Happy and Thankful Thanksgiving!

We've had a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend.  The next two weeks are pure insanity, so I needed to get a lot done.  And, I did--with time to spare.  Whew!
Well, actually some of the time wasn't to spare.  I got the food made and the kitchen tidied before we left for Thanksgiving.  I should have known that something was wrong with that picture!  Geneva finally called to see if we were on our way.  "Of course," I said, "we are in the car, we will be there promptly at 3:00 pm." 
"Hmmm..." she said, "we'll we were all here on time for the actual time, 2:30."  Oops.  My bad.  They all kindly waited for us, and even let us take the traditional picture before we ate! 

Ben didn't eat any lunch...so he was in full meltdown over having to wear a dress shirt before we even got there.  Luckily some food helped him out.  Don't they look amazing though!  Love those kiddos.  When we went around the table Ben said he was thankful for "Friends or Family."  The girls both got a laugh too, but now I can't remember what they said.  It seems like Libby said she was thankful for everyone putting up with her.  

The whole crew--minus Dave the photographer. 

Then swap--I'm the photographer. 

Earlier in the day Dave and I took a walk. 

Happy Thanksgiving.  Maren's new overhead lighting is amazing!  We could see our food and our game pieces! 

The spread.  The sweet potatoes were especially good this year!  (Goat cheese and pistachios are the secret!) 

And then games!  I didn't even bring my Christmas cards (I forgot), so I got to play Rummikub (which I won, once only, but I'll take it!), the Mind, and Skipbo.  

Me, winning! 

Mismatch Day!

Student Council is the most fun on Spirit Days.
Mismatch Day was pretty epic this year.  I wish I had gotten more pictures!
But here is our family effort.

Relief Society Fun

My current calling is as the Relief Society Meeting Coordinator.  Even though it is providing a fair amount of stress (especially because we are in charge of the ward Christmas party), it has been really fun.  For November we did competitive gingerbread houses.  We started with some "Organizing Games" the last one being one that got them into groups.  It was really awesome to see the sisters working together to build.  We did hot glue and graham crackers for the bases so that we could quickly get building.  We worked for about 40 minutes (I kept resetting the timer :).  We gave the groups each a different theme to work with so that we had a village when we were done.  And there were mystery ingredients that they had to incorporate at the last minute.  This initially wasn't actually my idea--my committee is great!  And when we put our heads together, we end up with a great product.  

  

Gratitude in 2019

This year we have a lot to be thankful for!  This week marks the anniversary of when my mom had her heart surgery last year.  What a blessing it is to see her so alive and vibrant when last year during this week she was on life support.  

Also, below is a picture of my awesome father-in-law who also had medical good news this week.  Earlier this year he broke his tailbone.  When they did some imaging they found a small bladder cancer.  They said they hadn't seen one this small because he wasn't even experiencing any symptoms. They removed the cancer this week and were able to declare him cancer free!    

 We even found time to make new gratitude leaves, pumpkins and acorns for our front door wreaths.  We didn't make any last year, I don't even know if I put them up.  But it was fun to sit together and think about what we are thankful for.  We overflowed the wreaths!  I put some away that I will use to make the 2019 garland in 2020.  (Hopefully--I pulled off the 2017, but didn't have time to make the garland.  Hopefully in 2020 I won't be doing student council, so I'll have lots of time for garland making.)  It is so fun to look back on what we were thankful for in the years when I did make garland of our former wreaths.  They make great decorations. 

Halloween 2019!

I can't believe it, but I almost forgot to blog Halloween!  Honestly, October was a busy, busy and overwhelming month.  By the time Halloween rolled around, I didn't have my usual enthusiasm and excitement.  I was left only with a fixation on getting a good picture of all of us in our Halloween costumes because our theme was so awesome.  Only Derek didn't fulfill his assignment of getting his costume early enough.  So I ended up doing it for him.  I didn't think through it when I didn't pay the extra shipping ($20!) to get it here early.  I was thinking, by Halloween is good enough.  But that wasn't true, since two parties happened the Fri & Sat before! 
Ugh.
I didn't dress up on Friday.  We did the whole family except Derek on Saturday.  His costume did come in time for Halloween.  So we paid $60 for a costume that he wore once, to Spiros.  We got one sort of okay photo--outside of Spiros in terrible lighting.  Frankly--I derived way less joy from Halloween this year than usual. 
This made me sad especially because we came to consensus on our theme so well--all the costumes were great--and it could be our last year....ibby wants to theme with her friends next year.  Which I get.
Although she has already been talking about next year, so who knows.

I do love my wrestling coach Derek. I don't remember the flowers on my costume when I ordered it.  They were glued on, so had to stay.  I should have made a honey wand...no time. 

All the kids loved their costumes.  Libby even wore her Wheaties Gold Medal winner ice skating outfit all day to school. 

The whole family together...but not our whole theme. 

Now that's more like it!  A Wheaties Box, a Honey Nut Cheerios Box, a Frosted Flakes Box, a Trix box, and a Huge box of Lucky Charms :)  (Did you realize there are no female cereal mascots?)

Sarah's School Picture

Sarah decided that she didn't want to mess with getting retakes.  Seemed like too much of a "hassle."  So she decided to stick with this picture.  Which is actually pretty adorable.  

It was Parent/Teacher Conference week at school.  Sarah's conference was great.  All good things.  She's a sweet student, and doing really well with Student Council Stuff too.  

Introducing herself at the Veterans Day Assembly. 

A Fun & Charitable Weekend

Last weekend we had events on Friday and Saturday night.  Friday was the Police Foundation Awards Night.  This year everyone on Derek's squad was getting an award, except him.  Haha.  He was having breakfast when the call came out--so he missed out on the award.  But I am okay with that--it was a pretty horrific call.  He also had 2 friends get the Lifesaver awards.  What I really enjoyed about the event is that I know so many more of his police world friends.  So even when I lost him for awhile, I still had fun chatting with all the people I know now.  It was fun to get dressed up (thanks Amazon for the cheap, comfy and warm dress!)  We didn't make it to the dance floor though.  I'm definitely showing my age!

 Then on Saturday Night we went to the Einstein PTSA Trivia Night.  It was super fun.  I really enjoyed the trivia.  We tied for 3rd with the other team of MP parents at our table.  I love being a part of the Shoreline Schools community.  Two dates in two nights!  We have probably filled our quota for the year! I think I am going to file away the trivia night idea for an RS activity.  It was simple and fun.

I will say that the kids didn't fare quite as well.  They were really tired and grumpy on Sunday (when we had family pictures).  The adults might have been a bit grumpy too--with two late-ish nights.  So it might not have been our best Sunday ever.  We did manage to get pics taken.  I hope they will be done pretty soon.  Gotta get those Christmas cards in!