Thanksgiving

This year we debated hosting Thanksgiving, or letting someone else do the heavy lifting and we just bring a few things to dinner.  I love hosting for holidays, but I was so glad we chose to join our MBA friends for turkey day!  

The day before Thanksgiving was beautiful and Mike was home from work.  The boys headed out to Big Boss (the huge dirt pile on the construction site across the street from our house) for some good old fashioned fun.  I LOVE these pictures!  I love how a pile of dirt can bring such joy to children and provide hours of entertainment.  

The next day, we drove to Grand Rapids and joined the Conrans, Vachs, and Ormes for amazing food!  It was a great afternoon/evening, but was cut short because Amelia and Reid both spiked fevers while there.  We had planned to spend the night and do some after Thanksgiving shopping the next day.  I felt so badly for our sickies, and so sad we couldn't stay and play.

Our project for Thanksgiving weekend was to build shelves in our toy closet in the basement.  Mike and I realized we don't do these kinds of projects often enough to be good at them.  It took much longer than we thought, the chaos was much more than we thought, and the mess during the process was much bigger than we thought.  The kids, however, were very excited about our project and were happy to pitch in when needed (and also when not needed).  I thought they were pretty cute.

Poor Reid was still fevered and miserable.  He just lay on the couch and watched the happenings.

Reid asked when we were having our special dinner.  When I told him that we had already done it at the Conran's he gave me these puppy dog eyes and said how much he liked having our own special dinner for Thanksgiving.  He completely pulled me in and it did sound fun, so I indulged him and we put on another Thanksgiving feast.  The kids were cute and helped make dinner and Andrew knew exactly what tablecloth he wanted to use and which decorations we'd put on the table, etc.  They did a nice job working in the kitchen and preparing for our feast, I was impressed.

"Happy Thanksgiving back!"  I'm so grateful for our sweet little family and grateful that we get to experience life together.  Sometimes it's a little crazy over here, but it's my crazy and I love it!