I think it's safe to say that the thing we were most grateful for this thanksgiving was that we were all together! It was so great of Wells and Emily to host us all week long. Morgan (Mark's niece) drove down to Phoenix with the kids and I on the Friday before Thanksgiving. Mark had the weekend off so he drove up from Tuscon. Wells was off to a Rugby tournament in CA and Emily was leaving with the kids to visit her sister in Tucson so when we pulled in we stopped at our good friends the Larsen's. (Emily wasn't gone yet and she was sure that her kids wouldn't want to leave for Tucson if they knew we were staying at their house so we crashed Tiff's house until they were gone.) Seriously Tiffany is one of the coolest people I know. She is one of those friends that you just wish you could plan your life around so you could always be neighbors. Seriously she was about to pop with her 4th baby (in a beautiful sort of way. For real she's super cute pregnant. :) but didn't even bat an eyelash when I called her to see if we could come and visit for a few hours. And it helps that our kids are the right ages and right genders. Except now she's got me beat because she had sweet baby Amelia right after we came home. :) Now if I could just follow in her footsteps and have another baby girl!
Eric, Sam, Ellie, Zina, Wilson, Charlie
Ok. this post is about thanksgiving. So that night we had pizza with the Larsen's and enjoyed the visit so much. Thanks guys! Then we went to Wells and Emily's. They were so gracious to let us stay there while they were gone. Sat. we took Morgan up to the Anthem outlets and had a picnic at the Anthem city park. Mark and the kids had a riot going up and down all the slides and the kids were in HEAVEN with park on the playground with them. Sadly that was also the day I realized my camera was broken. So any and all pictures were taken with Mark's Iphone. I hate not having a camera! Sunday we went to church at our old ward. It was bittersweet. So nice to see everyone and so weird because it felt like we had just been on vacation and were now home. Seriously that's how we felt all weekend. Sunday night Wells, Emily and co. came home and the kids were so excited to see their cousins. Sadly Mark had to go back to Tuscon to finish up his rotation. We spent the next couple of days visiting old friends, playing with cousins and having a girls night out. It was really great to see everyone! We woke up Wednesday to Joel and Angela having arrived in the wee hours of the morning and then the party really got started! Actually it was a big prep day for the next day. Joel brought his bbq so we made a couple of trips to the store to make sure we had everything we needed for thanksgiving and just hung out together. Thursday was the day we spent ALL day in the kitchen. Seriously at about 5pm I commented that I couldn't believe the day was almost over and Emily said it was because we were slaving in the kitchen all day and we were! Well the girls were anyways! The boys had a great time playing flag football at Thunderbird. They came home and said they had rocked the pitch. I guess their team won by 6 touchdowns or something. anyways they had fun. :) We had roasted turkey, Joel's smoked turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy, grandma's green jello, fresh rolls, broccoli, corn and cheese sauce, green beans with crispy onions, spinach strawberry salad with candied almonds and creamy dressing, Angela's yams, and I'm sure I'm missing something!
Joel carving his smoked turkey. y.u.m!
We took the kids to the park and Wells played some mini football with them while we all visited. When we got home we had pie! Sour cream blackberry, sour cream apple, pecan, and pumpkin. It was so good and there were lots of leftovers. :) The boys and Emily and Morgan headed over to Walmart at 10pm to see what deals they could get their hands on. Mark sent me a text at about 9:56 saying,
"This is INSANITY!"
He still ended up getting me a nice griddle for $10 and some 600 thread count sheets for $20. Thanks honey! Friday morning Angela, Emily, Morgan and I woke up at 6am and hit the stores. We shopped till we dropped! 8 hours to be exact and had a great time. Although now I need to return a few things. :):) We left 4am Sat. morning (which also happened to be Mark's 29th birthday) for home and made it all in one piece! Grandma Judy came to the birthday rescue and served up some delicious dinner with Mark's requested cream cheese brownie cupcakes and a BYU basketball? football? game on t.v. Good thing too because Mark flew out Sunday night for interviews in Syracuse NY and Bethlehem PA. That is whole other post though. Thanks Wells and Emily for hosting such a fun Thanksgiving!! And Happy 29th birthday Mark. Phew what a whirlwind!
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