And then the weekend following this lovely escapade, the three youngest kids and I traveled along with Blake to Scottsdale, AZ to a conference he needed to attend. The weather in Scottsdale was heavenly, the hotel was absolutely amazing with a fun water park and daily activities of tie dying, scavenger hunting, crafting and games. The kids and I visited Candytopia- a candy museum and shopped around, went out to ice cream and had breakfast at Snooze Bakery. We visited the Calls and enjoyed catching up with them for the evening. It was super short, but so fun. Again, Nancy saved the day by coming to spend the weekend with Evelyn who couldn't attend due to first trimester finals.
Other highlights from the month of November included soccer tournaments, haircuts by Jen for all of the kids, lots of kitty-cat moments, and most importantly, a week off from school for Thanksgiving!
During this week off from school, the kids visited SeaWorld two times-- once with a bunch of friends, and once just our little family. So fun to go at Christmas time and visit Santa, and see the Christmas shows. Grant thoroughly enjoyed staying late at Seaworld with his best buddy Brandon for the tree lighting and then getting to spend the night at Brandon's house! His first ever sleep over! We enjoyed hosting our annual Service night at our home- where we ate cookies and drank hot chocolate, tied blankets and made cards for the kids in the children's hospital. It is always my favorite tradition of the season. Thanksgiving day was special in every way. We absolutely adored being with Grandma and Grandpa, Stacy and Troy and Grandma's friend Marty. We loved eating the delicious meal they prepared and playing the game of things-- our new favorite family game. The pies at the end were the perfect finale. It was such a warm and special day and we feel so grateful to have family to celebrate special holidays with. Thanksgiving is probably my very favorite day of the year. I love Christmas day too.... but I get overwhelmed sometimes with all of the clean up and presents. Thanksgiving is just a sweet day to be with family, feel grateful for blessings and eat good food. It is my favorite!
We actually braved the crowds on Black Friday and went to the mall on a mission to return a birthday gift (long story.) It was something else. Something I won't do again, but the kids were eager to see what Black Friday was all about, so I didn't mind going this once. Boy, it took it out of me though. Luckily I had an amazingly fun party to attend afterwards for Sameen's 35th birthday. Dancing, crowns, desserts, my favorite soda, it was awesome.
Last highlight of the week was having the Rustands in town to visit us from Wednesday through Sunday. LOVED catching up, laughing, watching movies, hot tubbing, eating and shopping. They mean the world to us and it really was a fun week with lots of laughs about our cats, Blake's sweater in the Christmas card picture and of course the old standard of deciding what we are going to do. It's a long standing joke that the men might think of an idea or two, but it will be immediately vetoed by the moms who have already organized the entire day. We've been on so many vacations with the Rustands and spent so much time trying to organize our trips together over the years that we find this hilarious that the hubbys attempt to plan the itinerary at all anymore- after being rebuffed so often in the past. They're adorable.
So you see it was a pretty luxurious month full of trips, concerts, time off school, amusement parks, yummy food, family and friends. We loved every minute of it. And now it's crunch time. Please excuse me while I go get started on my two mile long Christmas to-do list! Ha!
