Thanksgiving

This post has been tripping me up for quite a while now. Yes, I know it's a new year and Thanksgiving was almost two months ago, but I had a TON of pictures to wade through, so it took me forever. I didn't want to skip it because I knew I'd probably never get back to it, so everything else got pushed back as well. Here I am trying to catch up.

This year, we decided to go to Utah for Thanksgiving. We ended up reserving a church because with parents, siblings, and their children, we are such a large group that it's pretty hard to get together at any one person's house. There was lots of good food, then lots of good pie. We also had fun hanging out with everyone and the kids had a ball having room to play and run and yell. My sister and her kids were sick and didn't get to come (we missed you!!), but there were still plenty of people to hang out with.

She's so excited to be there!

The kids started off just running like wild banshees through the gym. They were so cute any time anyone new came. The screaming and running started all over again.

Then my sister-in-law set up a fun Cranium for kids game. I think most of the kids played it at one time or another. It looked like fun.

Then Mimi and I decided to play horse.

Nathan joined in.

I was doing pretty good until Mimi figured out that layups would kick my butt. (Danny and Andrew, WHY did you never teach me a good layup?)

The girls having fun sitting on the floor playing ? ? ? ?

Then we decided to break out the volleyball stuff. So they tried to put up the net.

The kids got tired of watching them TRY to put up the net, so they began practicing their moves.

Still practicing.

I love the look on Turtle's face. It's like he's saying, "THAT's not where I meant it to go!"

Have no fear, Daddy to the rescue.

He teaches him how to aim and follow through.

And here he is practicing again. Now THAT's better.

And more cousins practicing. They had plenty of time to practice.

Still trying to get the net up.

It's finally starting to get there.

Tie the last few strings, and they're done.

While waiting, I took some pictures of Zoey and Mr. Carter. They are close to the same age and she loves seeing him.

Ahhhh, squeezing your guts out.

Here's Zoey, trying to steal a smooch.

And the volleyball game got underway. Here's the girls team. They had great participation.

The boys team, not so much at first . . .

But it did get better at some points during the game.

An action shot of the girls.

Zoey decided to do a little floor show in the middle of the game.

And some real floor moves.

Then someone found the nursery and found out the toy cupboards weren't locked. And that's where a lot of the kids played for a LONG time. It was great, once we knew where our kids had all run off to.

Of course, Zoey found the slide. Thanks to Stella's birthday party, she knew all the cool moves to do on it.

We took advantage of the piano.

Even Mr. Carter got in on the action. (Notice his pink potty sticker? Yay!!)

It looks like we're playing this intricate peice. Nope, chopsticks.

Crazy boys!!

Mimi and her cute baby.

The older cousins finally pulled the younger ones out of the nursery room and made up a cute play about Thanksgiving. But first, we got the pre-show of "Banana."

Jo and AJ's part in the play.

And they're off!

We had a fun time. I loved getting together with everyone in an environment where there was plenty of room. My kids were sad to leave. They loved getting together with all of their cousins. Thanks for a fun Thanksgiving!!