Thanksgiving at our house

“The stockings are all hung by the chimney with care…” Whoops, sorry, wrong holiday!   I was a little confused as my neighbor was hanging Christmas lights yesterday while I was spray painting pumpkins in the driveway and I was preparing and cooking Thanksgiving food while watching Christmas movies.

But it was definitely Thanksgiving today with all the yummy food and fun with family to go around.  Thought I would share a little of our house all ready for Thanksgiving guests to arrive.

My newly painted/re-decorated dining room (more on that later) with the table all set ready for company!

Love the candlelight . . .

I showed you how I made my centerpiece here.  The placemats and orange napkins are from Kohl’s and the brown pumpkins are from the Dollar Tree last year.  The plates and glasses are my everyday dinnerware that I love.

I enjoyed hosting for the first time this year and preparing more Thanksgiving dishes (turkey, stuffing) than I normally do.  And everything turned out great!

I have 2 nieces that would be coming for Thanksgiving (age 2 1/2 and 4) and I wanted to do a special kids table for them.  I found lots of inspiring ideas on Pinterest and took a little from a few of them.  I wanted to do more but just plain ran out of time. But there is always next year!    The “Thanksgiving banner” was a free printable from Paper Glitter.

The “centerpiece” is some pumpkin teddy bears I picked up at the dollar store years ago along with a cornucopia with some fruit/pumpkins.  I printed some Thanksgiving coloring sheets and glued them on different color construction paper.

My 2 nieces coloring their placemats – they were so excited when they saw the table just for them.

They also colored handprint turkeys right on the table – so much fun!   They already want to know if the next time they come to Aunt Nina’s house if they can color on the table again.  The paper on the table is just white newsprint and I have a huge roll so I am sure we will be doing this again sometime.

And for the rest of my fall/ Thanksgiving home décor…

I showed you how I made my “Give Thanks” banner last week (for FREE, by the way! 🙂

I shared my spray painted mirror and fall mantel here.

And my magnolia wreath greeted my guests as they arrived.

And I can’t write a post about Thanksgiving without sharing the things I am thankful for:

• My wonderful husband.  I can’t even imagine my life without him.  He is my best friend, a wonderful provider, a honest/devoted man and so much more.  I love him so much! 
• My family – my husband’s and mine!  They both are precious to me and I love them dearly!
• My home.  It is not perfect and is always a work in progress but I count my blessings to not only have a roof over my head but pretty decorations on the wall too!
• My friends.  My facebook friends that live far away, my local friends….  My blogging friends (Renee at Living, Laughing, and Loving; Christa at Brown Sugar Toast, Laine at Just Laine, and the list could do on and on.  (And for the blogs I love to read but have no idea that I exist – Thrifty Décor Chick, Young House Love, Beneath My Heart, and so many more!)
• My husband’s job.  5 years ago he came home the Tuesday before Thanksgiving having just gotten laid off unexpectedly from his job.  It was a hard Christmas season that year but we still had food on the table, I was able to work extra hours for a few months, and he started the job he is at now after the new year.
• My work at home job!  2 weeks ago I said goodbye to the office place and hello to my home as I now work from home!  It has been a lifelong desire to stay at home and I am truly thankful that the Lord granted me this “desire of my heart”.”
• and most of all, I am thankful for my salvation and the many blessings my Heavenly Father bestows on us daily.  We sang this song the other day at our Thanksgiving Praise service and the next to the last phrase stuck out to me like I had never seen it before……Strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow,
  Blessings all mine, with ten thousand beside!
  Great is Thy faithfulness!
  …All I have needed Thy hand hath provided;
  Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me!

I hope that you and your family had a wonderful Thanksgiving!

I am off to catch a few minutes of sleep before heading out to hit the stores for some Black Friday sales.   Anyone else skipping sleep tonight for shopping?