Traditionally Untraditional

This year we are going on 6 years of living overseas. Even though every year we celebrate all of our "tradional" American holidays--every year we celebrate them very "untraditionally". We never realized how difficult, and expensive it would be living in both France and China to find a big, juicy Thanksgiving turkey, let alone making it fit in our non-American sized ovens, not to mention find all the ingredients for the "fixings." Some years it was just easier to head over with many other Americans to a fabulous hotel chain that makes Thanksgiving dinners just like back at home. This year, we did just that--along with several of Bracken's friends and parents (whom ironically none are American). However, regardless of the size of turkey we end up getting for our feast, where we eat the turkey, or the day of the week we celebrate the holiday on, we hope each year we take the time to be grateful for the things that really matter to us---our family, friends and church.
This year the week of Thanksgiving, Bracken was in charge of Family Home Evening. He gave us a great lesson about expressing gratitude, and told the story of Jesus healing the lepers. As a bonus, he even gave us some impressive Thanksgiving history--who knew??

We then each added a few of the things we were grateful for to our "gratitude chart" (Kudos to Parker for writing his in Chinese characters---his parents were GRATEFUL to see he is listening in Chinese class!)


And together we made a "Harvest Munch" with ingredients that symbolized things that were important to us to give to friends and teachers.



Traditionally in America, on Thanksgiving Day the students do not have to go to school. However, for our boys school was in session. What better way to celebrate Thanksgiving at school then by particpating in the school-wide "Turkey Trot??" We were proud of this little turkey who took 4th place! We were grateful the next day, Friday, the boys had off of school, which gave us a perfect 3 day weekend opportunity to go to Seoul, Korea. John, Alison, Bracken and Parker along with several other members of our branch were able to go to attend the temple there. Bracken and Parker were able to go with several other youth in our branch and perform baptisms.
From Shanghai to Seoul it is an easy 2 1/2 hour flight. However, It was quite a hike from the airport to the temple....how grateful the boys were for their modern technology which kept them busy the entire 1 1/2 hour train ride!
Even though it was late by the time we finally reached the city, our group didn't waste anytime as we heard there was an "Outback Steakhouse" close by, and we were determined to find it!

The next day we were able to spend at the temple which was wonderful!
Upon arrival back to Shanghai, of course we were grateful to see Tyson and Preston who were not able to go with us on the temple trip. But we were even more GRATEFUL to see our last POTTY TRAINED child has diapers no more!!


And if that didn't make us smile---looking this adorable in skivies does!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING TRADITIONALLY OR NOT!