On Thanksgiving Day, we had a break from lessons, and chose to head to IKEA to get a rug they were running on sale, as well as a few other little home items. IKEA is definitely the cheapest place to get things for the home! It doesn't hurt that we can get free coffee with our IKEA card, as well as some really awesome cheap dark chocolate. While we were in line, we decided to make it a Thanksgiving lunch of French fries, cold green tea, cafe lattes, and dark chocolate bar. We looked so American scarfing down our huge plate of French fries, but didn't even care. We've been away from home long enough at this point to relish a chance to be American.
Since we don't own a car, we normally would have something as large as a rug delivered, but after testing the weight, Jason decided if I could handle wearing Finn and carrying our bag of other things, he could get the diaper bag and the rug. So yes, we decided to haul a huge area rug home. On a train. Of COURSE I documented it!
We had dinner that night with another American couple, and some Japanese friends. Thanks to care packages, we were able to have stuffing, pumpkin pie, mashed potatoes, and other traditional Thanksgiving foods. The pumpkin pie was definitely the best part. We made sure our Japanese friends knew that it's tradition to stuff yourself on Thanksgiving.
Saturday was our big meal with all our American team mates. It was great fun! We played bingo and a trivia game for prizes, which included American candy, and feasted on American food. I paced myself Thursday, but on Saturday I ate sooooo much! It felt good to be full. We joke about how we stay hungry all the time here because Japanese portions are so small.
I was thankful that we had our gathering scheduled for that particular day, because Saturday was the day that being away from my family during the holidays caught up with me. My family has always had the tradition of going to Little Rock the Saturday after Thanksgiving for a movie, Christmas shopping, and eating in one of the hundreds of restaurants we were lacking in our small southeast Arkansas town. It made me sad that Finn wouldn't get to grow up with that experience.
But as always, God has a way of showing up in the hard times. He spoke to me that day while I was praying and telling Him about my sadness, and said during this Thanksgiving, be thankful for the hard times I have here, because they make me dependant on Him in a way I would never be in America. God knew what He was doing when He called me to make my life outside of America. He knows that I'm too stubborn and independent, and that living in Japan is what it's going to take to best conform me to His image.
To end on a lighter note, here's a picture I took of Finn and one of our teammates. Apparently, the turkey was just too much for him. I love it because he looks like a little man after a large Thanksgiving meal. He just needs a recliner, the remote, and a football game on TV.
