Thanksgiving for daaaaays!

Our Thanksgiving celebrations are very different this year since this is the first one in which we have been "home" in 8 years! We were happy to serve as the stopping point for the Smith family as they made their way from up north to Big Bear for their traditional Thanksgiving with their family. They arrived on Monday night and stayed with us until Wednesday morning. Here are the "big" kids: Emma, Caden, Meg and Emeri. Caden decided to have a holiday romance with Emeri and held hands with her and we even caught him kissing her on the cheek. He decreed that she was "pretty." Emeri just smiled.

When it was time to say goodbye all of the kids jumped on top of Brian. If only this picture came with sound. . .

Here is Emeri having her handprint made by Jen!

On Thanksgiving Day, Brian's family came for dinner. Here we are all gathered around our table. This was the first time we have hosted thanksgiving and while everything turned out quite tasty, it was alot of work. Let me repeat that--it was alot of work. I have joined the millions of women in America who sit back at the end of Thanksgiving day and wonder to myself, "just what was I doing at midnight last night and why did I begin cooking at 7 am with a short shower break around 10? There has to be a more efficient way to do this!" With so much effort put into the food, I felt silly when we set the table--we don't have anything Thanksgiving-ish to make the table look pretty! I vow to purchase (at half price, hopefully next week) some table linens and trimming to make this all look a little better next year!

So, this is Sarah, Matt and Rebekah, Brian's siblings:

And this is Sarah and Rachel, Brian's sisters, with Rachel's daughter Elyana:

Matty! Snappin' the ends off of peas while watching the game! And Brian's dad, Emil, who usually cooks the feast, but was happy to have the year off!

Family pic in the backyard, as requested by Brian's parents! Tripod and camera timer put to use once again!


A note of Thanksgiving-ness. Thank you Brian, for preparing the turkey because once it was purchased and set upon the counter I decided that if I had to touch it I might vomit. He did a rock-star job on that turkey, I kid you not! A few phone calls to my mom, his dad and good-old Google and he rolled it out with the ease of a chef!

We truly missed the Shaws, our dear friends in New Jersey. We've spent the last several years giving Thanks at their home and we feel a little forlorn to not be with them this year, although we enjoyed the company of our own family. It's been a tough year for our little family but we've been blessed by so much so we thank God for all of our friends near and far and our family who was far and now is near. And now: ON TO CHRISTMAS!