it is not tradition here to celebrate Thanksgiving and they do not eat turkey till Christmas time. So a chicken had to do, and it did quite nicely thank you! It was followed by a wonderful and different type of stuffing...cornbread with blue cheese. Those of you who know me know I despise blue cheese, but this was actually quite good. We also had green bean casserole, mashed potatoes, gravy and corn. This was followed by a to die for apple pie and chocolate cake with chantilly cream. Yum!

It was no nice to share this meal with my new friends, the Bailey Brownes who have different traditions and the Bruzzones who had none...it was a great mix.

Sadly we had to leave as today (Friday) is a school day here in France so everyone left around 10:30...a very late evening for Abigail and Irie and I know they are feeling it this morning. Hopefully they will be able to share at school the true meaning of Thanksgiving. Yes it started with the Pilgrims and the Indians, yes they were fleeing religious persecution in their home country....but I find that the true meaning of Thanksgiving isn't what other people WERE thankful for way back when, but rather what YOU are thankful for right NOW. Don't forget that gratitude is an attitude...the world doesn't owe you one single thing, the things you get, the people in your life, the life you lead...it's all a gift. Remember that and be grateful for them!

Happy Thanksgiving!