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Saturday, November 30, 2013

Thanksgiving 2013

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving.  So much to be thankful for.  I've been reading the devotional Jesus Calling for a while now, and over the past 2 weeks it's really been talking a lot about being thankful. And to always thank God no matter what our circumstances are.  And while this is not a 'bad' time in our life....I do have my daily struggles.  With patience, with the overwhelming job of keeping up the house (which I'm pretty sure I fail at most days), for teaching my kids the the Word, for just teaching my kids to have integrity and think of other before themselves (we have a lot of work to do in this area...on them and myself), with honoring my husband, spending time with God, with getting my 2 youngest kids to sleep through the night.  ;)  


But I'm so thankful for it all.  
For the piles and piles of laundry....because it means I have a large family.
For the messes I clean up, but seem to multiply all within minutes....because it means I have 2 little girls that are running around me pulling it out.
For the sleepless nights....because it means that I have a baby.

We went to my moms for the day....and I had to run home not long after we got there to get a few things I had forgotten.  Fortunately- we only live minutes away.  But it was long enough to listen to a message that was playing on one of the Christian radio stations.  And I don't even know who it was that was talking....but he said something that kind of got to me.  How sometimes we might not seem grateful...or want to be grateful...because of the things that are going on in our lives.  And I've been there...I've thought, "Well, Lord...I know I should be thankful because I have so much, but this thing going on in my life right now is not so good...and I'm not really thankful for that."  But it is a mindset.  And the preacher even said...gratitude is not a feeling, but a choice.  And it really just spoke to me so I thought I'd share.  I'm sure I'll need the reminder again.  ;)

Our day.


Payton, Parker, & Grace


Me and my girlies.  {Nolan was napping.}


The kids table.


I made these cute and easy pilgrim hat crayon holders.  (idea from here)


The girls though they were so neat.  And the table was covered in brown butcher paper, so they colored their color sheets, then the table cover.




Poppa carving the turkey.  They fried 2 turkeys and they were delicious and beautiful, BUT I did not get a picture.


A few little snacks to munch on before lunch.


I made this fruit 'turkey' tray again this year.  So fun and easy.


And then we ate.  A lot.  Way too much.  And it was so so good.


Then we played a couple of rounds of Thanksgiving Bingo.  (free printable from here)  This was a great idea because the girls were able to play, and the adults didn't mind playing along either.


And a puppet show from behind the tv by Parker, Payton, and Grace.  It was very entertaining!  ;)


A picture with the girls and my Granny.


On a side note, I have to brag on my granny some.  She turned 90 years old a few weeks ago...and she is one of the godliest women I know.  Aside from that, we're able to keep up with her through playing Words with Friends, you can find her on Facebook, and she texts.  I sent this one to her the day before Thanksgiving because I was making her chocolate cake....and again, was so thankful to have my granny and all that she still does for our family.


And then the obligatory family Thanksgiving pictures.

Greg & Aubrey


Me and the kiddos


Phil, Kristin, Payton, Me, Grace, Parker, Nolan, Aubrey, Greg


Mom and Terry


Gramma & Poppa with the kids


Nolan and Aunt Sis


Nolan's Thanksgiving feast.



Granny fed him while I packed up leftovers for Geoff since he missed Thanksgiving lunch for work.


Gramma and Nolan


Baby Boy's first Thankgiving.


Our little turkeys.







Thursday, November 28, 2013

ready for Thanksgiving.

I had the best of intentions of posting this yesterday, but life happened and I did not.  So today it is.


Nothing exciting here, just wanted to post some of the Thanksgiving activities we did this year.  I think this one is my favorite.  We read Thanksgiving is Here by Diane Goode...then did this craft.  This craft has nothing to do with the story, but we did it anyways.
I traced the kids hands for the feathers and the feet for his body.  And Nolan's little hands traced out like this is just too cute.  I want to laminate and keep, but since I put the googly eyes on, I'll have to change those out first, so we'll see.



I love looking at all 3.

Parker took this picture of me tracing his hand.  I'll have to take a picture sometime of his chubby little hands.  They are bigger and chubbier than the girls' ever were.



One afternoon we skimmed through ...If You Sailed on the Mayflower in 1620 by Ann McGovern and then made these pilgrims and pilgrim hats and wrote out what they were thankful for.  My intentions for this project was for Parker to do more writing...but we are in vacation mode and she was not wanting to do it, and I was not in the mood to make her.  But I do plan to do more of these type activities for Christmas.

Our pilgrims.



A few weeks back, we talked about the trip on the Mayflower and how long it was, and how the pilgrims didn't have much at all...most stayed in the same clothes the whole 60+ days.  I cut out this 'suitcase' and asked her to write out what she would bring if she were going to go on a long trip.  She only came up with 3 things, and my intent was to go back and make her write more, but again, I did not.  (I got this idea from The First Grade Parade)




Another afternoon we read Run, Turkey, Run by Diane Mayr.  It was a really cute story.  And then we took a coffee filter and I let the girls color with marker however they liked.  Then we sprayed the filter with a few squirts of water and let dry.




We then did this sequencing activity found here.




Later on that evening, we glued everything down onto a large piece of orange construction paper.






Last weekend, we did our Blessing Tree.



And here's the wall in the kitchen where I displayed all of their activities.  The only other activity we did that I did not include in this post was when we read I Know an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Pie found here.


I think the girls had lots of fun doing these activities (I know I did).  Now I just need to find the energy for the Christmas stories.  Such a good opportunity to read aloud to the girls (something I have been slacking in) and encourage writing for Parker.

I hope everyone had a blessed Thanksgiving.  I know we did and I hope to post all about it tomorrow.

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