Thanks Giving, 2022 – The Different Finish of the Leash

The downhill vacation slide has begun: Prepare dinner the whole lot you possibly can consider for Thanksgiving dinner! Get an early begin on Christmas playing cards to get them on sale! Order Christmas presents that should be mailed quickly! Resolve what to offer to everybody else, together with the canines! Begin Christmas cooking! Work on future blogs about good Christmas books for canine lovers, and avoiding canine stress over the vacations! Be joyous and filled with cheer!

Or, the one necessary factor: Give thanks. Be grateful. Have fun Thanks Giving. That’s my focus as we speak, and I’ll preserve the nice and cozy gentle of gratitude shining inside me all through the tip of the 12 months. I hope you’ll be part of me to have fun the true and exquisite spirit of this week’s vacation: Giving Thanks.

First, and at all times, I’m grateful for my husband, companion, pal, lover, and man with the best eyebrows ever, Jim Billings. Right here’s a photograph lately taken a couple of weeks in the past by Steve Dahlgren, an awesome native photographer who makes a speciality of canines, however isn’t so dangerous at utilizing us two-legs as topics both:

We simply turned 74 collectively, (Born on the identical day, similar 12 months. Yup, actually.), and I’m grateful daily of my life that we discovered one another, twenty-two years in the past.

I’m grateful for household. Only a few days in the past I made last-minute determination to fly to San Antonio to be at my eldest sister’s new ebook launch and eightieth birthday celebration. Wendy Barker is a celebrated poet and artistic writing trainer, and I’m over the moon proud to be her sister. I left at 6:30 AM Friday morning, met my niece, Wendy Piatt (and singer Sweetlove), who additionally got here (from LA, additionally on the final minute, no small factor), flew residence  Saturday morning at 5:31 AM. It was magical. Right here they each are, earlier than Wendy’s studying:

And from Jim’s facet of the household, right here’s granddaughter Quinne at a Halloween celebration, who we bought to go to in upstate New York, together with son Shane, daughter-in-law Rachael, and grand children Taylor and Quinne:

And, in fact, the relations who characterize why I started this weblog in 2008, Skip and Maggie (picture additionally by Steve Dahlgren):

Watching them play is the very best a part of my day. (Okay, getting in mattress at evening–did I point out I’m 74?–is a detailed second.) I don’t have phrases to say how a lot I like Maggie’s expressive face. If any canine had a humorousness, she does.

There’s a lot extra. So, a lot. However I want to maneuver on as we speak, to engaged on my novel, to getting some boring however necessary techie stuff handled, to working the canines, and to interviewing somebody for my put up developing on December twelfth. Though it’s arduous to cease, I’m going to depart you with solely two extra pictures.

You could recall that we rehomed Nellie, the right cat, as a result of we couldn’t present her with the life she deserved. I miss her daily. Each single day. And, I’m grateful that she is in such an ideal residence, and is so blissful. I will probably be grateful to buddies Bonita and Fredericka for taking her again so long as I stay.

Right here’s what we get in return: A stream of gorgeous birds at our feeders all day lengthy. They will bankrupt me, however they convey me pleasure all through the day. Chickadees, Nuthatches, Tufted Titmice, Downy WPs, Furry WPs, Purple-bellied WPs, Doves, Finches, Bluejays, Sparrows, and who is aware of else will shock us over the winter. Right here’s a White-Breasted Nuthatch and a Downy Feminine at their favourite feeding station.

There’s time, at all times, for another assertion of gratitude: It’s to you, expensive readers, who encourage and problem and delight me each week. I want I had a photograph of you all!!!

I hope you’ve gotten the time to hitch me, and let our worldwide, dog-loving village know what you’re grateful for. Even only one little factor. I’ll learn each factor you write, over and over.

With love and gratitude,

Trisha