Our
Thanksgiving was really excellent because John’s sister Joan, and her husband
Joe, went to the trouble of driving 10+ hours with their 3 little kids to come
and see us. The kids and I hadn’t seen
them for 4 years!
John and I
enjoyed hanging out and talking with Joan and Joe the best. We got to go out to eat gyros and
custard- YUM!
I am really kicking myself for not getting a pic of their whole cute family. I didn't even bring my camera to Thanksgiving! This is all I got:
Joan helping Joan make PBJs...
Blurry River and Joe showing off helicopter stuff to our kids...
and Rivers feet. (Joe is showing the kids how to chart a helicopter route.
He also showed them some other cool pilot gadgets.)
No pics of Ezra or Cora!!! Boo.
Joan and Joe
were both patient and kind to all of the kids. I was especially impressed with
how kind they were to Noah, listening to him and enjoying his honest
nature “Wait a minute! You are joking!”
I was
impressed with how calm and mature Ezra and River are. Ezra especially was very grown up (and had
his 13th birthday while here!).
They both got on my good side by adoring Eva, and she thought they were
pretty neat, too (would actually lean to them).
Cora was cuter than I thought she would be (besides being a little
genius)- and I had thought she would be pretty cute. The only problem with craziness was our kids
were so excited to have them here, OUR kids would not calm down and go to
sleep. Their kids all came down to our
early morning devo and read scriptures with us (and Cora tolerated us dictating
to her what to say- we didn’t know she can read proficiently).
We were able
to go to my mom & dad’s house for Thanksgiving- bonus of not having to cook the whole meal
myself, plus I got to show off my extended family to Joan and Joe. Joe
was impressed with the cooking in general, and especially the pies. Mom
and Kim cooked spectacularly, as usual. And
Ryan made a really yummy sweet potatoe pie.
Everyone
humored me by playing a few rounds of Mafia (during half-time). Yay! I
was one of the mafia with Adalyn on the last round.
(Side
note: We later played a game of mafia as
a family, where Noah was one of the mafia.
I asked him if he was it, and he said “NOOOO” while holding the corners
of his mouth down, as his eyebrows twitched, and then he grinned an evil
grin. I laughed so hard I could not
breath.)
It was weird
the next few days after Joan & Joe left-
we kept feeling like we were missing kids and recounting heads! We were pretty bummed they were gone. It took Ammon a bit to notice. The 2nd day after they left he was
eating his breakfast and suddenly asked “Where’s Tora?”
Studies
The little kids (under 8s) favorite books to browse are the
submarine book above (lots of pics of torpedoes and some helicopter pics), and
several Audubon guidebooks (we have learned the most from the North American
mammals book). Ammon likes to stare at the star book (I am not sure why,
as all the pics look similar to me!) and Joan likes to stare at the shell book
(ditto!).
The boys recently finished the Hobbit, and are on to the Lord of
the Rings series (Mark is reading it out
loud to James and Noah). Noah is reading
Sense and Sensibility. (Books that we
have the movie to are some of his favorites).
Sarah and I are finishing up listening to
"Little Women" and have had some good discussions. We are both
disgusted with Jo for not marrying Laurie. Growing up, I related well
with Jo's character, and could not fathom why she would not marry him! I
think in reality I married a nice mix of Laurie and Mr. Bauer- handsome
and humorous, but also generous and kind! My main thoughts as we listen
are: "I am so blessed!"
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