I spent most of the day on Wednesday baking/preparing all the desserts. We had about 20 people coming so I wanted to be prepared. I made 2 pumpkin pies, 1 coconut pie, a chocolate sheetcake and a BTS dessert.
Here's the destruction of the kitchen!
Thursday morning rolled around and Sam's small cold blew up into a massive cold. We wondered if I should just stay home with him but we decided to at least make it to the Club then decide from there.
The entire family meets at the The Capital City Club for Thanksgiving lunch and it's really great. It's an all-you-can-eat buffet of some pretty yummy food...salads, shrimp, oyster shooters, prime rib, brunch items, and the typical Thanksgiving fare.
We have quite a group and require a lot of space!
After filling our tummies with way too much food, we let the kids run around a bit outside and they always love that!
Abby & Jonathan:
Judy with most of the grandkids: Logan & Austin were getting a family photo taken:
A quick family photo...blinded by the sunlight:
We then went back to the condo to get changed and a big group of us went to see "The Muppet Movie." The kids seemed to enjoy it but the adults feel more could of been done. I fell asleep so I have no opinion either way.
The men spent most of their time watching football:
The kids enjoy playing at the pool table:
There was also free make-overs by Sydney & Ava:
We then proceeded to eat once again but it was all traditional food and it was delish! Once the guys cleaned up, we were able to enjoy the fireworks!
Video:
After the fireworks, I pulled out ALL of the MANY desserts I made and barely any of it was eaten. I brought most all of it home and proceeded to throw it away after a couple of days. A sad waste of time, money and delicious desserts.
We had a really wonderful day and grateful that Sam managed to keep to himself enough so we could be there with everyone.
When I say sometimes I actually mean rarely but I did have a good idea last year.
Christmas is a wonderful time of year, with the exception of finding the funds to pay for it. I decided at the end of last year to start putting some money away for Christmas the following year. I have an online savings account so I added a checking account and started putting $25/week into that account. As fall rolled around, I got a debit card to use for that account and that was my Christmas money. I managed to save about $800 and let me just say how nice it is just to have that available just for Christmas and I don't have to worry about keeping track of every cent like I do in our regular checking account.
We were pretty easy going this year. Neither Todd or I dressed up. Todd did take the kids to the ward's Trunk or Treat while I was out of town relaxing and both kids had activities at school.
This year Abby was Hermoine from Harry Potter and Sam was a Starbuck's barista.
Sam was required to be a book character for his school's Fall Festival so here he is as Mr. Rogers. Not much other than a button up cardigan and a comb over.
I took Abby trick or treating in the neighborhood and Sam chose to stay home and watch his iPad...um, hand out candy. Both kids had fun and since Abby has braces, the majority of her candy, with the exception of chocolate, was thrown in the garbage.
We like to spend the 4th of July with the British. It just brings back that nostalgia & history.
We enjoyed a long weekend of swimming,
trying to learn the fine art of diving,
jumping,
attempting cannonballs,
floating,
buying illegal fireworks in Alabama, ($98 worth of illegality)
parading,
not sure what to say about this....
partaking of history,
being with friends,
trying to get candy, (which cannot be eaten by a girl who has braces)
fixing lots of food,
eating,
making s'mores inside due to torrential rain,
I have no photos of aforementioned illegal fireworks due to standing under an umbrella in the rain watching the fireworks.
All in all, we had a lovely day with the Taylor family who are, unfortunately, moving back home to England after nearly 4 years of being our neighbors. We are not amused.
other fun things done on the 4th of July not mentioned above:
changing sheets 5 loads of laundry (washed, dried, folded & put away) making beds chopping lots of fruit preparing salads cleaning kitchen vacuuming floor
Mother's Day and Todd's b-day landed on the same day this year. Needless to say, it's not much fun to share your holiday/b-day with someone else. We both tried to make it special, and it was, but it's more fun to have it all to yourself.
We went to sacrament meeting since the kids were singing then met up with Todd's family at the Capital City Club for brunch. It was really special to have everyone there (except for Syd & Josh, perhaps next year). It's a lovely spread of all-you-can-eat goodness without the moms having to cook & clean up after everyone. A treat indeed!
David & Judy (mostly Judy with David's support) bought all us moms this special little magical gift...
It's a nano watch! It plays the radio, songs, holds photos, it has a pedometer and it has a "thing that tells time." It is AWESOME! So awesome in fact, that I do believe I run faster when I wear it.
Here's a photo of most of the grandkids. Some were absent and some chose not to be in the photo (that would be Sam).
We managed to get Jonathan and Gma in this one
All the moms!
I am truly blessed to be a mom, to have a great mom, step-mom, mother-in-law, sisters and sisters-in-law. I am surrounded by wonderful women in my life who are kind, loving, smart, funny and terrific mothers.
As you can see, I am way behind on my blogging but I blame my friend Jennifer because she had a photo I needed and she used the excuse of "I have vertigo" for not responding to my email.
So...we had a nice Halloween. The weather was fantastic and since Halloween fell on a Sunday, most kids stopped trick-or-treating at 8:30pm.
Abby made her costume. She was an Indian Girl and Sam was nothing but we threw this lovely costume together 3 minutes before he went out. He's a very casual reporter. Not sure how many reporters wear Crocs but this one did.
Todd and I were MiB agents. Thanks to my High School friend Lavinia for the idea. Notice my cool black suit? It's Sam's. It's nice to know we can share clothes and shoes.
slept in until 9am Sam & I went for a walk/run at the soccer field Abby had a sleepover at Ava & Ellie's
We met up at Paolo's Gelato to pick up Abby and get a treat
Abby, Ava & Peanut
We then went to Piedmont Park
Todd decided that since it was Labor Day we had to grill something so I picked up some Hebrew Nationals (Todd's Jewish you know), had grilled veggies, tater tots, salad and to top it off:
