Crystal With Us for Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving was a happy holiday this year for us again-- especially since Jonathan had been able to get our daughter Crystal a ticket with his free miles to fly home for the weekend.

I went shopping day before Thanksgiving and couldn't help snapping a shot of these beautiful bouquets.

Definition of contentment--

"Drooling over Thanksgiving bouquets at Safeway's floral department and leaving them there."

I loved these Thanksgiving balloons, too. 

But you can't have Thanksgiving bouquets and balloons AND Thanksgiving dinner.

Soo--the balloons stayed, too.

Then we stopped at Big R for something and here was the cutest western style Christmas tree set up there.

Thankfully our family was getting over weeks of respiratory illness and coughs when Crystal came home. I had to stay home from church two Sundays, either sick myself or with sick children.
In desperation over how to amuse three sick young children, two different times I played Scrabble with them!

Even the cows get pumpkin pie! :)

Our oven went out on us a few days before Thanksgiving, but Jonathan was able to find a "new" used stove for us, and he and Sam installed it. However, the oven needed a good cleaning, so here is Carrie doing the job with oven cleaner. I so appreciate Carrie pitching in and helping me so much.

I saw a picture of a unique table centerpiece that used driftwood (which I at first thought was antlers)
and that gave me the idea to use the antlers from Jonathan's buck that he got this year
as part of our table centerpiece for Thanksgiving.
Thanksgiving Eve I read a couple poems from a Thanksgiving Ideals.

Timmy seemed to think this chick (which he'd hatched in the incubator) on a miniature sled he concocted would make a nice centerpiece, too! :)

Crystal arrived home very late in Denver, and Jonathan and Sam went to pick her up,
coming home at 2:15 a.m. with the last few miles slick with ice.
Jonathan almost fell asleep different times.
So thankful she was safe and sound here for breakfast on Thanksgiving morning!

Having family worship in the morning instead of the evening, since some of us were too groggy to do much useful!

Everyone enjoying having Crystal here!
She had just brought one little carry-on so had to make do with whatever she could find in her closet!

We had invited some friends for dinner, and again my girls helped so much. Rose had made a pretty cranberry jello the night before.

Carrie is our early bird. She goes to bed early and likes to get up around 5:00 to have her devotions, so I had gotten our turkey ready the night before, and she put it in the oven very early.
I love to serve the turkey whole. This dinner was quite simple, but so fun.
Carrie also made the mashed potatoes and gravy.

Our two families sang the doxology together before the meal, and afterward we shared around the table things we were thankful for--"Meaningful things," Jonathan said.
"Not just puppies and chicks!"
He wanted us to remember things that are worthwhile, eternal, and not just trite.
Then some of the children took off to play on the ice at our pond.

Not much was left of the sweet potato casserole our friends brought.

Crystal played some of her choir music that she was practicing singing for the Penn View Christmas Musical, which is being performed next weekend, Dec. 12-14, if any of my blog readers would like to watch online.
You better believe we'll be watching online, and looking for one very special person in the choir!

Even the cat swooned from the beautiful music!  :)

It should have been vacation, but Crystal had two large assignments that she hadn't even started and were due in three weeks, so yes, her mom kept her nose to the grindstone.
Here she is working on a term paper.

Thanksgiving evening Jonathan read the most hilarious Thanksgiving story called "One Terrific Thanksgiving." That story even had Sam leaning over the sofa to listen and look at the pictures of this crazy bear who loved to eat more than anything else, and who had to be taught a lesson by his friends about what is really important about Thanksgiving.

Carrie listened from the kitchen while doing dishes.

Morning and evening Thanksgiving Day, Crystal and we worked on a college project. It was a scrapbook of articles, poems, songs, and prayers compiled for her Christian Living class, and it was supposed to be a minimum of 25 pages. We managed to get about 32 pages done. The children and I had helped to gather materials for her to choose from, make copies, and cut out little creative accents and decorations for her from magazines, old Christmas cards, etc. I really enjoyed doing this project together.

And Jonathan helped her with her computer programming, downloading a different program for her since the other free program was giving her so much trouble.

And that's all for now!