Thanksgiving Adventures

We were so very fortunate this year to have Auntie Kelli and Uncle Jeff come visit for Thanksgiving. We always look forward to our visits with them--you can always count on some crazy shenanigans, a thousand laughs, and lots of fun when they are around! This holiday was no exception. Thanks for coming to visit us, Auntie Kelli and Uncle Jeff! We love you guys!

We decided to do the whole shebang this year for our Thanksgiving meal, and EVERYTHING was made from scratch. Two days before the big day, Brad and I set up our 20 lb. bird in an oven bag with a seasoned brine, and we let it sit for about 24 hours, soaking up the salt and spices. The result was great! The turkey came out perfectly, and we all had a feast! In addition to our very large turkey, we also had corn bread stuffing, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes with brown sugar/pecan streusel topping, green bean casserole, cranberry salad, Jeff's special "5 Cup" salad, and both pumpkin and apple butterscotch pies. YUMMEE!

After our meal, we settled in to watch the Horns beat the Aggies! Hook 'Em!

The bird

The feast

Leyton's first Thanksgiving meal...he tried it all!

The next day was the ever crazy Black Friday, and unfortunately for Kelli, she got some weird Black Tummy Ache that kept her at home most of the day. The rest of us set out to do a little shopping,and the Smith Family FINALLY purchaseda new camera! Yeehaw! On Saturday, Brody woke up and immediately ran downstairs to make sure his "candy house" was still there. Auntie Kelli bought a gingerbread house kit, and he was dying to get started on it. So they put it together right after breakfast. Later that afternoon, Uncle Jeff put up the Christmas lights on our house. Brody was his safety check right-hand man, and he loved it! Later that night, we hit the Holidazzle Parade downtown for some light-up fun followed by a yummy dinner at Buca.

Brody loved his new light-up toy. About ten seconds after this picture was taken, he dropped it and it shattered. Awww!

We couldn't let the adventure die down on Sunday, so that morning we headed up to Anoka to Rum River Tree Farm where we picked out and then cut down our Christmas tree. It was pretty cold that morning, and we could possibly have been the most indecisive people ever! It took us nearly two hours to decide on the tree we wanted, but it only took about 30 seconds for Uncle Jeff to chop it down. We got the thing home, spent another hour trying to get it to stay up in the tree stand, and then Kelli and I wrapped it with 400 lights. It looks wonderful!

That's Uncle Jeff's back end!

It was a fun weekend, and as always, it went way too fast! But we are happy that Auntie Kelli and Uncle Jeff were there to help us celebrate our many blessings and kick-off the holiday season. We look forward to seeing you guys again in a few weeks!