Thanksgiving 2013

Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays as of a few years ago. I absolutely LOVE the chance to focus on gratitude throughout the whole month. I always have a lot to be grateful for, and focusing on it throughout the entire year is definitely a goal for me. I always know that for the month of November though, I will get to be reminded daily of all I have to be grateful for.

The day before Thanksgiving, Jake took me to see Catching Fire in theaters. It was SOOO good, we both loved it! I read the books, multiple times, but Jake doesn't like to read, so it gave me the chance to keep him on edge without explaining stuff and see how confused he would get, since book 2 is SUPER confusing. Afterwards, we went to visit his parents for a few hours and then got JCW's ice cream shakes for dinner. Nutritious right? We came home, made our breakfast for the next day that goes in the crock pot over night and went to bed.

The next day, we woke up and got the rolls out of the freezer so they could start rising before we needed to leave for my parents house and then had breakfast.

The crock pot overnight breakfast casserole turned out SO yummy!! 

After we were finished with breakfast, we watched the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade and then did the dishes so we could have Jake's little turkey cooking while we were gone. I'm not big into turkey, but Jake LOVES it and wanted his own little one for sandwiches throughout the rest of the weekend, so I got one just for him!

I sure love my crock pot haha

We got ready and then went to Salt Lake to pick up my dad, then came back to our house super fast to get Max, the pumpkin cheesecake & the rolls and then headed to my parents house. My parents got divorced 13 years ago almost and have a good enough relationship they can spend Thanksgiving together. I am SO grateful for that!

We got to my parents house and played games for a little while and then had dinner!

Yams & stuffing

The carved bird

Honey carrots

More stuffing & potatoes

Green bean casserole, enough Martinelli's for the whole family to get sick on, and the rolls I made that would NOT rise. Good times lol

Dinner was delicious and the table was SUPER crowded - we had 14 people there and that was only siblings & the missionaries! My step dad is the ward mission leader, so of course we had to invite the missionaries for Thanksgiving. They ended up getting invited to 3 different dinners - I bet they were SUPER full by the time the day was over, since we were dinner #1.

Elder Gleed & Elder Poulima

Everyone {except me & Jake - we were tired} played the game where you write a sentence, then draw a picture of the sentence, then fold the paper so no one can see the sentence and the next person writes a sentence that they think the picture is describing, then they fold the paper so no one sees the picture and the next person draws a picture of the sentence, etc. until the paper is full. It's SUPER funny to see how the sentences evolve.

After that game, we played a game Jake's family introduced me to a few years ago. Everyone gets a 10-15 scraps of paper and writes different nouns on it. All the papers go in a bowl, and then each person gets 20 seconds to give clues about the noun on the scraps of paper they draw out of the bowl so that people can guess what the paper says. So kinda like charades except you can talk. You only get 20 seconds and then you pass the bowl with all the papers to the next person. The goal is to give the best hints so that you get to pull the most papers out of the bowl. So there aren't teams - everyone can play and shout out answers throughout the game. It was REALLY fun - we ended up playing it 3 times. While we were playing, Max was exhausted & kept falling asleep in front of us on the floor. He is normally Mr. Hyper at my parents house, so it was funny seeing him be so tired.

After the games, we had dessert: pumpkin pie, pumpkin cheesecake & pecan pie. Jake had never had pumpkin cheesecake before and wants me to buy another one just for us - it really is that good. We finished dessert, took some pictures and then took my dad back home to Salt Lake.

Me & my siblings who were able to come - Jeannene, Brynne, Lauryl, Lizzy & Richard {Chris was there but he wouldn't come be in the picture. Sarah is on her mission & Matt chose not to come}

Me & my sisters

The girls with my dad

My awesome little family!

The girls with my mom {pictures starting getting SUPER blurry}

The 4 girls with our parents

After we got home from taking my dad out, Jake opened the door to the house and immediately wanted some of his turkey. The house smelled SOO good, I was quite proud of myself.

Jake attempted to pull his turkey out of the crock pot and it totally fell apart - the meat was SOOO tender. That's my idea of a perfect turkey, and Jake agreed. We got his turkey all carved, the dishes washed and then called it a night. It was a SUPER fun Thanksgiving!