Thanksgiving

I am thinking of Thanksgiving ahead of time – planning a quite holiday with family with activities planned before and after:

• The holiday light display is open for Friends of the Garden the Monday before Thanksgiving…so we will enjoy our first walk through of the season unless the weather is wet. I missed seeing them at all in 2023 because I was in Dallas for the later part of the year.

• I am not a black Friday shopper…but enjoy being outdoors (maybe working off some of the calories from the day before). Our November has been relatively mild…good hiking weather.

There is also plenty in my life to be thankful for right now:

• My dad is comfortable at his assisted living home; my sisters and I are able to visit him frequently.

• I have finished my Missouri Master Naturalist training, and the volunteering opportunities seem to be coming along as I expected. There is much to learn and do even during the winter.

• The Identifying Woody Plants class at Missouri State is about over…and I thoroughly enjoyed the field trips – learned a lot about great outdoor places close to where I live.

• Our home is snug – ready for winter…the sprinkler system winterized and the heating system checked.

• Both cars are performing well. Both have been used for road trips recently. My husband and I both appreciate the driver’s aids on modern cars when we make longer drives.

• The fall has been prolonged by the milder temperatures. The color might have been muted from less rain in the summer, but the length of the display made up for that.

• Internet Archive is back online. I missed it a lot while it was down and realize how much I savor browsing through its digitized old books; many of them are not available otherwise.

Life is good….