Did Everyone Have A Great Thanksgiving??

Hey Ya'll,

In case you didn't notice, I changed up the colors in my blog in honor of the Christmas spirit!  I love Christmas!!  Let me know if the colors are too loud or hard to read.  I know that some colors don't mesh well & can hurt the eyes to look at too long!

Well, the day started out slow, but gained momentum throughout the day.  I had originally planned on going to my parents house to visit for a while as they were not up to coming to our house.  Unfortunately, since we had agreed to have Thanksgiving Dinner at our house for Walt's side of the family & some friends, we couldn't just leave.

However, like I said, I had intended to go visit my parents early, then come back in time for our guests.  But, things just didn't work out as planned.  For some reason unknown, I just could not get to sleep last night!  It was 4 am before I managed to get to sleep, so I got a late start, & before I could finish & get over there, our guests started to arrive.  So I called my parents instead to wish them well.  My daughter Christa prepared Thanksgiving Dinner for them as she always does if they are not coming to our house, & took it to their house.  She ate with them, as my grandchildren were sick all night with what appears to be the flu.  So they stayed home so as not to get my parents sick.  Then my daughter went home to stay with the kids while Christa's husband went to his families home for Thanksgiving Dinner with them.

We still ended up with a lot of great people to be around.  We had, my DH & I, Walt's kids Kat & Russ, & Kat's BFF, Courtney came with her Fiance Jeremy & his two Daughters, Ari (14) & Leah (9) from a prior marriage & his Mother, Alice.  Then Courtney's Dad & Step-Mom, Don & Debbie came too!  Oh, I forgot to include Carolyn, Walt's Ex-Wife was here as well!!  We have been inviting her to all our gatherings for about 9-10 years I believe.  We joke & call each other Sisters!!  LOL.

Leah went crazy when she saw my painting studio & wanted to ask all kinds of questions.  She also wanted to see all my paintings & sketches that I have done.  She was just so excited talking about it, that I gave her one of my smaller sketch books & a sketching pencil & eraser to sketch with.  So she spent the rest of the day sketching things & showing them to me all day!  Wasn't that sweet?  Then she left me with one of her sketches, so of course, I had to pin it up on the fridge with a magnet.

I am going to post some pictures, but I want to apologize in advance for them not being very good!  I was taking them pretty fast before anyone had time to say no!!  So some are blurry, some are not in total focus, etc.

This is Courtney & Jeremy with Courtney's Dad looking on behind them!  I would like to mention that I HATE the color of the walls in our (green) family room.  Walt picked the color out & to this day, I still don't like it!  He also insisted on painting them in enamel semi-gloss!  So they shine as well!!!

This is Court, Jeremy & his mom, Alice (Courtney's soon to be Mother-In-Law)

Kat, with Leah (9) on her right & Ari (14) on her left.  They were impatiently waiting for the Turkeys to finish cooking!

This is Courtney with her Dad, Don & her Step-Mom, Debbie & her future Mother-In-Law Alice in the white sweater.

Here is Carolyn & I, the sister's!! LOL  But we get along great.

Walt draining off some of the excess liquid out of the corn.  He had spilled it carrying it from the stove area to the counter.

Walt getting more of the dishes on the counter for the buffet line up!

The beginning of the buffet line!  We had two differently prepared Turkeys.  One was rotisseried on the barbecue, the other was deep fried (yum), & a Honey Baked Ham (double yum).

Just a quick shot of the whole line of food.  Everyone was starving by the time the Turkeys were done, & they didn't even want to wait for Walt to clear off the carcass's from the counter!!

And last but not least, a picture of my Step-Son, Russ.  He was already totally drunk by this time!!  He will not drink & drive (thank god), so he had to wait until he had brought Carolyn to the house, then he could start his drinking in earnest!  He made himself some Long Island Ice Tea's!!  I believe he was much more liberal with the alcohol on the second one!!

Sorry about the messy pictures!  Also, sorry that I didn't get any shots of the desserts!  But they were fantastic believe me!  Yes, I did partake of the dinner.  I had two small pieces of Turkey, a small piece of Ham (sliced very thin), a spoonful of Mashed Potatoes & Gravy, a spoonful of Corn & a couple of spoonfuls of the homemade Macaroni & Cheese!!  Then a little bit later, I had a small piece of the Pumpkin Pie & an even smaller piece of the Chocolate Creme Pie with a small amount of Vanilla Ice Cream.  But, I didn't eat the crusts!!  However, I did eat more than I should have, but still didn't eat to the point of hurting, so I hope that I didn't swell out my pouch (that is the only concern I had).  No getting stuck or PB'g thank goodness!!!

Well, I better go for now, hope everyone had a fantastic Thanksgiving!!  Next is Christmas!!!

Aloha My Friends  :)