Thanksgiving Break

I'm having a hard time getting into the Christmas Spirit this year and I think one of the reason is because I haven't blogged about Thanksgiving yet.  So let's go over all the fun stuff that we did for that holiday, and then maybe I'll be able to work up some Christmas Cheer.

We had a really great Thanksgiving.  We were able to spend it with my sister Emily in North Carolina.  The kids got 10 days off of school and originally I was hoping that Brandon would be able to get most of that time off as well.  I really wanted us to go on a road trip to Northern Alabama before heading over to North Carolina.  But alas, flight school classes were scheduled right up until the day before Thanksgiving.  

Part of me didn't really want to drive all the way to North Carolina and only spend three full days with my sister.  But Brandon said that's what he really wanted to do and since Thanksgiving is his favorite holiday we did what he wanted.  Plus we are really lucky to have family on the same side of the country so the long drive was worth it to have family to celebrate with.  

So we decided to drive to North Carolina as soon as Brandon could sign out on Wednesday and spend as much time there as possible before we had to head home.  But I'm getting ahead of myself here. First we need to talk about what the kids did for Thanksgiving at school. 

The kids had lots of fun learning about Thanksgiving themed stuff in Pre-K.  Charlotte's teacher had us send in an old tan Army shirt for Charlotte to make into an Indian dress.  She wore it home on the last day of school before the break.  Lydia had worn a jumper that we call the Indian Dress to school that day. They each made headdress at school too. It was fun to see my two little indians get off the school bus. (I'm sure Derrick's class did fun Thanksgiving stuff too, but he didn't wear anything special.)

Lydia also made this turkey in class.

We started the break off with a fun trip to the immunization clinic so the kids and I could all get our flu shots.  Fun! Fun!  Actually it turned out pretty great because the kids are all old enough to get the nasal spray so they all got immunized without any drama.   I opted to still get a shot because I wanted the kids to see that it is possible to get a shot without crying.  They all thought I was so brave. 

The rest of the break was spent enjoying the fact that we didn't have to be ready for the day at 7:45.  One morning the girls made up this little band.  They specifically wanted me to film this and put it on the blog so you all could see. 

Later they wanted to have a parade so we all walked over to our neighbors house with silly instruments.  

My favorite part of the break was when Brandon came home early on Tuesday and I took the Honda to get an oil change.  The place we go has this really nice leather sofa in the waiting room.  I looked forward to sinking down into that sofa and reading a book all day.  It was so nice!  

We also cleaned out the car and packed it for our trip to Emily's house.  I was planning to arrange the seats the way I always do for our road trips with two kids per row and the side seats folded down.  But Derrick and Veronica have new, wider car seats and so that wasn't possible.  After thinking about it for a minute I decided to try a brand new arrangement.  We put the three girls in the front and exiled Derrick to the back with all the stuff.  This actually made a lot of sense because this way Derrick couldn't hit anyone when he got bored.  (He did that a lot during our summer trip.)  I was worried that Derrick would feel alone in the back, but he seemed to like it a lot.  

We weren't sure when we'd be able to leave.  Technically Brandon couldn't sign out until Midnight on Wednesday and that meant we wouldn't get to Emily's until about noon on Thursday.  But we also knew that it was possible he'd be able to sign out earlier on Wednesday.  So I just had the car packed and ready for whenever he was ready.  He was able to sign out early and we were on the road by 3:00 pm.  We drove through some really pretty scenery in Alabama. Unfortunately the sun set around 5:30 and we had to make most of the drive in the dark.

We stopped for dinner at McDonalds in Phenix City.  Actually we'd been looking for a gas station so the girls could go to the bathroom, but we found McDonalds first.  It had a play place and the kids needed to stretch their legs so we decided we might as well go in and order some fries.

The kids had a lot of fun in the play place.

They wanted me to take this video.  (And yes Charlotte is wearing her Halloween tutu.)

After everyone got their wiggles out we got back in the car and headed over the Chattahoochee River and into Columbus, Georgia. This is where I visited when Brandon went to basic training three years ago.  Back then we both felt like that was the only time we'd ever be in Georgia - or the south for that matter - yet here we are now.

We continued on to Atlanta and through the rest of Georgia.   We stopped for one more bathroom break at a rest stop somewhere along the I-20.  We also hurried to change Charlotte and Lydia into pajamas. (Derrick and Veronica were already wearing pretty comfy clothes.) The kids watched movies and gradually fell asleep as we drove.

