Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving. We had our first Thanksgiving in Arizona, and Bret made the turkey and I even baked. I am happy to say that no one got sick, so I say it was a great success. Before dinner we all go around the table and say everything that we are thankful for for the past year. Mackenzie started and said she was thankful for her friends, Julia and Shannon. With a little probing she did say she was thankful for her mom and dad and family, ok it was a lot of probing. When each person would talk Mackenzie would chime in with, don't forget me, you are thankful for me. It was absolutely adorable and soon our thankful speeches turned into a dinner of Mackenzie praises. She absolutely loved it.

You are probably looking at the pictures wondering what the heck we were doing, well it is a family tradition that I started a few years ago. At the end of dinner each person sits in the end chair and trys to blow out both candles in a straight line. As you can see we look very funny, but definitely have a great time doing it. My dad says stupid things like, "be the candle", or my mom starts by meditating. We are all so strange, but dinner always ends with a great laugh. Sadly this year, no one was able to do it, I couldn't even blow out the first candle. Mackenzie was old enough this year so she joined in with us, she is just like her mom and is not good at blowing out the candles, Ithink we will start practicing for next year, only 364 days to go.

A little sad news to conclude with: on Wed my family got the news that my grandma had passed away. My grandma was a special lady who will be missed dearly, but I am thankful that she is now in a peaceful place and reunited with my grandpa. I will be leaving to go to Chicago for the funeral and wake, while my sister stays and watches Mackenzie for a few days (she is an amazing sister), and Bret helps Gary move to AZ. Please keep us in your thoughts as my family is doing a lot of traveling in the next few days, so that we all return safe and sound.

I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving and now it is time to get those Christmas trees out:)