We had a great Thanksgiving! It actually started Monday when CJ's parents surprised us a day early, along with his sister Jessica and cousin Nick who were visiting from college. Then on Tuesday we were joined by Kandis, who had been gone all week working, her friend Mike AND CJ's brother Andrew and his wife Lisa who came all the way from North Carolina! We had a house full, but it was so much fun to be together! Wednesday almost everyone enjoyed a day of just hanging out and napping. Steve and Joanne enjoyed part of the day car shopping though! What better thing to do on vacation than car shop? Although before shopping Steve and Nick were able to take a 4 wheeler ride with CJ. Yep, the right of passage!
Then Thanksgiving Day!!! I, obviously, was in my bliss. You think I was cooking for 13, right? Nope! 18! I'll get to that later!
It was nice that none of our days had anything pressing to be done in the mornings, so it was always very laid back in the mornings and people just took their time getting ready. Steve and JoJo headed out on the car exchange and to do some last minutes grocery errands. CJ, Kandis and Mike took out the 4 wheelers (yes, they received the right of passage as well), Nick left the night before to visit a friend and to stay with his mom who had gotten to Salt Lake from Oregon. And Blake and Andrew caught up on some long sought after ping pong and chess playing.
(There was a lot of long sought after ping pong and chess playing that went on this week!
This was the families traditional round robin tournament!). 
That left Jessica, Lisa and I, in a very quiet house, to get things ready for dinner... but not before Lisa, Kandis and Mike got everything peeled and cut for me! Jess, Lisa and the girls 
prepared centerpiece turkeys for each plate, then Ashlyn and Lisa made name cards to go with them. They turned out so cute!!! And Jess did a BEAUTIFUL job setting the table! 
With preparations well on their way CJ, Kandis and Mike came home, Steve and JoJo got back and the company started to arrive!! Four more, and Nick... Steve's Mom and 2 sisters, Shelley and Cindy, and Cindy's husband Paul! My fist Thanksgiving, if I do say so myself, turned out perfectly! I made 2 turkeys and neither was either frozen or dried out!! SUCCESS!! Our best friends in Utah, Spencer and Allison, live down on the corner of our street and had gone to Spokane for the holiday. I... we... owe a huge THANK YOU to them for letting us use whatever we needed in their house... and we ended up really needing their house for more than just the second turkey... and all of their silverware :) (more on that later too)!
I also owe a H U G E debt of gratitude to my dishwashers (especially Kandis who does them every day :0))! I DID NOT DO ONE DISH ALL WEEK!!!!! NOT ONE! Maybe, I might have put one MAYBE two into the actual dishwasher... but I did not wash ONE DISH! I can't imagine what would have happened if I would have. We probably... no we DEFINATELY wouldn't have had such a beautiful thanksgiving table! And thank you to the Thanksgiving clean up crew... I didn't do ANY of that either!!! I don't even know if I cleared my own plate off the table?!?! Thank you all!! Dishes stress me out!!!
Friday we went to Grandmas condo. The building she lives in has a game room and a theater. 
Unfortunately my kidney decided that it was time to become active again (we're still waiting for medical assistance) so I didn't have the greatest day, but it was so great to watch everyone have so much fun! I did attempt to play Foosball... that was way to intense for how I was feeling! I did manage to endure through a game of pool ~ though I have lost all the skills I had in the past, but it was fun nonetheless!! 
The theater room played The Muppet's Christmas Carol which Kailey and Canyon enjoyed part of while eating popcorn and drinking lemonade with aunt Shelley and aunt Cindy. Kailey also became an air hockey pro with Grandma, while Ashlyn became the Foosball champ of the world! CJ is contesting the ping pong and chess titles with 
every other man that was here, and I will proudly honor my Best Thanksgiving Ever title... ok, so that's being contested by both JoJo and Grandma too!
Unfortunately my kidney decided that it was time to become active again (we're still waiting for medical assistance) so I didn't have the greatest day, but it was so great to watch everyone have so much fun! I did attempt to play Foosball... that was way to intense for how I was feeling! I did manage to endure through a game of pool ~ though I have lost all the skills I had in the past, but it was fun nonetheless!! 
The theater room played The Muppet's Christmas Carol which Kailey and Canyon enjoyed part of while eating popcorn and drinking lemonade with aunt Shelley and aunt Cindy. Kailey also became an air hockey pro with Grandma, while Ashlyn became the Foosball champ of the world! CJ is contesting the ping pong and chess titles with 
every other man that was here, and I will proudly honor my Best Thanksgiving Ever title... ok, so that's being contested by both JoJo and Grandma too!I am already looking forward to next year!
Saturday was one last day of rest before everyone started heading out in the afternoon. The highlight of that day was listening to the brothers jam together. I had never seen this before, but they sounded great!
We had so much fun and welcome as many guests as will ever want to show up! I have come up with a few statistics for our Thanksgiving week....
Saturday was one last day of rest before everyone started heading out in the afternoon. The highlight of that day was listening to the brothers jam together. I had never seen this before, but they sounded great!
We had so much fun and welcome as many guests as will ever want to show up! I have come up with a few statistics for our Thanksgiving week....
14 rolls of toilet paper
7 pounds of butter (YIKES!!!)
7 gallons of Milk
16 pounds of potatoes
20 pounds of meat
6 loaves of bread
3 pounds of cream cheese
AND
1 house evacuation!! Oh, did I fail to mention that?!?! Mom and Dad... stop reading now. No, REALLY stop reading now.
Ok, now that they're gone... What have I always said about us and drama?! Thanksgiving night we were playing games. The kids were all in bed. It was probably about 9:30. Blake went downstairs and decided to open a window (one of the brothers had been having "issues" earlier in the night). He then came upstairs and asked CJ to go back down with him... and a few moments later CJ came up and told us to get the kids and leave the house because they thought there was a gas leak!!! So a few of us grabbed a kid and we headed down to Spencer and Allison's where we called 911. The fire department showed up within just a couple of minutes and determined that yes we did have a gas leak, a significant gas leak, on the outside of our house which could be heard audibly! Thankfully it wasn't following any piping into our house. They did inform us though that the odor the gas company puts into the gas, so you can smell it, is so strong that the odor can be detected before there are any harmful levels of gas in the home. The fire dept. turned off the gas and the gas company showed up to fix the problem. It turned out to be a seal that was left off a few months ago when they came and changed the meter! It was so cold that night that all the pipes shrunk and caused the leak to become significant. We are very thankful for Andrews gas that night which caused Blake to open the window!!! Oops, I wasn't going to mention names! But I do think he is rather proud to have saved the family! We love you Andrew! (And no Mom, I didn't really think you would stop reading!!)
The happy family....
and the wonderful women who work all the magic behind the scenes!
A few more weeks and we'll be headed for Spokane!!! YEAH!! I am looking so forward to the clouds and gloom... ok, so maybe not that part, but I am very excited to be back "home" for a while. Taraka, I have the 27th reserved for you!! You better be there... or at least not forget ;0). Sondra, I havent heard back from you! Angela, Christmas Eve, right? Nita we've got a dinner to figure out!! Shaaaandiiiii.... ohhhh Shaaaandiiiiiii.........!!!!!!! Love you all and I CAN'T WAIT!!!
