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!!

A few November happenings

Here are just a few pictures from our pre-Thanksgiving November.

Anna was excited too make this apron from a dish towel at activity girls.

She has made a lot of small goals for herself including learning to sew new things and cook.  She has a great chocolate chip cookie recipe she has made on her own several times.  We had a conflict one afternoon when she started making cookies and I needed the stand mixer for our gingerbread houses, but we are learning to share our cooking space and deconflict with one another.

Buttery delicious cookies

Took a trip with Emma to Trader Joe's.  I love Trader Joe's (the grocery store) but the nearest one is in downtown Salt Lake so I don't go that often.  It's about 25 minutes away so not terrible but I still don't make it there a lot.  It's a special treat when I do.  I loved going to TJ's as a kid - I remember getting cheesecake, pirouette type cookies and lots of dried nuts and fruits.  And in college (when there were no Trader Joe's in Utah) I would always stock up while I was home in California on nuts and cheese  and other fun things to take back to college.  I remember bringing disposable coolers back several times from college to keep the cheese fresh.  So I love Trader Joe's is what I'm saying.  My dream is to live really close to one some day.  My sister lives a few blocks from one in WA.  She is living the dream. :).  In CA (Monterey and Gilroy) we lived pretty close and that was great.  I love you TJ's!!  On this day we got a lot of seasonal treats like advent calendars, pumpkin spice things, tri-color carrots.  Fun times.

Anna had her DARE graduation (it used to stand for Drug Abuse Resistance Education but they may have changed the acronym - still about saying no to drugs though).

A former Miss Utah spoke to the DARE graduates.  I was conflicted about this picture because I object to beauty pageants on principle, but Anna wanted to try on Miss Utah's stuff and she did give a good speech about her brother's struggles with substance abuse so I let it go.  I don't want my girls to aspire to only being valued for external things - so boo to pageants, but yea to good inspiring messages about saying no to drugs.

Lots of fall leaves to deal with still.  Scott used a leaf blower.

John thought it was too loud.

Emma has learned to sort of clean her room by herself

She is also excited for Frozen 2 to come out

We played with bubbles one afternoon

She wants to have constant stimulation while the kids are at school.  It's exhausting.

Before going to pack meeting one night.  Starting to regret having the boys do scouts 'cause I have to make pinewood derby cars soon.  Gah!!

Working on Saturday jobs

Anna went through my old stash of fabric and we found some precut pieces (charm packs) of fabric for her to make a quilt.  I also had some white strips leftover.  She's making plans.

And executing them.  Good job Anna.  She's becoming a good seamstress.

Emma's Birthday

Emma turned five years old at the beginning of November.  We celebrated a few days early since Scott was going to be out of town on her real birthday.  This was confusing to Emma, but I think it worked out in the end.

Emma wanted a batgirl birthday party so we made bat cupcakes.

We went to Chuck E. Cheese

And had some cupcakes and presents at home.  My parents came up to celebrate with us.

Emma had a lot of fun

Anna wanted to make/sew Emma a doll for her birthday.  My mom helped her make this doll.  

Anna did a lot of the work.

It turned out really cute and Emma loved it.

Emma got to celebrate her birthday in her preschool class too.

She got a paper birthday crown that she was excited about.

On Emma's real birthday we went out for frozen yogurt

And we had a little frozen cake

And a special birthday balloon

Emma is so excited to be five and can't wait to to go kindergarten next year.

Happy Birthday Emma!!