Turkey, Shopping, Hockey and Babies!

The Wednesday before Thanksgiving after Matt and I got off work, we packed up both cars and headed to Lansing for Thanksgiving.  This year Thanksgiving was with my parents and Christmas will be in Minneola with Matt's family. We stopped for dinner on our way to my parents at the Iron Skillet in Oak Grove.  Very big portions! After that we finished driving to my parents house.  Once we got there we all watched 'A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving' which is a big tradition for me.  Very happy to share these traditions with Andrew.

Thanksgiving morning we watched the parade while my parents worked on the food.  K-Mart was open so Matt and I took the opportunity to have some time to ourselves and went there together.  It was nice to spend some time together.  We also bought some Christmas presents for some people. Once we got back to the house, I worked on the green bean casserole and helped my parents with whatever needed help with.  At about noon, everyone started showing up.  All of my grandparents, Aunt Audrey, Uncle Bob, my sister, Mark and us were there. I think there were 15 of us!  Everyone was able to bring something.  My Grandma Carol brought her chicken noodle soup which is delicious! I've had that since I was little. We also had turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy, green bean casserole, cole slaw, mac 'n cheese, rice, cranberries, rolls and dessert of course! I had to squeeze everything on my plate!  Everything was delicious and it was nice to catch up with family.

Turkey in the oven

 My plate!

Matt and Andrew

Grandma Hamm and Mom

Mom and Dad

Grandma Georgeann, Grandpa Dale and Grandpa Galen.

The famous chicken noodle soup.  It was my dessert lol.

Andrew, Mark, Renee and Grandpa Galen

After the Thanksgiving meal, a couple of us went through the Black Friday ads.  Yes, I have become one of those persons that shop on Black Friday or now it's on Thanksgiving.  Later on that afternoon Matt and I met up with my sister in law Stephanie, Matt's dad Butch and his mom Sandy at Michael's.  We shopped there for a little bit, I got some photo albums, and then we headed to Walmart.  Walmart had a lot of what we wanted to get.  We bought a train set for Andrew, some cars, Rachel Ray pot and pans set that my Aunt and I split up, some board games, Play Doh for Andrew, a couple of crock pots for some family members and a basketball.  After that I went to Toys R Us to get some of the diapers that were on sale and some DVD's for Andrew and Matt, Butch and Mitch (Matt's brother) went to Target.  Stephanie and Sandy went back home.  After I went to Toys R Us, I met back up with the guys at IHOP.  We also met up with Jon and Leslie.  It was great to see them too.  They are good friends from our old church in Gardner. Jon also is the guy that helped with our kitchens. After that Matt and I headed home.

Friday morning we headed over to Mike and Stephanie's house to hang out with the Harris' family for the day. We met Stephanie, Sandy, Jon, Leslie and their kids at Joe's Kansas City BBQ.  It was delicious! We hung out at their house for the afternoon and helped Stephanie put her Christmas decorations up. Matt had to head back to Columbia that night so he just hung out at their house till it was time to leave.  After dinner, Stephanie, Amy (Stephanie's friend), Mryanda (Stephanie's daughter), and I went to see the Mavericks Hockey game.  It was nice to have some girl time!

Saturday was a relaxing day at my parents house.  I did go see a couple of good friends and their adorable new baby boy! It was nice to catch up with Jacqy, Jason and baby Bruce.

Baby Bruce was so sweet!

After I visited them, I went to see my Aunt and Uncle for a bit.  Stopped by to say hi and drop off some things I picked up for her from shopping.

My parents got out a whole bunch of my sister and I's old toys.  Andrew was having a lot of fun with them!

Sunday morning I packed everything up into the car and then that afternoon my cousin had her baby shower.  She is expecting in January.  It was very nice to see her and other relatives. We had lunch and cake. Then played a couple of games and Kara unwrapped gifts.  She is having a girl and lets say baby Kennedy has a lot of pink and purple clothes!

Cute party favors!

Pretty center pieces.

They were Starburst flavored candy corn candy! Very good!

After the shower, Andrew and I headed home to Columbia.  It was nice to see family and friends over the Thanksgiving holiday extended weekend! Can't wait for Christmas, it will be here before we know it!