Giving Thanks

Given that I live in England and have no connections with anyone in America, I've obviously never really celebrated thanksgiving before. This year however, a friend wanted to organise something for her partner who is American but couldn't go home for the holiday. Us and a few friends went to Jamie's Italian in Norwich for dinner and it was lovely to spend an evening in good company, with good food, and free wine! (For those of you that don't have a Jamie's Italian Gold Card…get one! Free wine, free desserts and extra food, what's not to love!) Also, the lovely host made everyone gingerbread biscuits spelling their name!

(In case you wondered, she didn't just get lazy with my name! Lots of people, mostly old friends and D's family know me as Ele)

It also got me thinking about gratitude. I spend a lot of time reading blogs, perusing pinterest and filling the house with beautiful magazines, and often I find myself feeling envious of the lives of the people featured in them. I realised yesterday while we were out quite how ridiculous and probably very unhealthy that is! I spend so much time wishing things were magazine worthy I don't stop to look at how great they actually are! I'm really lucky in so many ways, and I think I would do well to be more mindful of that and grateful for the little things that in my life that I would feel envious of if they were posted online by someone else (like the fact that I had the best toasted brie sandwich in my favourite cafe today, or that I'm writing this while drinking a spiced chamomile tea with Harry Potter playing in the background and the cat curled up next to me)

I'm wondering about the best way to get me into the habit of doing this. I know lots of people keep gratitude journals and theres plenty of gratitude apps around. My sister recently completely a '100 Happy Days' photo challenge which is a great idea, I just need to figure out the best way to make it work for me.  If anyone has any ideas or would like to share their own experiences with gratitude journalling, I'd love to hear them!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!