Thanksgiving Weekend

We had a nice relaxing weekend.  Shawn worked on Thanksgiving so we didn't really celebrate until Friday.  I brined the turkey (which I highly recommend if you haven't done before) and we've been feasting on leftover since.  We don't usually get our Christmas Tree and decorations out this early, but because Shawn had a "golden" weekend (he only gets one weekend a month were he doesn't have to work Saturday or Sunday so we call it a golden weekend) we decided to get the tree out.  Here is the result.

and all the decorations

We also went and got our 2010 family ornaments.  Here are this years picks:

Ethan: Christmas Vacation House. I actually think Shawn had a lot of influence in helping Ethan pick this one because he loves this movie, but the ornament is really cool, it plays music and the whole house lights up (just like on the movie).
Liv:  Barbie.  Pink, pretty, princess.  Enough said.
Cole: The Abominable Snow Monster.  Cole liked ALL the ornaments and changed his mind every second, but he finally settled on this one.  It is cute and fuzzy.
Shawn:  Shawn always gets the stupid/sarcastic ornament and he definetly didn't disappoint this year.  Remember the Christmas story where Ralphy sticks his tongue to the pole.  This ornament has a button you push and you can here him screaming.
Jenn:  Snoopy.  I'm not really sure why I chose this, maybe because Snoopy dances to the Charlie Brown music and that always makes me think of Christmas.

We signed up to do a sub-for-santa this year.  We have a 3 year old boy and 4 year old girl.  I am so excited to give my kids an opportunity to think about someone else this holiday season.  It seems like all kids do is think about what they want for Christmas and I really wanted to find something to help my kids think about someone else.  So I'm really excited to go shopping tomorrow night for FHE for our sub-for-santa.

Another fun family tradition is that each year we exchange scrapbook pages with my mom's whole family (aunt/uncles, cousins, grandma etc.)  Every family makes a scrap page and then we make lots of copies and exchange.  Every year I add all the pages to a book and it is fun to look back over the years and see how each family has changed.  Here is mine for this year.

Last night I made Liv this cute little christmas apron.  She LOVEs it.  I think she would wear it to bed if I would let her.

Last, the kids really think it is funny to try and hide from Shawn when he comes home from work. It is a game every day.  The other day the kids left him this note on the back door.