We passed into South Carolina.  It was after midnight and all the kids were asleep.  I convinced Brandon to pull over at a Love's Travel Stop so we could try to take a nap.  We ended up sleeping for two whole hours before any of the kids woke up.  Then it was on our way some more.

Our next stop was at a rest stop just over the boarder in North Carolina.  This was around 4:00 or 5:00 am and the sun wasn't up yet.  I was surprised by how many other cars were at the rest stop.  There were many people walking in and out of the rest room building.  Apparently we weren't the only ones trying to get our destination that night.

We headed north and then east and soon we were approaching Greenville. Emily called me when we were about 20 minutes away from her house.  I hadn't told her that Brandon had been able to sign out early so she was super excited to hear how close we were.

We arrived at her house and were so happy to be out of the car.  Emily and David were really happy to see Brandon.  This is the first time they've seen him since we went camping together in the summer of 2012.  That was almost three and a half years ago.  

I thought Brandon would just want to go to bed (he'd been up at 4:00 the day before and had only had a few hours of sleep in the car) but instead he went with David to a Turkey bowl football game.  Emily and I kept the kids entertained in the house.

Since we knew we'd be arriving on Thursday we'd agreed to do Thanksgiving stuff on Friday.  So we were free to just relax and recover on Thursday.  I kept expecting Brandon to want to take a nap, but instead he came home from the turkey bowl and started making pies.  I decided that one of us should get some sleep so I headed up stairs for a four hour nap.  At some point Derrick joined me.

Meanwhile Brandon and Emily and David took the other kids to a skate park.  Here are Brandon and David with six of the seven kids.

 They all had fun sliding down the ramp.

 Charlotte showed that she's not afraid to get tough even while wearing a fancy dress.

 This picture perfectly sums up Veronica's personality.

 And this one could be one of my baby pictures.  She looks so much like me its uncanny.

I woke up while everyone was gone and had dinner ready for them when they all came home.
Brandon finally crashed sometime after dinner.  I stayed up and played games with Emily and David.

The next day was Black Friday and I tagged along with Emily to Joanne's at 6:00 am.  She bought a ton of Christmas Fabric at an amazing deal.  When we got back home Brandon was already working on the Turkey for our Thanksgiving Dinner. I told Emily that hosting us for Thanksgiving is super easy because Brandon will cook everything.

Emily had told her kids that Thanksgiving is super fun because you get to watch movies all day.  We bought our projector so the kids have a big screen to watch movies on. 

For several weeks Charlotte had been telling me that she wanted to make "Sun flower Caramel" for Thanksgiving.  I was a little confused about what this was exactly,  I wasn't sure if it was something she'd made up or if she'd learned about it at school. She told me that it needed Caramels and honey.  So I bought caramels so we could make Sun Flower Caramel.  I thought that maybe we were supposed to mix the two, but Charlotte told me to just pour the honey on the caramels.  I thought it would be fun if we added some pretzels so I talked her into melting some caramels onto pretzels. Then we put everything into the freezer. Charlotte was very proud of her creation.   (and they tasted pretty good too)

At one point we took the kids on a little walk in the woods behind Emily's house.

When we were here in the summer it was just too dang hot to enjoy the outside, but now the weather was perfect.

All the food was done around 2:00 and it was time to eat.  Everything looked and smelled great.

It was so nice to be together as a family for this meal.  We've spent the last two Thanksgivings with my sister Lindsey's family.  I'm glad we were still able to be with family even though we've moved. 

I'd told myself that I was allowed to eat whatever I wanted during the actual Thanksgiving Meal, but that I wouldn't eat any left overs.  And I held myself to that.  I started out with a small 6 inch plate and filled that up.  Later I ate a ton of green bean casserole because that is my favorite side dish.  I also ate a lot of rolls because eating bread is something I've really missed the past few weeks.

After dinner Brandon switched gears and started trying to fix Emily's dryer.  Emily and I took the kids to another park.  They played for a long time and then we walked by a river.

Then we went back home for some pie.  The kids were really excited.

I ate one piece of pie with whipped cream and then I laid on the couch and thought I was going to die - or at least throw up.  My body does not enjoy sugar like it used to.

