Exciting Thanksgiving Week



Since Mick and I have been together (about 12 years now), we've always celebrated Thanksgiving with my family and Christmas with his--this week though, we had a special unexpected treat when his parents decided to come up for a visit for a few days. 

 

Saturday morning, our neighborhood had a fall festival with a chili cookoff and a pie contest.  Because of some insane inspiration, I decided to enter both contests--the chili was pretty good, but my chocolate peanut butter pie won second place!  There was a popcorn machine, which was a big hit with Em, and a bounce house, which she decided to skip.

 

Grandma, Papa and Landon arrived late Saturday afternoon, and Em was super excited!

She loves having extra family here because she's the constant center of attention :).

On Sunday, we decided to head up to Concord Mills Mall to get some shopping done--the nice thing about this mall (aside from the outlet stores) is all the extra stuff, like the huge carousel in the middle of the food court

and the bungee jumping!  Em and Landon had to try it out, and what a big girl she was!

She looks like she's in kindergarten or something...where is my little baby going?!  They had a great time bouncing, and there was even a train going around the mall that we caught a ride on. 

I had taken the week off and had some appointments on Monday, and Mick had taken the day off, so Grandma and Papa decided to take Landon and Em to a place called Sports Connection--there's an arcade, bowling alley and bounce houses and they spent a good bit of the day there.  I think they were all thoroughly exhausted by the end of the day.  Mick and I didn't know what to do with ourselves, but went and had lunch and got a few things done.

Mick went back to work on Tuesday, and Aunt Julie got here--she had flown in on Monday and spent the first day with a friend in Charlotte.  I picked her up Tuesday afternoon and she went with me to pick up Emily at school--what a great moment when Em saw her across the playground and ran to her, screaming "AUNT JULIE!" 

We took Em to school on Wednesday for a little shorter day while we had a girls' day out--we had a nice leisurely lunch, manicures and pedicures, and did a little shopping.  It was a really good day that I wish we could repeat much more often!

On Thursday morning, we set out for Brevard to my parents' house (a Grandma and Papa visit for the second time in one week!), and had a huge, delicious Thanksgiving meal.  After we were all stuffed, Mick and Julie and I decided to give Grandma and Papa some Emily time and we went to the movies to see Lincoln.  It's funny, because Mick and I used to go to the movies several times a month before Emily was born, sometimes even seeing more than one movie in a day, but we haven't been to a movie theater since I was pregnant!  It was fun, but we always find ourselves feeling a little lost without our little Em.



Our visit was way too short--we decided to brave some of the Black Friday shopping the day after--Hendersonville is still a pretty small town, so it didn't get too crazy.  We had a nice lunch together and then decided to head home so Em could nap on the way home.  They always have a busy Saturday with Church services, so we knew we wouldn't stay overnight.

 

We had a pretty relaxing weekend--we picked out our Christmas tree and started decorating, and got in the spirit by breaking out Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer!  We also started our Elf on the Shelf for the first time (Mick's mom had given us the book and elf when I was pregnant).  Em named her elf "Elfie" and immediately started telling him all of her dreams and secrets :).  First priority, "a black bear with black paws and black feet."  At least she's specific!

Em and Aunt Julie enjoyed snuggling together and watching some movies while we put lights on the tree.  Emily is more of a clown every time she visits :).

Monday morning, it was time to get back to routines.  We dropped Em off at school, then Julie to the airport and me to work.  It was an unwelcome dose of reality after such a great week!