We interrupt our regularly scheduled programming of fun nonsense to bring you a special post about the things we are thankful for this year.
Lauren: Things are about to get REAL SAPPY up in here. Just warning you. Something I am most grateful for this year is family.
- I’m so thankful for my new family in Matt. We are beginning to build our life together as husband and wife and it’s exciting. We are currently working through a short transition period where we don’t 100% live together yet but I am looking forward to January where we finally live together completely. I love driving by our house and watching the building process. I can’t wait until our house is done and we are official homeowners together! I’m excited for all these milestones and I just feel so lucky that I married my best friend. Best time ever.
- My relationship with my parents has never been the easiest but at this point in our lives, we couldn’t be closer. We have been getting closer and closer over the past few years and I feel like we finally understand each other as people and friends in addition to our regular parent/child relationship. It’s been very nice and I’m incredibly thankful for that.
- Marrying Matt meant marrying into a new family and I’m so thankful that they are so wonderful. They have welcomed me into their family with open arms and immediately made me feel loved and included. I also love that I have a niece and a nephew that we can spoil! I can’t wait until I can take my niece Eden to Sephora for the first time. She loves makeup almost as much as i do and sometimes I forget she is 4. Matt’s parents are just generous and wonderful and I love spending time with them. You hear horror stories about crazy in-law’s and I feel like I really lucked out.
- I have always considered my friends to be my family. These days I have been focusing on quality versus quantity. I feel very lucky to have some amazing friends all over the country. Somehow I’ve grown closer with some of my friends from Baltimore when I moved to Texas (kind of like when I started this blog with Jill!) and I think that is really neat. Technology makes it easy to keep in touch with people everywhere and I’m grateful for that. If you are reading this blog and we know each other in real life, I’m probably talking about you. 🙂 I’m lucky to continue friendships with gals I’ve known since college and I also treasure my friendships with those I’ve connected with only recently.
- Not family related but I’m really thankful for my job where I have the opportunity to learn from interesting and brilliant people. I appreciate it when it challenges me and forces me out of my comfort zone.
I am in love with my life and feel so blessed. So much has changed for me in just a year so I can’t wait to see what my life is like next Thanksgiving!
Jill: I feel like I have so much to be thankful for that I couldn’t possibly list it all. For that I am grateful, for sure, but I will focus on Lauren’s theme as well and focus my thanks on my family.
I’ve always heard people say that family is who you make it to be, not necessarily who shares your DNA. I never fully understood or appreciated that until I was making my wedding guest list (if you haven’t been there yet, you’ll realize a lot of things when you make your wedding guest list). While I am extremely close to my parents and sister, I am not at all close with my extended family. They’re basically strangers to me, and have always been. My fiance doesn’t have a large family either, so when we arrived at a 200 person guest list, we realized the vast majority of our list were friends – and we weren’t willing to shave the number down.
I have so many friends in my life who I consider family, who I genuinely care and think about. They’re all over the country, but we remain close. You know how you have those friends who you have an inexplicable bond with that no matter how much time passes that you don’t see each other, you can pick right back up where you left off the next time you’re fortunate enough to be in the same room together? I have more of those friends than I can count. Those are my version of cousins and aunts and uncles, my people who I wouldn’t trade for anything. For them I am thankful.
I have seven bridesmaids. Seven. That is ridiculous. But I can’t picture my wedding day without each and every one of them, so seven it is. They are my sisters, even if I didn’t meet them until college or adulthood. I got to choose them.
Also, I’m grateful for my dog. He’s the shit.
We both love writing this blog and we couldn’t do it without our lovely readers. We appreciate you all so much.
xoxo,
Jill & Lauren