Christmas music is blaring behind me.  The kids and Robert are gathered around the Christmas tree playing Monopoly (I graciously bowed out since it is really just a 4 person game.  I won't mention that it is my absolutely least favorite game on this good green earth.  It just goes on FOREVER!)  So we are ready for Christmas.

But WAIT!  I never posted anything up from Thanksgiving!  How embarrassing.  Well, we still have two days before Santa comes and so I'll just sneak this little post in today.

Thanksgiving was so much fun.  Mom and Dad Jones and Tonnette came to spend the holiday with us.  Lindi wasn't feeling well, which was very sad,  but I was secretly very pleased to have everyone staying at our house.  Don't tell on me.  :)  And it was fun.  We got to have big breakfasts in the morning and play games at night.  During the day we were able to go over and spend time with Nathan and Lindi when she was feeling up to it and we were able to give her some space when she wasn't.  And of course, there was the cooking.  I cannot tell you how much better cooking a Thanksgiving meal is when Grandma and Grandpa keep the kids busy.  Especially Jason.  There were so many helpers around that things happened even when I wasn't looking.  Dishes would be washed.  Children fed.  It was like Christmas.  (No. No. No.  Not Christmas....not yet.)  

One day we tried to go to Hoover Dam, which is what every other family in Nevada was trying to do at the same time and so we decided to hike around a random hill instead.  It was all the same to the kids!

On Thanksgiving day we all got together at Nathan's and ate and ate!  I still have to get the recipe of homemade stuffing that Lindi made.  I think that is the first time I've ever eaten stuffing that wasn't from a box.  Delicious!  It was so much fun to get everyone together.  So much fun, that I failed to take many pictures.  Well.  Actually.  I only took one.  *gasp!*  I know.  So very unlike me.  To make things worse, it wasn't the most wonderful picture, but here it is nonetheless.

Despite the twins and Anna being whited out by the sun...doesn't that all look very yummy?  It was.   Good food.  Good company.  That makes for the best kind of Thanksgiving, if you ask me.  A big thank you to Mom, Dad and Tonnette for making the trip down.

One morning Nathan got Robert, Dad and Tonnette to go shooting with him.  It looks like they enjoyed themselves.  A lot.

Beside all the fun we were having for our Thanksgiving crew, we found out how cool it is to be living in-between Utah and California.  It turned out that Jim and Steph were going to CA form UT to Stephanie's Dad's house for Thanksgiving and Spencer and Lisa were going to Mom's house in Payson from San Diego for their Thanksgiving.  So before Thanksgiving, both families criss-crossed each other and stayed one night at our house to cut their trip in half.  They missed each other by a couple of days, but on their return trip, both families were here the same night.  That meant that we had Mom and Dad Jones, (Tonnette had left the day before) Jim, Steph, Yve, Oliver, Spencer, Lisa, Myles and Ellie here for one night.  I realized how much fun being a half-way house is.  

Here are their pictures all mixed together from both mini-visits.

Alaina and Ellie

Alaina and Yve

Jimmy was here for his Birthday so Rob made him a gigantic pancake to eat with a weird little candle we found.  Jim was a sport and somehow ate the whole thing (even though I told him he din't have to.)

Austin, Myles, Ethan.

We spent the morning before Spence went on to Utah at the park.

And the boys love Uncle Spencer.  I don't know why.  It's a mystery.

Overall, the before, Thanksgiving itself, and the after was all full of family and laughter.  It made me even more Thankful for my entire extended family.  

Whew.  We made it.  Now, let Christmas come!