A Thankful Recap, part 1

We are back from a long weekend with the family near Chattanooga. The drive took longer than normal (holiday traffic) and we arrived Wednesday evening, ready for a later supper and bed.


Thursday morning was spent helping a little bit around the house, prepping for the dinner that evening, and waiting for my nieces and nephew to arrive, to help decorate a cake, and eat our Thanksgiving dinner.


(click on the pictures to make them bigger.)










Lunch on Thanksgiving day. We had Thanksgiving dinner at around 6 p.m., which I like. I don't get eating the Thanksgiving meal at lunch. Wouldn't you just call that "Thanksgiving lunch?"





Isabel and her grandpa dance some calories away.




My brother-in-law holding his puppy Ripley as if she were a baby. It's so funny - she doesn't complain. He's been doing it since she was a weeee pup and now she just sits there patiently.










The cousins arrive. Isabel looks like a hobo because I dressed her in clothes she could ruin, in case they got themselves dirty with the food coloring.



The girls first made tiaras. Then they helped decorate the cake with me, at which time I took zero pictures. These next two were taken by my sister-in-law Jennifer.





The girls and their matching aprons, made by great-grandma Arlene over a year ago.



Work it! I thought for a moment that the fondant was not going to work. It was so HOT in the kitchen from all the people, the oven, the stove, etc. that it was sticking. But we prevailed. The girls helped color the fondant and gumpaste, and they shaped peas, cherries, plates, silverware, pie pieces and...voila!



Our Thanksgiving Dinner cake! (which was dry cause it was 2 days old and I overbaked. LOL)

I have no pictures of the meal itself. Bad me. Isabel went to her first sleep-over ever at her cousins' house and had a great time.

Friday morning, my mother-in-law, father-in-law, grandmother-in-law and I went out to do some minor shopping. We did not leave at 4 a.m. like you crazy black Friday shopping people. We were out for maybe two hours and then went to get Isabel at her aunt's house.

That evening, after dinner with my brother-in-law at a Mexican joint, we headed to the water at downtown Chattanooga, where two of Isabel's cousins would be performing a dance at a holiday event being held by the city.

It was COLD and I did not pack us anything remotely warm enough! Isabel complained the entire time we were there that she was freezing and we ended up carrying her most of the time.









They had boats going up and down the river.




They had a Nativity scene.




We watched the girls do one number and then, not knowing how many more there would be, we skedaddled because we were freezing.