Thanksgiving 2013

I was up at 6 with my tiny guy.  HE's sleeping through the night which is glorious.  So of course now he's up at the crack of dawn instead of his usual 7:30am arousal.  I'll take it.  I love calm mornings with my baby.

This morning we made coffee and ogled each other for a bit.  Then I thought I'd check out some deals online, excited to find that a few items in my Magic Cabin cart had gone on sale for black friday, ooh carter's too.  Party gifts for Ainsley's birthday and stocking stuffers, done and done. Ahh.

Ian had to work today.  It makes this weekend feel much less holiday-y I will say.  It makes it a bit more interesting too that it's Black Friday meaning venturing out sounds like torture.  So inside it is.

This morning the girls and I made three batches of cookie dough.  They have a school fundraiser "cookie walk" next weekend and we need to bake 12 dozen decorated cookies to donate.  I think the first batch will be fun.  I'm preparing for the rest to feel like a whole lot of work.  This year we're sticking to the basics.  Decorated gingerbread, stained glass sugar cutouts and painted sugar cookies.  I hope we have enough stamina to make some more for ourselves a bit later in the season!

The kids are all resting and I just finished rearranging and cleaning the living room.  half in preparation for decorating this weekend and half just to scratch that fung shui itch I get about every 4 months.  It's nice to get a good deep clean and feel a bit more organized.  Especially right on the brink of so much holiday chaos.

I've been struggling a bit this fall with that whole "holiday cheer" feeling.  Usually I am SO into it, plans months in advance, excitement of a tiny child etc. etc.  This year I'm feeling a bit less gung ho.  I'm still pretty tired most days from all this child caring I do.  I just want it to be easy and to enjoy it all a bit more.

I am excited for Dec. 1.  Today we brought out some decorations to get organized.  Last year I segregated the child friendly ones so it should be a relatively easy set up.
I'm most excited for our stocking advent, Ainsley too.  She remembered getting to look in the stockings every morning to see what treat awaits them.  She's a girl after he mama's heart.  I've always been a stocking girl myself.  I'm glad I've stashed away some fun treats and goodies, and counting on fun holiday-ey plans and recipes to get us through the rest of the days.  For any bit of cheer I'm lacking my girls make up for it.  They are SO excited.

Oh, so this post was titled Thanksgiving.  I guess I should write about that!  We had an awesome day.  I'm so bummed we only have ONE photo (of my Gram and her cranberry sauce).  I didn't cook or host this year which was so wonderful but it made thhe day so casual fun it hardly felt like an event.  I'll have to get the kids dressed up and take a post holiday photo this weekend.

We started our day in jammies with the parades on in the background.  Then I made pumpkin pie with the girls.  I believe we added almost twice the recommended amount of spices...I left the girls alone with the jars, whoops!  Then we made our contribution to our shared meal, green bean casserole, trader joes style.  I love their crispy onions and portabello mushroom soup.
Then we headed over to our friend's house for the meal.  The girls were SO excited to play with their friend Lily and it was lots of fun to hang out and eat and play with friends.  Lizz is an amazing cook and the food was so good.  It was the perfect meal.
After stuff in ourselves to the brim we headed back home to whip up some cream, grab our pie and drive up to Winnetka for our second celebration.  We went to my aunt and uncle's house and ended up getting to eat a bit more turkey and gravy before our pie and our drive home.  The girls had tons of fun with my cousins.  My 10th grade cousin Kiley has the most perfect amazing girl bedroom ever and the girls were enamored.  It was so much fun to see my Gram too, and her perfect cranberry sauce.  It was a great day.

Now I'm looking forward to the weekend.  To picking out a tree and decorating a bit, perhaps seeing that new Disney movie with the girls and getting the last of the shopping done.  Perhaps I'll even pull out the wrapping paper and get going on that a bit.

I love this time, I'm just trying to live it day by day and eek out every bit of joy from this season and my wonderful family.