Today I am thankful for our country.

We’ve lived in four countries so far on three continents. Living overseas has made Joel and I more patriotic and appreciative of “home.” It is pretty common to hear one of us say, “God Bless America” over just about anything. Grocery stores. High school football games. Basically anytime we find something easily and/or when things work the way they should. Heck, a trip to Walmart and I practically break out in song. 

I know many of you guys won’t get that. I understand. But after getting used to two-hour grocery trips that cost $200 for what we’d get here for $50 (without couponing, because that does not exist overseas) where the bulk of those two hours are spent attempting to read product labels in a different language (am I buying canned peas or canned tomatoes?), yeah, shopping in the US is pure joy.

And there are parts of life that are taken for granted here that we revel in. Small town parades. High school football games. Good Chinese food. (No lie- we have yet to find decent Chinese food in any of the other countries we lived in or visited.) Libraries filled with books in English! You guys seriously don’t know how good you’ve got it. We do, and we’re loving that we’ve got to spend the past year or so “back home.”

And just as soon as it all seems like “old news,” we’ll head back out to start learning to appreciate the good ole’ USA all over again.

This is my first attempt at a blog challenge, something you might see friends doing on Facebook – “__ days of Giving Thanks.” I thought this was a very fitting challenge to get myself back into a regular habit of blogging again. Feel free to join me, and post your own blog link in the comments below, so we can keep up with each other! Follow others that are participating HERE.