Happy Turkey Day!

Here is our Thanksgiving mantel. My amazingly crafty friend, Sarah, taught me how to make the cute bunting last year. I had good intentions to sew "GIVE THANKS" onto it, but I ran out of time. Again. Oh well. The sticks came from my neighbors' yard after a big wind storm and the apples were on clearance at JoAnn's way back in February. Hooray for cheap decorations! On Pie Day, I made four pumpkin pies (the boys in my house LOVE pumpkin pie!) and one Very Berry pie. I found this recipe in the Lion House Desserts cookbook. YUM!These cute turkey-shaped butters were from the Fresh Market. I think people were afraid to use them, because even after dinner for 26 people, all three turkeys were barely touched.

Once again, we felt so blessed to be able to spend Thanksgiving with wonderful friends while we are away from family! I felt a little sad that this was our last Thanksgiving in Ohio; we've made so many good memories with friends here during the holidays. Our celebrations have never been very fancy - just plastic tablecoths and paper plates, but there has always been plenty of delicious food and good friends to share it with.My amazing friend, Angie, and her beautiful fresh fruit cheesecakes and chocolate-covered strawberries. She and her daughter, Hadley, made adorable place card favors with the names of each guest.

About halfway through the meal, Hannah climbed up on our laps and discovered the CRANBERRY SAUCE! I gave her a little taste, and she liked it so much that she started eating it by the handful! She also helped herself to the chocolate-covered strawberries and the fruit on Angie's little cheesecakes.
Happy Thanksgiving!!!

Happy Turkey Day!

Thansgivings here in Ohio have been so fun for us. Since so many of our friends here are "transplants" far away from family, we have really enjoyed getting together and sharing Thanksgiving together. The Palfreymans, Collettes, Days, Shupes, Deb and Paiton Christensen, and Elders Fernandez and Johnson joined us at our house today. Everyone brought a few favorite dishes to share, so there was a TON of delicious food!

The Palfreymans

The Collettes

The Days

Look out, Gavin, Paiton's got her eye on you!

It wasn't super fancy - we ate on paper plates, we didn't have many decorations or personalized place cards, but we had plenty to be thankful for: good friends and lots of yummy food! Years from now, I think we will always look back fondly at our Thanksgivings in Ohio.

HaPpY ThAnKsGiVinG!

Pie Day!

Today was the day before Thanksgiving, AKA, Pie Day! This year I did two pumpkin pies (Bryan's very favorite) and one apple pie.


Earlier today, I made Turkey Cookies with the kids. I think they really got a kick out of them. I figured most of the kids would rather eat cookies than pie on Thanksgiving anyway, right?

Yes, the red things are supposed to be the "gobblers" (apparently they are really called SNOODS. I had to Google it), not gushing facial wounds.

This is my little baking buddy, Ruby.

Everyone should have a Ruby to bake with. It's like having my own personal cheerleader. I crack an egg, she shouts, "Wow, Summer!" I beat the egg, she cheers, "Whoa, you're doing great!" She's just so enthusiastic!

The best part of my day today was when she added the last cup of sugar. She turned to me with a huge grin on her face and said,

"Whoa! We're having so much fun today, Summer!"

Happy Thanksgiving!

Well, we finally did it..... we made a blog. After seeing so many friends and family doing it, we finally succumbed to the peer pressure. So here goes...

This past week has been relatively eventful. We were somewhat nervous about hosting our first Thanksgiving away from home, especially when we planned to have it with such a big group. I think we counted a total of 23 people including us and all the children.

Baking our first turkey (or in our case, turkey(s) since we bought two of them to ensure we'd have enough) was an adventure all in itself. Since neither of us had done it before, we really didn't know how the whole process worked. We called Summer's mom and she walked us through it, but when she explained that we would need to stick your hands inside both the front end and the back end of the turkey to get the giblets and insides out, both of us looked and each other and said "no way, I'm not doing it!" You could say it grossed us both out... a lot. In the end, we bit the bullet and did what needed to be done, but it still sends chills down my spine if I really think about it. Also, we're glad Eric Shupe was there to teach us how to carve the turkey, and that Kimberly knew how to make the turkey gravy. They were lifesavers. Anyway, the whole feast turned out great. The turkey(s) were nice and moist, everyone brought some amazingly good foods, and it was great to hang out with everyone and catch up on all the latest news from the ward.

Summer's pregnancy is plugging right along, although it seems that she has been pregnant forever. Luckily, her doctor says everything is right on course, and every test so far has shown that both mom and baby are healthy. We're excited to have a little girl on the way. The much anticipated arrival is February 17th.

The kids also got their flu shots yesterday, and neither of them cried at all. Summer got her shot a week ago at her OB appointment, and Andrew was upset that he had to wait an extra week until his appointment to get his shot. It was funny hearing a five-year-old complain that he actually had to wait to get poked with a needle. What's more is that he wasn't upset about not being able to get it over with; it was that he didn't want to contract the flu in the time he had to wait for the vaccine. As a kid, I was terrified of needles!

Logan is becoming a lot more expressive lately. It seems like just a few months ago, he couldn't even pronounce his own name. He kept calling himself "Dun-dun." Now he's speaking in full sentences, and he even hit us up the other day asking "We go to restaurant to eat chinese food?" What a crazy kid!

On the news, we heard that a lot of stores are opening their doors at 3 and 4 AM to roll out some of their post-Thanksgiving deals. There was even one store that was opening at 11 PM on Thanksgiving night! How crazy is that? Apparently, there were even hoards of people who were camping out in the freezing cold to be some of the first people in the doors. Personally, I would rather sleep in my nice warm bed, sleep in, and shop during normal daytime hours, even if it means missing a couple of sales and spending an extra few dollars.

Anyway, that's it for the Andersons for now. We'll try to update regularly.