Thanksgiving + Football.

We had a nice little Thanksgiving. I decided I should practice cooking in case we start playing host in years to come, so I cooked EVERYTHING! Then we ended up eating at our neighbor's house, so we saved our turkey and some other sides for a meal the next day. I am realizing now that we took no pictures of all the beautiful food! Sad! Let's just say that injecting your turkey with a little butter goes a long way. This recipe was awesome!! I had some good learning experiences (bake the rolls for less time, don't drop the pumpkin pie toffee cheesecake on the floor while pulling it out of the fridge, etc.), and Rick and I seriously had fun cooking up a storm in the kitchen together for two days straight.

The kids' table at our neighbor's house. Again, no other pictures is breaking my heart! But thanks to the Walton's for hosting a lovely meal.

Ok I did find one more picture. The salvaged part of the dropped cheesecake, and an apple pie. (I am a little bit proud of my beautiful crust.)

The boys were pretty excited about these little candy turkeys we made. We stuck name card in them for the table setting.

I convinced BFF Carrie to go Black Friday shopping with me. We headed out at 9:30 p.m. and got back before 2. We had SO MUCH FUN, but let's be honest: the deals were just not worth it to me. I actually have now returned most everything I bought that night.

We got to go to a Wake football game Thanksgiving weekend. (The last of the season, which means it was our last chance ever to attend a game while living here! Thanks Jared for hooking us up!!) The game was just perfect. Beautiful weather, all three kids had a blast, Rick got to watch a football game, and I got to chat with BFF Etta. (I have a lot of BFFs.) You can see how the kids felt about the game:

So maybe we don't look thrilled, but I'm sure we were chatting about something important.

We learned that big pretzels keep Faye occupied for a long time.

The loudness of the game plus the threat of the Deamon Decon mascot coming near had Carson doing this for the first half of the game, but he loosened up eventually.

If you look, you can see Everett hugging the Deamon Deacon. Lately, Everett wants whatever is exactly opposite of what Carson says or does. So, I ask Carson if he wants to go meet the Deamon Deacon, and of course his answer is, "No way." Everett immediately says, "I do!" And there he goes.

And now we are feeling all Christmas-y around here! Off to work on some home-made gifts!!