"Random Prompts" of Thankfulness

 Good Saturday Morning Friends! I hope this day finds you feeling happy and blessed and ready for a wonderful week of Thanksgiving!  Our little friends at Pamela's Victorian Cottage have been busy getting ready for their Thanksgiving feast:

Everyone is buzzing around, decorating the house and helping Mama with the menu for our guests. Most of all, they wanted to wish you and yours a Happy Thanksgiving.

I know, I know...some of my newer blogging friends probably don't even know anything about this little family at Pamela's Victorian Cottage. (click that link for the very beginning of their story)  They've kind of been in the background lately, but they are still very much "alive and well" here in my little "Room With a View".  If you'd like to know more about this sweet little family, you can click on the links on my sidebar for Pamela's Victorian Cottage and you will find lots of happy times with Mama and her house full of children.  That particular link above will take you back to Autumn Days from last year.  I hope you will enjoy this sweet little family and their adventures.

Now on to other current events.

Recently I made a new blogging friend, Jennifer Smith at Trading Ashes for Beauty.  In this following post she shared some "Random Prompts for Which to be thankful"...Trading Ashes for Beauty, "Random Prompts for Which to be Thankful",  by Jennifer Smith,   and I liked her post so much I asked her if it would be okay if I borrowed her "Random Prompts" for a post of my own sometime. She was very happy to oblige me and so I've been thinking about this for a week or so and thought it was time to give it a whirl. So here you go:

THE BEST THING THAT HAPPENED THIS WEEK.
That would be hard to say. I may have to come back to this one, because the week isn't over yet, and also some of the things that are on this list below may add up to the "best thing that happened this week".  (see down below)

SOMETHING THAT MAKES ME HAPPY.

I have to think...does it have to be a "thing"?  Probably blogging and sitting here chatting with my friends in blogland makes me happy. I think this was one the best decisions I ever made way back over ten years ago...to start this blog. It keeps my mind challenged to think of things to share with you, and it also has opened the door to a whole new world out there filled with lovely people that I would never have gotten to know otherwise!  Say what you will about "social media"...I know it has its faults, but I love being connected with so many special people in all parts of the world who have blessed my life with their stories and smiles.  So yes, blogging is a "something that makes me happy".

SOMEONE THAT MAKES ME SMILE.

Well, gee, my hubby makes me smile every day.  He also makes me get up and take walks with him everyday. And that is a good thing.  He's been making me smile for over 53 years.  We met in September of 1968, and were married in August of 1969.  And we've been smiling together every since. 

A SIMPLE ACT OF KINDNESS THIS WEEK.

On Monday we attended a funeral at our church for one of our dear sweet members who passed away. The ladies of the church were also providing a reception for the family after the funeral. When we arrived at the parking lot of the church I had a cake carrier in my hand to take to the fellowship hall.  A kind gentleman (I believe he was part of the funeral home staff), came up to my car door and opened the door for me and took the cake carrier and said he would carry it for me to the fellowship hall! I was so surprised by this little act of kindness that I never expected.  Then to top that off, the next evening I went to choir practice for the first time since my surgery. I am still a little bit "wobbly" in some ways...just not quite as full of vim and vigor as "normal".  After practice was over, the Pastor went over to the fellowship hall and came out carrying my now empty cake carrier and brought it to me so that I wouldn't have to go looking for it.  I never expected that either. I didn't even know he knew that I had a cake carrier in the fellowship hall, but apparently he had seen it there (my name is written on the container), and he wanted to save me the trip over there to get it.  Again, I was flabbergasted by this little act of kindness.  You know, it's the simple things that really mean a lot!  I am happy this little exercise has helped me to think about these things!

THE LAST PERSON WHO GAVE ME SOMETHING.

I showed you this picture yesterday: 

My sweet Daughter in Love Rose brought this over to me as a little pre-Christmas decor gift!

Of course, it is from both her and our son Benton. This picture was taken last week on their 4th anniversary.  I feel very blessed to have such a dear daughter in law living right here near us who actually goes out of her way to do special little things to brighten our days. 

A RECENTLY ACHIEVED GOAL.

As many of you may know, last year I was on a mission to discover the history/genealogy of my paternal grandmother because she was adopted.  Through Ancestry.com and also doing the DNA testing, I was able to discover the birth parents of my grandmother. You can read more about that HERE. My goal last year was to put it all together, at least as much as I could, by my grandmother's 125th birthday, which was December 27, 2020.  And so that story linked above was the achievement of that goal.  I am still on a quest to find pictures of my grandmother's birth parents, and have been in contact with several descendants of both sides of her birth family.  And that leads me to this next prompt:

THE MOST RECENT BLESSING I RECEIVED.

One of my new "cousins" that I connected with through the genealogy research recently sent me a few pictures that she could find, not of our mutual Great Grandfather, but of his daughter and son's families, who would be my grandmother's half-siblings.  Of course, these pictures are from the 1940's, and it isn't very clear to me who is who, and my "cousin" wasn't really sure either, but she went out of her way to mail me these pictures so I could see them.  I scanned them into my computer and then returned them to her.  I will share this one with you.  My Grandmother's half sister Lenora is in the center of this picture, standing in front of the person with his hands up in the air. She has on a dress with what looks like large sunflowers on it.  Her brother Roy is somewhere in this picture, but we don't know which one. This looks like a big happy family. My cousin said they used to have a lot of family reunions back in the day. I told her that it's too bad my Grandmother never got to know her half-siblings and their families. I know they all would have been great friends.  Perhaps they are all acquainted now in heaven and enjoying each other now for eternity.

To me, having this new "cousin" go out of her way to send me these pictures was a real blessing. We never even knew each other existed until last year.  

Later:  Okay, now that I've written about all the other prompts here above, I think the best thing that has happened thus far this week is writing about all these other things that have made me stop and count my blessings and think about these good things that have happened!

Perhaps you might want to do a similar exercise...you can use these prompts (because Jennifer Smith said so, but you might want to visit her first and tell her about it and make a new friend in the process!), 

or you may use your own random prompts.  Some of you already do that on a regular basis.  

Hope you and yours have a blessed and happy Thanksgiving!!  And thank you, Jennifer Smith, for these wonderful "random prompts about things we are thankful for". 

Post Script Added Note: I just received word that our blogging friend Mildred Nalley, formerly of "Laurel Wood" blog, has entered her heavenly home this morning.  I heard from her niece that she passed away peacefully earlier this morning. For those of you who knew Mildred and would like to send a card of condolence to her family, please contact me via email or send me a private message if you need more information.  Please keep her husband John, brother Larry Williams and sister Karen, also a former blogger who is not in good health either at this time, and other nieces and nephews and family in your thoughts and prayers. Thank you.