Thanksgiving Weekend

This year was a Call Thanksgiving, and all the aunts were bringing a turkey. So Lori promptly asked Danny to smoke her 20 lb turkey contribution. :) He was happy to do so, and it was quite the impressive amount of bird when it was prepped and ready for the smoker the night before Thanksgiving!

    

My contribution to the family Thanksgiving feast was a couple of pumpkin rolls, and they turned out beautifully! And luckily the tasted every bit as good as they looked. :)

We had dinner at our church building this year, since Great Grandma Call's building was already reserved. Bishop-perks, I guess! :) We had a good turnout of Call relatives, and it is always fun to get to catch up with some of the cousins. The most wonderful part was that our kids are old enough to watch Joseph more, and Joseph is old enough that we're willing to let him be watched...so the kids enjoyed some time "practicing their talks" in the Primary room. :) Unfortunately, I was having so much fun chatting with everyone that I failed to get one single picture...not one single picture of any assemblage of Calls, including our little family! Oh well. 

The greatest thing about the Call Thanksgiving is that many hands make for light work, so it makes for a much more relaxed holiday! After our early dinner, we came home and had nothing else we had to do! So my cute boys fell asleep watching football while I read my Sanderson book and the older kids had a "Liv and Maddie" marathon downstairs. Best. Thanksgiving. Ever!

Our Black Friday was pretty easy going too! Lots of food and football. Seriously, Joey sat in his chair for hours watching the games. He really loves his football! We were planning on buffet and games at my Mom's house that evening, so I spent the day working on my cherry pie. I was so excited to try the crust all by myself, and to attempt my first lattice crust. And it worked out pretty nicely, and was one delicious pie!! Danny smoked a turkey breast for the buffet (since there wasn't a single morsel of that giant 20 lb bird leftover from Thanksgiving dinner), and we had quite the decadent buffet at Grandma Candy's.

It was a different kind of Thanksgiving weekend than we usually have, but we needed the downtime and it was perfect. It was nice to have enough time to actually reflect on all we're grateful for! Family, friends, food, and of course our faith. It really all comes back to our knowledge of the Plan of Salvation, and the gift of the atonement of Jesus Christ. Of everything I've been blessed with in my life, I am most grateful for that. 

And with Thanksgiving in the books, we're officially into the Christmas season! Buckle up!!