Thanksgiving

We celebrated Thanksgiving at our house again this year, but were sad to be missing my parents. We had many an illness running through the group with my lingering respiratory infection, some colds and Brynn's ear infection which she was diagnosed with on Tuesday night. However, unfortunately, my mom was perhaps in the worst shape of all of us with walking pneumonia. We also missed Rosha and her family now that they are in Seattle.

It was still a good celebration, though, and another reminder of all we have to be thankful for.

On Sunday we made turkey cut-out cookies with some cutters that Grandma Laurie loaned us.

We were excited that auntie Christel and uncle John were able to join us this year.

On Wednesday night we celebrated auntie's birthday which was actually yesterday. Happy birthday, auntie!

The girls were anxiously awaiting the cousins' arrival on Thursday.

Elise and Clara playing Manchala.

It actually turned out to be a pretty nice day outside and the kids were able to play in the yard. Our neighbor's cat came over for a visit.

Photo Cred: Tessa

My bird, Esther, oven-ready!

I did my traditional stuffed bird and Dana smoked a couple of turkey breasts as well...which ultimately ended up in a turkey cook-off. Thanks, Tessa, for documenting. :-)

Tessa made her delicious pies again this year. Yum!

Pie photo bombers!

Brynn put together her pin the feather on the turkey game again.

Thanksgiving just isn't the same with out a friendly game of Pictionary. Kevin and Holly were willing participants, but Chad and Dana were not so keen to play, as per usual. Holly snapped this pic of Tessa and me trying to capture Chad for the game. Dana ended up falling asleep on the couch, so it was just Chad and me on a team up against Kevin, Holly and Tessa. Chad was a super good sport, though!

Yay! Best game ever!

Tessa and I showing our Buddha drawings which happened to be near carbon copies.

We kind of went Black Friday shopping in shifts. Dana and Kevin headed out in the AM to replace our TV that had apparently up and died overnight. I thought Dana was joking when he told me it kicked the bucket, as we had all just watched a movie on it the night before. Well, if there's a good time for your TV to quit, I guess that's Black Friday! I'm hoping, though, that our string of things going kaput on us is over....our dust buster also bit the dust (hehe) this week as well as Brynn's little four-wheeler (Dad has a part on order for that though).

Tessa, Chad and Oliver went to Scheels while the rest of the kids stayed behind to play. Clara and Ben always play so nicely together.

Kevin and Holly watched the girls for us while Dana and I went out later in the day.