Thanksgiving 2010

For Thanksgiving this year we decided to do it with just our little family. Josh has been traveling a lot and spending long hours at the new job and we felt it would be good for us to just be together when we didn't have anything else going on. It was a little daunting to me to have to prepare everything for the dinner myself, but I got some tips from a friend and I felt like I was up to the task. I made a lot of the dinner and did most of the prep work the days before Thanksgiving. It was a little tricky with Lincoln's birthday the day before, but it was okay.

We set up Netflix and I got a whole bunch of craft ideas and we had so much fun. I got this crazy idea for a turkey hat (a cooked turkey that is), at familyfun.com.

Josh helped the boys make them while I finished up dinner.

They were so funny we couldn't stop laughing.

Palmer wore his for most of the day, which set me laughing any time I saw him.

The finished products.

McKay's first Thanksgiving!

We moved the table into the living room so it would feel a little more formal and so the boys would be excited. I was worried that they would be bummed that we weren't doing thanksgiving with all of the extended family, and they were at first, but everything was fun and different and they ended up loving it.

There was A LOT of food. I actually forgot the potatoes (which nobody missed but me), but it was a good thing because we had so much. I am pretty proud as I made the stuffing and cranberry sauce from scratch. It was so yummy!

I am so glad that I made enough food for an army because the boys weren't hungry at all and just wanted to keep on with all of the fun activities and bag the actual dinner. I think they spent a total of 10 minutes at the table.

After dinner we watched "The Never Ending Story," which the kids had never seen and LOVED and then made turkeys with apples and gumdrops.

Lincoln's turkey kept falling over so we made a "peg leg" out of a toothpick and then everyone had to have peg legs for their turkeys.

Hunter's looked like it was on stilts.

Josh and I made one together.

Then we played games (Josh's favorite).

McKay ate marshmallows and was cute.

I think the highlight of the games for the boys was that they got their own can of soda. That must not happen very much :)

Then it was time for pie. I went a little crazy and made four...just about a whole pie per person. What can I say, I love pie (especially from scratch...mmmm).

Josh loves chocolate cream pie and sad to say I never make it. So this year I made it up to him and made two different ones to find his very favorite. We decided to make it a taste test. The boys were way into it.

This was the winning pie, which is funny because the other one was so elaborate and called for a million ingredients. This one was simple and it will definitely be made again.

We ended the night with hot cocoa and a movie ("Home Alone 2"). It was definitely a successful Thanksgiving and we had a ton of fun together. It will be a great memory in years to come.