Thankful For Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving in my favorite holiday. Why? Well, here are a few reasons:

1. There are no presents to buy
2. You're encouraged (nay, expected) to feast on delicious food
3. There's football on TV
4. The whole family gets together to celebrate
5. I get two days off work
6. Black Friday / Cyber Monday deals on Amazon

Now maybe I'm weird, but that looks like a pretty good list of perks to me. What's not to love?

We started out with some exciting travel the weekend before Thanksgiving. Leslie and I drove down to Wilmore, KY to visit my sister. She's currently a student at Asbury and we've been meaning to visit for awhile, so it was nice to finally get down there. We got to see campus, check out a local restaurant, go ice skating, grab some coffee, and even meet her boyfriend. It was a quick trip, full of fun, and definitely worth getting up early on a Saturday to take.

Then, in preparation for the greatest holiday ever invented, we spent much of Tuesday night baking. Leslie made a double batch of the delicious yeast rolls that her family has for most holidays and I made a few pies to serve after dinner with my family. We then journeyed up to Fort Wayne, baked goods and the dog in tow, on Wednesday after work.

We spent Thanksgiving day at my parents house. It was a large event, as usual, with 21 people, family and friends, all packed in for our Thanksgiving meal. The usual suspects were there - turkey, ham, mashed potatoes, stuffing, green beans, sweet potato casserole, and more. And, as a special treat, we made homemade ice cream later in the day (in case we hadn't already had enough food?). We played cards and watched football and talked and did all that typical family stuff. It was the lovely, familiar holiday I'm used to.

Friday, instead of going shopping like some people do, we went to Leslie's parents' house for round two! We had lots of food, but it's a different take on things than what we had the day previous, so it didn't feel redundant at all. Oh, and this was a Thanksgiving I'm still not so used to... there are kids. Lots of kids. Five whole kids. And they all want to climb on / sit on / ride on / jump off of / be thrown in the air by / wrestle me (well, maybe not the baby... but he'll get there soon enough). So it's a little more hectic environment, but still fun. They're great kids and love their aunt Leslie and uncle Jeremy the best. Leslie's sister's family also got a new puppy recently, so Leo had a lot of fun playing with their two dogs. It was a good time for everyone, and we were glad we got to see everyone on both sides.

And that about does it for our Thanksgiving adventure. Thanks for reading and I hope you all had wonderful Thanksgivings of your own. Now, just as a warning (as I'm sure many of you will also be busy with holiday festivities this month), our blog posts might be a little more inconsistent for a bit. Sorry to ruin your day.

Thanks again and have a great week!