Thanksgiving

We had a nice Thanksgiving week.  I scheduled fewer things than last year so I felt more relaxed and happy.  I hurt my lower back and re-injured an older shoulder injury the week of Thanksgiving so I wasn't feeling 100% awesome that week and it was nice to have less on my plate (pun intended).  We got a lot of snow the week of Thanksgiving which made it extra magical.  Here are some of our Thanksgiving adventures.

Anna wanted to make a pie on her own so she studied some different recipes and made an apple pie.  I suggested we use a premade refrigerated pie crust instead of making our own pastry this year.  I figure we could tackle that on her next try.  She cut the apples and peeled them and prepared all the filling.  Here is her apple pie ready to go in the oven.

Pie on top, turkey on the bottom.  Having a double oven is truly a luxury.

Makes me remember our Thanksgivings in Okinawa using a tiny oven.

We did a Thanksgiving themed scavenger hunt - I put about 20 little pictures of Thanksgiving items around the house and gave each kid a list they could check off as they found them.  They got a chocolate turkey as a reward (from Trader Joe's).  You can see Grant's turkey in his hand if you look close.  And one of his items to find - a turkey.  The kids enjoyed that.  Emma wants to do it for all holidays.

We had a little Thanksgiving feast the day before Thanksgiving.

Grant made these origami turkeys for decoration...

...and secret place cards

Yum.

And we went and had a delicious dinner with Scott's family on Thanksgiving day.

If you look close you can see mad Emma.

She was tired and overwhelmed with all the people.  She was a little out of sorts at first but felt better once she started playing with the cousins more.

Big boys table!

Matthew and Anna brought their instruments so they could perform some holiday songs

They did a good job.  They are both newish to playing.

The Guptill side cousins - minus Kallie who we talked to via Skype/facetime from her mission in Texas.  We had a lot of fun and many of our kids were mad that they weren't allowed to spend the night.

The next day we had planned to drive down again to Utah county for some cousin birthday fun, but around the time we had planned to leave our house it started snowing heavily.  We decided its was best not to drive in it and the kids were very disappointed.  Here's Emma crying that we weren't going to the birthday party.

Anna was also mad about it.

We got a lot of new snow in a short period

The kids eventually accepted it and went out to play in the new snow.

Anna made an Olaf snow man

Good job Anna.  Happy Thanksgiving all!!