Thanksgiving

We had a nice quiet Thanksgiving. Dave enjoyed his 4-day weekend, and I got 4 days off working on the Nativity. The day started with Dave running 4 miles in the local "Run for the Pies" in which the first couple hundred people across the finish line won a pie.

Two years ago he ran this race with my sister and her husband, and we thought it was a 5k (3.1 miles). This year he trained for 4 miles and was pleased he improved his time by a whole minute, and got a Publix apple pie.

Jessica and I waited at the playground during the race. She had no fear; she climbed all over and was happy to have kids running all around her.

Dave cooked ALL of Thanksgiving dinner. I had been only buying instant & frozen food, and hadn't made any plans by the Saturday before Thanksgiving.  Dave took the initiative: "I'm making a list and going shopping, Liz. What do we need?"

Dave and I love watching Alton Brown's Good Eats. Dave used Brown's recipe to brine our turkey for the second year. 

All I did to help was set the table, take pictures, and beg for vegetables besides everyday broccoli and carrots. Dave got me spagetti squash and artichoke--yum. Besides some extra salty potatoes, everything was perfect. He even did all the dishes. Thanks, hon.

We failed to get a good picture of all of us.

Jessica chowed down and used our tablecloth as a napkin for her hands. Here she bites a stuffing popsicle.

Here's Jessica's opinion of the meal:

After Jessica's morning nap on Black Friday, we went shopping. Jessica lasted about 4 hours--the last hour we had to switch toys, snacks, or distracting games every 5 minutes. But we made it to 4 stores and picked up some deals.

We wanted to buy ALL of the toys from our childhood for her THAT DAY. We had to keep telling ourselves "She's too young for a:
dial-up phone
lite-brite
legos or duplos
tricycles
toy food and kitchens
science kits, especially involving rockets
Playdough
bristle bricks
anything Crayola
giant puzzles
popcorn pusher
toy register with plastic coins
Lincoln logs or tinker toys
etc.etc.etc."

She can't stand, and she doesn't really know how to use her shapes bucket or the wood puzzles she has now. Her first birthday is in 2 months anyhow, so we can get other toys then. We opted for a giant plush lion, balls, a 3-D bookmark, a baby laptop with buttons and lights and music, foam bath letters and a doggie washcloth mitten, and a short push toy with music & buttons.

I also bought her a cute stripey outfit (which says size 24 months but will probably fit her this summer.)  Our little baby is growing like a weed: she turned 9 months this weekend, but is wearing 9 & 12 month clothes already. She has long outgrown her little baby bjorns/slings, so we also got a frame baby backpack off Craigslist. We already tested it and it works great. We also Amazoned a plastic, indestructible Nativity.

Saturday we pulled out the decorations, and Jessica loved the loud plastic sparkly tree beads.

Dave persuaded me we needed a real tree. It's been 5 years with only the fake 3-footer. So Jessica went with us to get the skinniest tree in the lot. (I thought that was a funner milestone than seeing Santa.) She just thought it interesting, but spikey. I've been letting her play with the little tree (shown below), and our Christmas bells. So far she's pretty obedient about not pulling ornaments off, and Smokey has no interest in the trees either...but we'll see.

I also found the cutest Christmas PJs for her with "I've been good" and reindeer all over. But she kept pulling at the forearm sleeves, which were too tight, so we cut them off.

We're terribly excited for Christmas this year (we're staying in Florida), and very grateful for our little Jessica.