Thanksgiving 2013.

My parents flew in for a visit over Thanksgiving weekend, very exciting for us! Rick was so excited that he got a little sick right before they came. He got home from work one night, and I came in to see this:

And while falling asleep while doing his reading isn't unusual, falling asleep before eating anything is very unusual, indicating the sickness. (Side note: when I walked in and saw Rick asleep, my first thought was, "shoot, he's going to pee on the couch!" But then I remembered that this is my husband, not one of my kids.)

And then that sickness spread to my dad and got him really sick, which was not so great. But the rest of the holiday was!

Our second time making a turkey injected with garlic and butter, the Our Best Bites recipe. We are fans.

The kids love making those little candy turkeys.

As always, I had some projects waiting for my dad's assistance. I was in the middle of putting in a wall of built-in bookcases, which is a lot easier than it sounds thanks to IKEA's Billys. We all wrote on the back of the last piece of bookcase to go up on the wall. Maybe decades from now, someone will take them down and find our messages.

I told Carson to take a picture of this, so thanks, Carson. The morning of the day my parents left, I ran to Home Depot to get the crown molding, my dad and I rushed around to cut it and install it right before going to the airport.

And this is how they look now. Unfortunately I'm dragging my feet about doing the last steps of caulking and painting, and then it will be so fun to fill the shelves! If I could create my dream life, my parents would live right down the street, and my dad would help me with projects every weekend.

One major highlight of their trip: the rodeo! (The boys are annoyed at having a picture taken, not at going to the rodeo.) Grandmama and Pappy took just the big boys, and they had so much fun. Not pictured are lots of fun grandparent activities like making gingerbread houses with Grandmama (which Faye has affectionately shortened to just Gram) and playing Monopoly with Pappy. Very grateful to my parents for being devoted to my kids.

I just realized I neglected to take a picture of our Thanksgiving tree. I like to get out the tree and Christmas decor nice and early, and for the month of November the tree is decorated with thankful ornaments. This year we just cut a bunch of stars out of brown paper. I gave each kid a few stars (the number of their ages), and they were instructed to write only the things they were most grateful for out of everything. Carson thoughtfully wrote: my body, soft grass, family, school, food.  Everett was equally sincere when he wrote things like cows and an ax. I asked him about the ax, and he said if a tornado ever tore down our house, we'd need the ax when we were doing construction to rebuild. Faye dictated to me to write toys and Jesus. I was most grateful for Scobee Elementary School, a healthy body, financial stability, forgiveness, and laughter. Rick wrote three things: a free country, a beautiful wife, and good kids.