Thanksgiving the Ward Way

      Before we were almost empty nesters, we would have upwards of 30 people join us at our house each Thanksgiving.  I had a system.  Thanksgiving on Thursday, take down fall decor on Friday.  Put up Christmas decorations on Saturday.

     Now I don't have a system.  That's hard for me.  I am a planner, a system-in-place type girl. I'm not really sure what to do with that.  So I started Christmas decorating early, but I'm not done. I decided to just leave it and take to the road.

    Thanksgiving at the Wards began this year with an adventure in snow.  We started out Wednesday to head to PA where our girls are.  Had we left at 7am we may have avoided a snowstorm. But what fun is that?  No no no; we wait until 10am so we are sure to hit the worst of it by the time we reach Binghamton. Lots of close calls, white knuckles and tightened muscles later, we arrived not much later than usual. 

        The fun really begins on Wednesday night. We all sit around the table and play spotify.  By that I mean we designate a SJ (Spotify Jockey) and we take turns picking songs while the teenagers do complicated dance moves ...

busting a move

sometimes an adult will join in the fun

and of course after all that exercise we want to eat - this is our pre-thanksgiving treat time...

Ronnie's first attempt at homemade pumpkin cheesecake

    Ok that pumpkin cheesecake was the bomb!  Funny how we ended up with approximately 10 desserts.  Really?  10 desserts?  No one complained


     My favorite part however is when we all sit down to the table on Thanksgiving Day and give thanks to the Lord for all we have.  Then everyone looks at me to make the yearly toast?  What?  Why didn't you warn me so I could prepare something?

    "Because mom, if you knew you wouldn't do it"

    "Oh right".

    So I give extra thanks and we enjoy a sweet meal together.

    Afterward, football, snoring and coffee ensues.

this is how teens do post Thanksgiving dinner

    Yesterday we decided to go shopping - yikes!  Black Friday shopping??  Well we weren't entirely crazy.  We didn't go until the afternoon  and apparently we missed all the sales because we didn't see one single Black Friday sale deal!   But somehow our cart was so full we kept bumping into everything.  

    Anyhoo - here it is Saturday, sitting around in PJ's by a crackling fire watching movies all day - now that's what I'm talkin about.  

     

All in all, it was a quiet, fun, thankful weekend, with just a little crazy - perfect.  


I'm still not thinking about everything I have to do when I get home - nope, not going there, not going...