{It's Christmastime...| Thankful Thursday}

I can't tell you how much I pride myself in my card every year. Being a graphic designer for 14 years - it was my thing. It was my photos, my design.. all from scratch. It was a representation of me, my life. Every year I enjoyed it so much, the concept from start to finish. It was a big deal. This year has been much harder. For many personal reasons... I procrastinated on the card and knew that designing it this year would be different - 8 hard months, so many lessons learned and growth I didn't ask for, but obtained. How to do something that now represented what was so broken in my life and put it out there on display. I cried. And I smiled at my beautiful kids. How proud I am of them.

When things were hard in the past I kept a book of blessings. That when I was down I would write things I was thankful for. Thankful Thursday also was another way for me to remind myself of how very blessed I am.

And just today after a very tough night, my best friend reminds me.. "tell me 5 things that you are thankful for, that you are blessed by." Thank you Vincy. I needed to be reminded that there is always a blessing as much as there is a weight.

This year my card is beautiful. It is just my kids - and they are blessings, they are beautiful blessings. I am so very thankful for them. SO with that said.. after a very tough year, I am still very much a thankful girl....

1. Thankful for ability and freedom. To dream,  design and discover. I live in a country where I can design a Christmas card, that shows my belief in my faith, in Christ's birth, in love and giving. I can sit in a coffee house on a Thursday morning and upload a picture of the card I designed, front and back and enjoy coffee and the warmth of a fire nearby.

2. Thankful for family. My kids. My brother. My mom, my dad. My grandma. My aunt. My cousins. My sister, even though she's in heaven. I know she still talks to me in her own ways. Thankful for these people - they have all individually done their part to help me through one of the hardest years of my life.

3. Thankful for friends. New and old. "Bear ye one another's burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ." Gal. 6:2. Thankful for relativity and kinship. What would we be with out it?

4. Thankful for health and prosperity. God is so good to me. Beyond measure. My health, my kids health. He pays my bills. Every month, month after month. This alone has been one of the biggest ways I have seen Him care for me. He is so faithful.

5. Thankful for a future. I was told that you can't build a future out of the past. You have to step away from yesterday and leave it where it was in order to take the next step into tomorrow. Even into today. There are so many seasons in life. We ALL have our ups and downs. Our summers and winters. Thankful that joy comes in the morning. That each day is a new beginning.

To bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes,
the oil of joy instead of mourning,
and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair.
Isaiah 61:3

Holidays are difficult for many, for many different reasons. I have been more sensitive to that this year. That for many... holidays are dreaded and not anticipated. This is a hard concept to grasp until it is you in that situation. That's when we step back and count our blessings...