Thanksgiving Joy!

This week was all about family and Thanksgiving. Deborah and her children came up last Sunday evening… after they’d celebrated Simon’s 3^rd birthday. We lodged them in the suite. Hmm. It was nice to see how well the mini-split heated the room. It was warm and cozy.

Monday, about noon, Kera and her kids arrived. They took over the downstairs bedroom and spilled over into Nathan’s room (Matthew) and the library room (Katie and Aaron). Then on Wednesday, Jonathan and Kristy arrived… and late that evening, Andy arrived. We rearranged accommodations, giving Jonathan and Kristy the library room. Isabelle and Katie slept on blow up mattresses in our room. A few got tucked into the suite, and Aaron and David decided to be he-men and sleep in the treehouse. Ian arrived early Thanksgiving day. So we had 17 children (if you include Nathan in that generation) and 8 adults for a total of 25… plus two dogs.

I was surprised by how well everyone got along. Monday Tom and I finally closed on the 211 Spring Park house that had been held up by a title issue. After closing we went to the house and started doing some leaf raking. In the short time before dusk we collected 9 bags and created a HUGE pile of leaves. Tuesday Tom and I and Kera and a bunch of kids went over to rake leaves. Katie mowed and mulched or bagged leaves in back. I trimmed bushes. Tom, Aaron, Matthew, Sarah, and Emma raked and had fun burying each other in leaves.  They bagged another 46 bags of leaves.

Kera and I walked through the house discussing flooring, paint colors, trim color and a few remodeling jobs. The large laundry room has an awkwardly small ¾ bath and a weird place for the washer/dryer. Kera cleverly solved all our problems. All it takes is knocking out a wall, removing a floor-to-ceiling cupboard and moving a sink and a heating vent… And yes, we should paint the trim white and the fireplace. I hope it turns out as nicely as I imagine it will.

In trimming and weeding the overgrown landscaping I managed to come in contact with poison oak. I knew it was there, but with the leaves off, I couldn’t tell what was what. And it needed to come up. I thought the gloves would protect me. But, apparently not.

Tuesday we began the prep for feasting. I cooked a bunch of sweet potatoes. Kera made a huge batch of cheesy potatoes and some cinnamon rolls for Wednesday breakfast. I think that night we watched the new Star Wars movie, The Force Awakens. Wednesday we cooked a ham for dinner. But we also made chocolate truffle and tollhouse cookie pies. Deborah made a cherry pie. Kera premade the veggies and sausage that would go into the stuffing and more yummy rolls. Kristy brought two pumpkin pies and made a wonderful apple pie from canned apple pie filling she’d made that summer. It was delicious! The apples were already cooked down, so the pie was dense with apples and spices! I also made a blackberry cobbler for Wednesday’s dinner.

Tom had done some food shopping on Wednesday at least once. Then as it got closer to supper we realized we needed more things and Deborah headed off to the store. We kept calling her and adding more things to buy— Ice cream to go on top if the blackberry cobbler, corn syrup for the pecan pie (then we found some in the pantry), cranberry sauce— which I was sure I had in the pantry, but did not.

Of course it all came together just fine— both Wednesday’s dinner and Thanksgiving. We had invited our neighbor, Barb, over for Thanksgiving, but she called… just not up to it. She was probably right. The commotion of 25 people might have been excessive for someone who lived alone. We got an extra table and chairs. Kera suggested a great way to rearrange the living room furniture and turn the tables window-to-kitchen so we could fit two in side-by-side.

It was great. And when we weren’t eating on them, the children were playing card games or monopoly or coloring or creating iron-bead creations. The beads aren’t made of iron, they’re plastic. But once you set them into a design, you iron them together into one piece of plastic. For some reason, this is endless fun. And I now have a variety of circles, cats, fish, and odd shapes of colorful plastic around my house.

Adults played 5 crowns, watched a movie or two, read, chatted, tried out some shooting, cooked, ate, and relaxed.

Thursday night Andy headed home. Friday morning Kera took her kids to Silver Dollar City and then home. Jonathan took his three oldest to SDC as well and they had a great time running around with their cousins. Deborah and Ian went off to try their hand at Black Friday shopping. We watched their kids. A little after noon they packed up and headed home. Wow… down to Kristy and two little ones! Jonathan and his happy bunch if kids didn’t return until 11pm or so.

Saturday was Tom’s and my turn to clean the church building. Jonathan and Kristy and family kindly came along to help out, so it only took about an hour. We stopped by to visit an elderly church member and returned home. The Mt. Vernon Foxes left early afternoon, in time to check on animals before dark. They were great about stripping beds before they left, so we did several loads of laundry and have most of the beds remade.

Nathan kept busy with work a lot of this week. And he’s been going to the gym quite a bit. So we didn’t see a lot of him with all the crowd. However, he helped rake and mulch leaves along our fence lines.

Saturday afternoon we went on a double date with another church couple and saw Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. It was a good movie. Then we went out to a Mexican restaurant. It was nice to visit and get to know them better.  When we came home and went to enclose the chickens... we found two possums in with the chickens.  A little one in the coop itself and a larger one in the run!  We scooted the little one out and enclosed the chickens, letting the larger one find its own way out. Probably should have done them in.  If they know how to get in, they'll come back.  But we will set traps.

Today we had good lessons and good Sacrament meetings. The choir sang “Ere You Left Your Room This Morning, Did You Think to Pray?” It was a lovely arrangement and fun to sing. I’m working on making the Sabbath a delight. Tom helped out by making popcorn.

We are so blessed. It’s a joy to have so many family members who love each other!