Happy Thanksgiving!

We had a very relaxed Thanksgiving this year with only one dinner to attend!  We spent the morning relaxing and watching parts of the Parade.  Around 1 we headed over to Tim and Susan's, joining them, Connie, Jenny, Brett, Brayden, Bryce, Becky, Chris, Andrea and Clint.  Later on Rocky, Margaret, Christa, and Brandi joined us.  It was a full house!  The food was fantastic and it was so nice to get to visit together all evening.

This was the main course, after a table full of apps had been cleared and there was a third table of desserts!

The next day Tim had to work, but the boys and I headed to Reston Town Center to be in the annual Holiday Parade.  We got to walk in the parade with Tyler's Preschool so we saw lots of his friends.  Timmy chose to stay bundled up in the stroller the whole time, but Tyler and I wandered around to meet some characters while we were waiting for our time to walk.  The kids got a kick out of the parade itself.  They waved at the crowd and Tyler jingled his bell the entire time we were walking!

The week before Thanksgiving we went to Timmy's school for the annual Thanksgiving Luncheon.  It was hectic but fun!  Tyler was so excited to be there and really wound up.  He and Timmy were going back and forth between loving on each other and hitting/tackling each other the whole time!

I love Timmy's Thankful Turkey.  He's thankful for his brother, his mom and dad, his hair, and his pool!  :)

Thanksgiving and Friendsgiving

We had a nice Thanksgiving this year.  Timmy's class spent a lot of time learning about Thanksgiving, so I think he understood it a little more this year.  Out of everything that Timmy learned about Pilgrims and Indians, what stuck out for him the most was that the Indians taught the Pilgrims to fertilize their corn with three dead fish.  Timmy's school had a Thanksgiving Luncheon the Thursday before, so Tyler and I joined him at school.  Next year we will split one lunch; between it starting at 10:30(!), only having a half an hour to get them to eat, and my picky eaters, we will definitely be able to share!  Timmy did try a bite of everything though and he seemed to like having company for lunch.

 

Vice Principal, Mr. Moose, and Principal, Mrs. Devers

 On Thanksgiving we got to visit with all of Tim's family.  Unfortunately, Susan wasn't feeling well, so we only went to visit at their house for a little while.  When we got back to our house we helped Elena with the finishing touches for dinner, and the rest of the family got there just in time to eat.  Everything was delicious as usual, and the kids were especially excited to have their cousins over and Uncle Chris home.  After dinner Bryce showed off his newest skill!

 

While the big boys ran around like maniacs and got into everything!

Later on, Uncle Joe and Lindsey arrived.  They played a super hero board game with the boys for a while, and then settled in to the new Mario for the rest of the night with Uncle Chris too.  Timmy was in heaven!

Uncle Billy showed up long enough to give Timmy and Tyler about 10 marshmallows at once!

It was a much more relaxing Thanksgiving then we have been used to!

The next day the boys and I got to hang out at home all day and Tim got home early.  That evening we had college friends over, some of whom we hadn't seen in entirely too long!  I was very excited for the chance to have my boys play with Natalie's kids, I'm looking forward to them being friends too!

 

Once they headed home, we went out with Sami, Ryan, Billy, Ryan Schmid and his girlfriend Marilee.  It was really nice to spend the evening with everyone.  Hopefully we will be able to do it again soon!

 

 

Thanksgiving

We enjoyed a very nice 4 day weekend celebrating Thanksgiving with our families.  We had our customary three dinners on Thanksgiving day and enjoyed all of them!

We had a good opportunity for some posed pictures at Elena's house.

Timmy and Brayden kept themselves, and the rest of us, amused all day with various, random, activities!

And almost all of the Joneses were able to get together.

We wrapped up the day with dinner at my parents house.

And it was Tyler's first Thanksgiving and that meant he got some extra camera time!

This is Tyler wearing Timmy's 1st Thanksgiving outfit!

Thanksgiving

Well this post is a little late but I blame the hectic time of year! We had a wonderful Thanksgiving this year, it involved lots of company, friends, and stretching the dinners out throughout the long weekend! On Thursday we had our first dinner of the day with the Jones family at Tim's Uncle's house. I think they have the biggest variety of traditional foods for their celebration, everything was so good! Our other dinner of the day was at my parents, with Grandma, Dale and Paula, and Ron all in town! Timmy really enjoyed having some new faces around, and invented unique games to play with each person, Ron's game is shown below.

On Friday we hosted the 10th Annual Mock Thanksgiving at our house. We had a great group this year, only a few people were missing from it really feeling complete! Mock Thanksgiving Day is definitely in the running for me for favorite day of the year. We do not see our friends as often as we would like any more, especially the people who have moved out of NOVA, and it is always so great to see them any chance we get, but having all of these people who have been such a big part of our lives, all in one room at the same time, just can't be beat! Half of the people in this picture were in our wedding, the other half are mostly their other halves! I just love it! Towards the end of the evening Timmy decided to play paparazzi with Aunt Sami's camera. Most of his pictures got the person's face, but also Timmy's finger... a few of them came out like this:
But he took this one too! This is one of my favorite pictures of AM and Nat, I can't believe Timmy took it! I watched him stop and line up this shot, the girls are leaning into the couch, you can see from the angle of the countertop, they were not sitting up straight. He looked at the window on the camera and tilted it, making the girls straight in the picture! I was in awe!
On Saturday we had our fourth and final dinner at Tim's Mom's house. We never really had left overs, all fresh meals! Lots of company came to Elena's as well and it was great to see everyone. Timmy even had someone his age to play with, cousin Dylan! He was Dylan's shadow all night long, they were so funny to watch!

On Sunday Tim and Timmy hung out at home while I headed downtown with Mom, Grandma, and Ron to the Newseum. I had never been, it is such a great museum! I definitely recommend it to anyone, they definitely have something to cover any individuals interests. The roof of the Newseum has this incredible view and a studio that shares the same view: