Wednesday: Garrison, Bailey, and I headed down to Barnesville Wednesday morning to get settled in and start helping my sister with the cooking and baking. After we arrived and unloaded half of our house from the car we worked on making the macaroni salad and started on Anna's famous red velvet cake. The little man is all about helping out so he was the third chef in the kitchen this year. He helped pour, stir, and sift ingredients and we only managed to lose a teeny bit of flour to the floor once.
Helping AnAn pour in dry ingredients for red velvet cake
Sifting the flour... his definite favorite part I would say. AnAn added a touch of flour to his face for good measure (and pictures).
Helping mama with macaroni salad
After a lunch break at El Durango, we came home and I got the little man ready for a nap so Anna and I could focus on making chicken pot pie and finishing up the cake. Garrison wanted no part of a nap because we could hear him talking and playing the whole time. It worked out okay because he had fallen asleep on the way to Barnesville and he wasn't really ill or anything. Thankfully we also had a chance to do what we needed to in the kitchen before getting him up.
After cleaning up the kitchen and everyone changing clothes, we got ready to head downtown to eat supper at Pastime before walking outside for the "Lighting of the Trees/Illumination Service".
Garrison and AnAn
Terrell's parents met us at Pastime and Garrison seemed to be really excited to have his whole family eating together. He was actually a little hyper while we ate. Afterwards I attempted a few pictures of the little man with Granna and Nana and this is the only one that didn't blur. I have got to work on my photographing skills.
Granna and Garrison waiting on everything to get started. We didn't think we were going to make it for a while there because they were having technical difficulties and the little man's attention span was wearing thin.
Garrison and Papa... precious!
Yay!! They turned the lights on! Garrison actually noticed the lights this year and clapped and everything. =)
Our family after the Lighting of the Trees before going back to my parents house.
Thursday: Thursday morning we woke up to the best smells coming from the kitchen. My parents have had Thanksgiving at their house every year since before I was born and the smells from the kitchen on Thanksgiving morning are a favorite childhood memory for me. We had plans to have breakfast with Terrell's parents so we made a quick family picture before heading over to their house.
At Terrell's parents house we watched the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade while Garrison played and then we ate a delicious breakfast. His parents made pancakes, bacon, sausage, and some type of potato/hashbrown casserole that was extra yummy. Garrison had a ball playing with his grandparents and became even more wound up than before we left my parents. It was like he knew things were different and it was a special day so he was super excited.
Sweet picture of Garrison and Pops
After spending the morning with Terrell's parents, we headed back over to my parents right around lunch time. For the past several years my parents have welcomed around 30 family members into their home for Thanksgiving, but this year was a little smaller than normal. My aunt, uncle, cousins, and Nanny went to New York City for Thanksgiving... we were just a tad jealous (although I don't think I'd want to miss a major holiday to go to New York, just any other time of year). Anyway, I was thinking this year would be sort of small and quiet and just different than years past. Wrong. We still had 21 people total for Thanksgiving and it felt like it always does... fun, loud, and busy until everyone eats and half of us pass out. =) It was neat the way our tradition stayed the same and Garrison got to experience it all and was way more aware of everything this year. He ate a really good Thanksgiving dinner and had tons of fun playing with Meghan and Carter (my little cousins who are now big enough to play with my little man and essentially baby-sit while Terrell and I relax for a few minutes). A few times throughout the day I'd "lose" Garrison only to discover him playing away with Meghan and Carter.
Late that afternoon (after Garrison didn't take a nap AGAIN), we decided to go get our Christmas tree since there was a high chance of rain for the next day. Our tradition is to get our tree the day after Thanksgiving, but this year the weather caused us to change things up. So, we left a handful of people at my parents' house watching football while we headed to the tree farm.
Helping Granna and Papa pick out a tree
Standing beside the one we picked out. (Thank goodness Granna, Papa, and AnAn helped us keep up with him at the tree farm. He was a wild man!)
The three of us in front of our tree
Garrison and AnAn rocking outside of the Christmas Store at the tree farm.
After taking forever to pick out our trees, we finally made it back home in time to have leftovers for supper. De-lish! I'm always too full to eat all the leftovers I want on Thanksgiving night, but I feel like it's such a blessing to enjoy all that good food more than once! After supper and giving the little man a bath everyone started to leave and Garrison went to sleep and slept all night. We on the other hand stayed up until almost 1:00 in the morning watching Erin Brockovich. I never stay up that late. I seriously don't know how I did it. I was probably a teenager the last time I stayed up that late on purpose. Thankfully we were able to sleep in a little bit Friday morning. Thanksgiving day was filled with family, food, and fun and I'm so thankful we were all able to be together. God is good!
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