We'd rented Inside Out from Redbox so we all sat down to watch that.  It was super cute and I really liked it.  Then I started washing dishes because that's my contribution to Thanksgiving.  Brandon had been unable to fix the dryer so he and David went to Lowes and bought a new one.  They bought that back and Brandon hooked it up.  

The kids enjoyed the box.  I didn't get a picture of it, but later Brandon made the box into a really cool fort.

The next day was Saturday and we started out by taking family pictures in the woods behind Emily's house.  We got at least a one shot good enough for a Christmas Card, a few almost good enough pictures, and a whole bunch where at least one person looked terrible.  Here is one of the near misses. 

 Somehow though some crazy coincidence Emily and I both married men born on November 30.  Since that was Monday and we'd be gone by that day we decided to just celebrate their birthday's on Saturday.

We started our celebrations by going to Krispy Kreme donuts and watching donuts get made.

 We bought a dozen donuts and everyone (except me) got one.

 The store was giving out free balloons and that made everyone happy.

 After that we went to the office where David does therapy.  He took us into the play therapy room and the kids had fun playing with all the toys.   Veronica, of course, found the biggest bear in the room.

 Charlotte, of course, made a little farm with animals.

 Derrick, of course found the train.

 And I can't remember what Lydia did, but I'm sure it was completely in character for her. Afterward we walked down the really cool staircase.  Emily says she likes to pretend this is her house.

After that we came home and had a little lunch.  Later it was time for cake.  I'd made and frosted the cake but Brandon and David took care of lighting their own candles.

We put thirty candles on the cake and sang to David.

Then we added three more so we could sing to Brandon.

Here is a video of Brandon's turn. 

Everyone had cake and fried ice cream.  Emily had spent a long time on the fried ice cream.   I had a few bites of the ice cream and I told Brandon that he needs to make it for me on my birthday.

That night Emily arranged for two babysitters so we could go on a double date to eat at Long Horn Steakhouse.  It was really fun to go out as couples and not worry about our slew of kids.

Then we went home and started packing up our stuff and putting it into the car. We were supposed to go to bed early-ish,  But instead we stayed up until after 11:00 talking.

The next day we woke up and had a relaxed breakfast and then it was time to say good bye to Emily's family.  The nice thing is that we don't have to say goodbye for long.  They are coming to our house for Christmas!

We drove down to the rest stop over the South Carolina Boarder and had lunch. Again I was so surprised by all the other travelers.  We'd stopped at this same rest stop in August and there had been just a few other cars.  This time there were at least five times as many.

Derrick liked looking at all the leaves falling.

We were on the road again.  Travelling during the day was harder than travelling at night because the kids seemed a lot more needy.  Charlotte and Lydia also needed more bathroom breaks than they had at night.

Somewhere in South Carolina we stopped to go to the bathroom and noticed a small church near the gas station.  We drove over there and let the kids get out and run around.

Everyone had some pudding.

There was a graveyard near the church and we walked around that and read the headstones.

There was also a little path so we went for a walk on that.

That ended at a dirt road.  We turned around and went back to the car.  It had been a good little break and everyone seemed a lot calmer after that.

Here are the girls goofing off in the car when Veronica fell asleep.

And they took a video of what it's like to ride in the car.  Check out how bored I look.  Long drives are just mind numbing. (But I love them anyway.)

It was dark by the time we reached Atlanta.  We drove straight though Atlanta and south to Columbus. Around Eufaula all the kids fell asleep and so we just kept on driving until we reached Ozark and the Fort Rucker gate.  The drive had taken 13 hours and we were exhausted. We got the kids out of the car and put them in their beds without any fuss.

Brandon hurried over to sign back in and then we went to bed.

There wasn't much time to recover though because the next day was Monday and the kids and Brandon all had to go back to school.  Fortunately I'd made sure that everyone had clean clothes to wear when we get back so it wasn't too hard to get everyone out the door.  I struggled though.  My shoes were missing and so it was the first time I've ever been barefoot at the bus stop.

I spent most of the day in a fog with occasional bursts of clarity as I paid our bills and did some online shopping.  Then in the evening it was time to fully wake up and celebrate Brandon's 33rd birthday.  But that's another post.

Anyway, driving to North Carolina for Thanksgiving was exhausting, but also very worth it.  I'm glad that we have family within driving distance - even if that distance is 13 hours worth of travelling.