Sneak Peek for Saturday Night...

The Remains of the Day

Old Man Ammy and Little Boy Nev

Eat, Drink and Be Thankful

We did it again.  Thanksgiving 2012 was another legendary meal with our friends.  And lucky for you, I captured it in photos this year!  Aren't you excited?!

Okay, so yesterday I made pies.  Homemade pie crust with pecan, cherry and pumpkin.  Then this morning I got up and cooked for another 3 hours - dressing casserole, 10lbs of mashed potatoes and white buns.  So here was our contribution to today's meal:

Yes, that is a lattice crust - I'm kind of a big deal.

So we were the first to arrive.  Here is the amazing table set for 16:

and of course the kiddos table:

I was put in charge of organizing the food on the table.  We started with the buns:

And within 30 minutes and 3 more families arriving, we were ready to eat.  The table now looked like this:

Oh.Shut. Up.  I know that's what you're telling me.  It was amazingly delicious.  And the 20 of us barely made a dent.  And this photo doesn't even have the desserts in it!  This was our menu:

turkey

cranberries

gravy

mashed potatoes

buns - white and wheat

cornbread

dressing casserole

stuffing

sweet potatoes

green bean casserole

pomegranate jello salad

cranbrosia

veggie platter

spinach salad

Desserts:

pecan pie

pumpkin pie

cherry pie

chocolate fudge pie

pumpkin cheesecake

chocolate mint brownies

whipped cream and ice cream

The tradition continued of the Dean baby having a turkey bone to chew on their first Thanksgiving.  Remember these guys?

Here are the last babies to join in the tradition:

Ammon couldn't care less about that thing.  I think he tasted it once then was done with it.  So Miss picked up his slack:

Dace and Zade both ate well and had a great time at their little table, complete with drawing on the table cloth!  Here is Dace showing off his artwork:

After dinner, outside games commenced - the traditional post-turkey volleyball match.  Zade wanted to team up with Dallin.  Do you see him clinging on?

Then trampoline jumping

And lots of time with a whole tub of Little People toys.  

It was a fabulous, fabulous day.  I love having Thanksgiving this late in the year because it kicks off the Christmas season.  Tomorrow, the tree goes up!!!!

Little Miss Walkin' Girl!!!!

Fall in the Backyard

We don't get many leaves but we get lots of pine straw.  They love a freshly raked pile to jump in, play in, explore in.  and Miss was the only one that would sit long enough for me to take pics of her....

Life with Little Things

A Whole New World

The twins are in love with their new found freedom of playing in the backyard. They would probably stay out there all day if they could stay warm enough and snacks were provided.  I love watching them explore their world.   It melted my heart to see Ammon staring up into the tree tops and how Miss will sit there and intricately examine a fallen leaf...before eating it.  The older boys also love having new playmates to join in their adventures.  

On a sidenote, Ammon is walking more than he is crawling these days.  Miss walks alot too but is more sneaky about it, hence more photos of Ammy walking than her.  But they both get a big kick out of this new mobility.  

iPhone video of Ammon walking

Better late than never

The new blog banner.  I had it made and ready to go but Google was telling me I had reached my max of free photo use for the blog.  So I have had to deal with that and figure it out etc blah blah blah.  Anyway, I wanted to put this up just for a few days.  I'll do something thanksgivingy over the weekend and replace it with a current theme next week.  these kids are just too cute not to feature these pics for a few days

Isn't she lovely

She just gets prettier every day.  I finally found some cute baretts for her and she leaves them in- she hated the headbands.  Now I just need to get her some shoes and I'll have my own little dolly to dress every morning.  Oh how I love this little girl.

To keep child warm, simply dip in Pepto-Bismol.  ;)