Thanksgiving Peek of the Week - November 25, 2011

Does it count as a peek if it includes nearly 40 photos? Probably not. Oh well. 

What's Peek of the Week, you ask? It's our Friday feature and it's all about you! I want to hear (and share with my readers) what wowed you this week. It could be a cool finished project, a work in progress, a personal accomplishment, a cute kid moment, or something that surprised you.

If we could peek into your week - what would you want to show us?

Each week I'll share my own Peek of the Week to get the ball rolling, and invite you to link to your blog post about your Peek of the Week. I know y'all are up to cool stuff - we wanna see it!

 

So, a Thanksgiving Peek:


This was possibly my favorite Thanksgiving to date. Only one rivals it - our first as a married couple. We were at Vanderbilt living in Disciples House and everyone else had gone home for the holiday. The fella and I helped make and serve Thanksgiving lunch to homeless folks in the morning and then went back to Disciples House, made manicotti and ate in the lobby on the floor. Good times. 


This Thanksgiving included:

tree climbing

bocci

hide and seek

bouncy castle jumping

theological discussion

naps

stomp rockets

italian slingshots

croquet

chocolate delight

and Rudolph noses. 

Of course... Rudolph noses. 


Oh...and Hazel! Happy 1st Thanksgiving baby daughter!


The house was full of lovely folks and the food was dope. 


The clincher may have been hosting it in our home. I think that's the way to go. The kids are in their own environment and we're not on edge worrying that they'll disassemble someone else's. We know they can run around safely and other parents can relax and not worry about their kids trashing the place because our kids already are. Win win.

Kids' Table!

Tree climbing with Gil and Kaia.

Bocci strategy session. 

Love.

Kids' croquet set with giraffe wickets!

            

Getting all the goody off that plate.

Yaya bought these awesome led-lit slingshot helicopter things in San Marco's Square in Venice. They were a big hit. 

Micah devised a target point system to take things to the next level. 

This was one fun bunch. There are a few missing from this shot, but you get the idea. 

Everybody was happy and worn out by dark. Once people left we put on a movie and Amos and Hazel cashed in their chips almost immediately. I'm about ready to join them. I hope you all had a lovely blessed Thanksgiving. We'd love to see all about it. Link it up to the Peek!


You could get peeking in three easy steps:
1. Blog about your Peek of the Week - whatever it is. Whatever happened that made you proud, laugh, smile, inspired, excited, or just plain happy - now that's worth sharing.
2. Include a link to this blog or put the Peek of the Week button (on the sidebar) in your post.
3. Link your blog post using the InLinkz button below.

If you don't get a chance to get here on Friday, feel free to link your post up later.
The InLinkz button will be active for 5 days.

Feeling Thankful

Shew. The last few days have been a blur. Hazel and I flew to South Carolina to celebrate dear Uncle Pete. It was a beautiful weekend of stories and laughter and tears and love. We saw so many beloved family members and watched and listened and smiled as Pete was remembered so lovingly.

Then yesterday - Halloween - we flew home. I landed at DIA at 4:30 and caught up with Eric and both our moms at their gate where they were waiting to board their flight to Frankfurt before their flight to Venice. 

That's right. We were two ships passing in the airport before he left for 10 days for Italy. With Yaya. 

Whose idea was that? 

Oh right. Mine.

So today I'm on my own with all three kiddos for the first time (for the next 10 days), and you know what I'm feeling (besides tired and a little trepidatious?)? 

Thankful.

It's serendipitous then that I'm feeling so thankful and that today is November 1st - The first day of our Thankful Tree. 

Each November we bring out the Thankful Tree. And everyday we write down something we're thankful for and tuck it into that day's leaf. 

In today's leaf:

We're so thankful Hazel Mae has come to join our family!

I'm sure we'll get to monster trucks before the month is out. 

If you'd like to see how we made our Thankful Tree, click here to last year's post about it.

Oh...and hi dear reader. I'm thankful for you. 

Vegan Mother Hubbard is all about thankfulness this month. I linked this post up to get in on the thankful action:

T-Day Revisited

What I did on my summer...I mean Thanksgiving...vacation:

Did some swinging.


Listened to secrets from Aunt Joann.


Chilled out with my new buddy...Buddy.


Chased some kitties.


Beed cute. (There's a whole series of these found here. Trust me it's worth a click)


Played outside with Dad.


Posed with the fam.


Played charades. Two words. It's a dance move....Sprinkler Dance!


Watch a movie with my bro.


Looked cherubic.


And at the end of the day I jammed as many applesauce cookies as possible into my mouth gerbil style by the double fistfuls. And I was thankful.

Sweet Anticipation

The goodies are cooking. The tables are set. The babies are resting as we wait and ready the house for a family Thanksgiving.


Gram prepared a special table for Eli and Amos. As soon as he saw it Eli got situated in his vintage child's chair and said, "I'm ready Mama!"


He played away at his little table, setting his barn and trucks just so and chattering about being thankful. A bit early but still.


As we've been traveling I've been repeatedly struck by how big and confident and self sufficient my elder boy child is becoming. He's tall enough to turn on the sink to wash his hands on his own - and what's more - he does it. Sometimes without being asked. When did that happen?

I'm struck by Baby A's joviality and gusto. His personality gets bigger by the day and now includes, in addition to his usually sweet contented whimsy, little grumbles of displeasure. These usually occur when Eli's trying to exert his birthright wherein he assumes he has first dibs on all the toys. Way to go Little A. Get yours.


I am struck because I am unduly blessed.

On this day, only slightly more than on any other day, I give thanks.

Thankful Tree

Bursting with gratitude?

Got a hefty stash of felt handy?

Well here's the tutorial for you.

I must give credit where it's due - I get (*cough* steal *cough*) lots of ideas from Pottery Barn Kids. Eli loves to play in there, and while he plays, I get inspired. That's where the idea for the Thankful Tree was planted, as well as the Paper Bird Mobile. I don't take photos (the fella scolded me for that one) I just look and let the ideas ruminate for a while until they bust their way out via my fingertips. To begin, sew four sheets of green felt together like so:
(That beige sheet should be green, but I only had three green sheets).

Then cut it into a bushy/tree shape por exemplo:
Now, because my sheets weren't all the same color, I decided to felt in some green roving to mask the different shades. You can skip this step if you have enough green sheets of felt.
Make some branches and a trunk out of brown felt:
Voila.

Then cut out a buncha leaves out of fall colored felt. Add numbers for the dates of the month. I sewed my numbers with a very tight wide zig zag stitch. But you could cut numbers of out felt and stitch them on by hand or machine (don't worry about the edges - felt doesn't fray - love the stuff!).
Then stitch the leaves on, leaving the center portion of the leaf, and the top wedge un-stitched, so that you'll have a little pocket into which you can tuck a note of thanks.
Because November's been a busy month, I just got this finished today, so the boys and I played Gratitude Catch-Up at dinner tonight. Dizzy totally gets it. Right out the gate - he's thankful for his family (melt). Then he's thankful for us one by one (including me, with a little goading - "How about the one who made the tree?")

Then he exclaimed, "The next one's for Luca and Inara!" - his besties. Heart...warmed.

We were thankful for his school, teacher and class buddies...our yummy food, especially when prepared by Daddy, and being so healthy. And now we're caught up.

The plan is to continue discussing gratitude and write something we're thankful for each of the remaining days in November. I even plan to take this with us on our travels.

Gratitude abounds...