Thanksgiving . . .

Heck, I'm further behind that I thought!!  I was looking in my picture folders and realized that I haven't written about Thanksgiving or about Glenn & Lauren and Laura's birthday celebration . . .and of course, Christmas!!  I love Thanksgiving.  I think it is my favorite holiday.  I love the food - turkey and dressing and gravy - one of my all time favorite meals.  I love the decorations.  I love the fellowship of family and friends without all of the craziness of gift giving.  Here are a few pictures from the weekend.  This is our table.  I love pilgrims.  My friend, Donna Nelson gave me one of the big sets several years ago.  Mark's mom brought one set from the Amish "country" in the Pennsylvania area.  I have purchased several other sets.  The deal with Pilgrims is this.  If you want some and IF you see some, you have to buy them right then.  You can't think about it.  They will be gone.  So many people want to rush the holiday season and decorate for Christmas at Thanksgiving (if you do that, it is ok with me . . .but it is not for me).  I used brown burlap as a runner.

I love the turkey!  He is actually supposed to hang on the front door but his wooden feet continually bang on the door every time the wind blows . . .so this year, he had a home in the dining room.  Isn't he cute????

I love pinterest.  Yes, I know that my thought processes are all over the board tonight.  I found this turkey vegetable tray on pinterest and just had to make it.  It was so easy and looked so cute.

I know this is a weird picture but we love olives and I wanted y'all to see these gadgets.  Behind the can, there is a white thing-a-ma-jig.  It is a jar opener!!  The little silver spoon is an olive spoon.  My mother-in-law has some of the coolest serving pieces and as I was putting the olives on the tray, she handed the spoon to me!  Too cute!!

Thanksgiving wouldn't be complete without a nicely browned turkey.

These cute turkeys were at everyone's place on the dining room table.

Here is a picture of Mark's mom's table.  You thought that I had a lot of stuff!!!  She has tons of stuff.  Look on the server behind the table . . .more decorations.  We have to eat dinner rather than lunch because she wants to light the candles :-)

This was the year for George and Alice and Grace to be with Alice's family. We understand but we are always sad because that leaves so few of us. This year was great thought. Glenn and Lauren were home so Lauren's mom came over to eat with us. Laura's friend, Dustin, didn't want to travel to his home state so he was with us. We ended up having a nice table full of folks. We always end up telling old tales. Mark's stories have become my stories because I've heard them so many times that now I can tell them. I think it is so funny that we laugh so hard at stories we have heard so many times.


We had a lovely Thanksgiving celebration and we have much for which to be thankful!!!