Thanksgiving Weekend

It was so nice having those four days off, it's hard to go back to work today and be bored again. We had a great Thanksgiving with a couple families that live in our neighborhood. They are definitely our family here since we're all transplants and don't have much family around (each of them at least have one set of parents around--we're all alone!). I had considered doing Thanksgiving on our own, we haven't ever had one with just the five of us doing the turkey and everything, but when it was time to eat, I was glad I hadn't. Just making my dishes was enough work, I can't imagine having made more! I did manage to screw up one dish, which you know, is my goal for every Thanksgiving. This year it was the green bean casserole again--I messed that one up a couple years ago too. It must be my subconscious because I hate green bean casserole, and I only make it for J, but he said it turned out ok. I was too busy working on my strawberry banana napoleon, which turned out excellent! I made it up to him with the banana cream pie too, so I guess it's not all bad. After eating, we just hung out with our friends and played games (phase 10 especially) and had a good time. The families all have kids our kids ages, so everyone had a good Thanksgiving. Lindsay made me especially grateful because as we were talking about the holidays coming up, we had a discussion about which was our favorite holiday. My little sweetie (and if you know her, she's not sweet that often!) says that Thanksgiving is her favorite holiday because she likes to think about what she's thankful for. Sometimes she makes me think we must be doing something right. And then there's Bailey...Mom, just so you know, Bailey's favorite holiday is her birthday cause it's the only day that's just for her. That's such a kid thing to say. Oh well.

I was very determined this year to not go out shopping Friday morning, but Jason had heard that Circuit City was having great deals on video games this year since they're closing the one by us, so we both decided to go. Got up at 4:30, almost left Jason at home cause he wasn't getting up, and headed out to get to Circuit City close to when they opened. Well, J is the one who told me they opened at 5 and like a dork, I didn't check to make sure he was right. We got there at 5:15 to find that they opened at 7. We ended up going to most of the other stores we wanted to hit before it even opened. I have to say it really was not worth getting up at all. The sales were horrible. I guess if you want an HD tv, this was the year to do it, but we've got more than enough of those. We finally did buy some things just because we were out, but nothing that we were looking for was on sale at all. It was hugely disappointing. But, I'm happy to report that I finished shopping for the kids before Dec. 1. That was my goal this year and I made it. So I can relax and try to find something for J and then I'm good.

The other thing we did this weekend is our traditional day after Thanksgiving decorating. The kids love to help, and we think it's funny when they're done inside because everything is all clumped around one area. I think J's looking forward to when Cole is old enough to help hang lights too, cause I know it's tiring for him. He had Cole help just holding the lights and I think that was frustrating enough because Cole is Mr. Space Cadet. I swear, that kid lives inside his own head most of the time, which is great cause he's got a great imagination, but not so great when you want his help. I got to add one more blow up decoration this year too, so I was happy. Charlie Brown and Snoopy joined the Grinch in our front yard, so now we have my (Charlie Brown) and Jason's (Grinch) favorite Christmas shows represented. I'm really happy with how the yard looks this year too. I think we do a pretty good job. I'm going to try to take a pic at night and post it, but we'll see.