Day 28: Happy Thanksgiving!

Posted by: Cris

As expected, our Turkey Day was busy but fun. I was under strict orders from their mommy to make sure the girls were dressed cute when we left the house. I think I pulled it off: We headed over to cousin Melody's house a little before noon. The girls were super excited. When we got there, the cooks were hard at work.

While Aunt Wally finished cooking all of the delicacies, the girls were already well set-in to their playing in Melody's room.

Aunt Wally's first Turkey in years - turned out great!

My cousin Tim - who is about 3 years younger than me ;) - had one major responsibility for the day: inspecting the turkey and verifying it was safe for consumption.

Somehow we managed to coax the girls away from playing long enough to come eat dinner.

Tim (who is 5 years younger than me) carved up the first Turkey of the first Thanksgiving in their new home.

After dinner, it was back to full speed play.

Tim says that getting the girls an iPad at this point seems unavoidable.

It's amazing what a disaster 4 little girls between the ages of 2.5 and 4 can make of a room.

Eventually the playing spilled out into Tim and Beth's room as well.

This eventually led to an actual game of "5 little monkeys jumping on the bed"

Resting up for round 2 - DESSERT!

Aunt Wally was thrilled that I brought Buckeyes!

Finally, it was time to head out to Thanksgiving #2 - It was now 5:00 and the girls were already exhausted from playing all day without taking a nap.

The girls actually fell asleep in the car during the 10 minute drive from Melody's house to our next stop. I let them sleep about 30 minutes then made them get up.

The "Orphan's Dinner" at Dr. Kimura's house - Master's and PhD students with no place else to call home on Thanksgiving.

Part-time PhD student, Part-time superstar cook Dax's job was cooking the turkey this year.

PhD student Melanie (wife of Dax): Apparently it was her job to drink all day while Dax was cooking.

PhD student Jen: Apparently she was joining Melanie all day. Apparently being in a PhD program drives a person to drink.

Juneau and Nova were still super tired and were happy to just sit on the couch and watch Beauty and the Beast

Eventually Nova found this "Nova-sized" lazy boy recliner, parked it in front of the show, wrapped herself in her blue blankie and was content for the rest of the night.

Not surprisingly, they were both out cold halfway up the hill on the Likelike on the way home.

So, Thanksgiving 2010 is in the books. Though it would have been nice to be able to be together as a family and with the rest of our extended families is Ohio, it was nice to spend Thanksgiving doing some of the things that had become our Turkey Day traditions over the last 5 years (minus the Gordon Biersch). I was able to determine the one possible silver lining to Emilie being gone right now: There's not any possible chance that I have to go out and participate in the shopping fiasco that is tomorrow. Well, actually I'd be glad to sit in line at Toys R Us at 3:00 a.m. if it meant mommy was home.

I spent alot of time today thinking about how much I have to be thankful for, even in our current circumstance with Emilie so far away. I could truly never do enough to deserve the blessings that God has given me...especially the ones named Juneau, Nova and Emilie.