Thanksgiving 2015

The Feast

We enjoyed a relaxing but very productive Thanksgiving holiday this year! Mike and I hosted this year, and it was wonderful to have the whole family together for dinner on Thursday. My mom and I took a divide-and-conquer approach to the meal that worked out really well.

A traditional Thanksgiving dinner at our house involves turkey and gravy, sweet and mashed potatoes, Stove Top stuffing, cranberry sauce, fresh rolls and a variety of steamed and roasted vegetables. Oh, and dessert of course! This year we had three pies (pumpkin, coconut and apple) plus a mini cake for L.J.

I did a simple table setting this year that I think turned out pretty well! We used the island in the kitchen as the buffet, which was also much easier than passing lots of dishes around.

A delicious dinner was enjoyed by all! Well, except L.J. Opting to repeat last year’s menu, he had two rolls.

Mini Birthday

After dinner, we had a mini birthday celebration for L.J. since my parents aren’t able to make it down for his party. This year his name was added to the special birthday cape that we enjoyed wearing each year when we were little. We sang, he blew out the candles (with help and without spitting on the cake) and then he enjoyed a giant slice of cake with extra icing and whipped cream.

His present from Nana and Poppa was a gigantic set of Lincoln Logs. He calls them “Lincoln Blocks” and likes having us build garages for his cars, which he then promptly and loudly Godzillas.

Baby Girl’s Room

A big action item for the week was prepping Baby Girl’s room. My parents graciously offered to help outfit her room since we already have all the baby gear we need. What a perfect gift! My dad and brother came down on Tuesday to start painting. I am totally in love with the color and the room looks so much fresher with new paint and new white trim. Here’s a sneak peek of the progress:

Ikea Oops

A needed item for Baby Girl’s room was a dresser that could serve as a changing table. I picked out the popular Hemnes dresser from Ikea, and my mom noticed a Black Friday ad that offered 20% off the dresser plus a $50 coupon for the first 200 customers. Ikea was opening 2 hours early for this event.

My dad and I arrived at Ikea at 8:00 on the dot. There were a handful of people waiting by the door; certainly not the crowd we had thought might be there. But the doors weren’t open and the lights weren’t on in the hallway, which was odd. We waited around for 10-15 minutes, and then drove around the front of the building to see if maybe only one entrance was open. That entrance wasn’t open either, though we did encounter a few more confused people.

Well, turns out we were in the wrong country. The Black Friday ad we were all referencing was a Canadian Black Friday ad. That made no sense since Canadian’s celebrate Thanksgiving much earlier. But at least we felt better that we weren’t the only ones who had seen the ad and arrived early.

It was much too far to drive back home, so we went to West Egg Café. We’d already eaten breakfast, but my dad got coffee and grits while I enjoyed a chai tea latte the size of my head and a biscuit. While the situation was annoying, the bright side was that I got to spend some extra time at my dad and get a treat from one of my favorite breakfast spots. That was pretty cool.

Finally Ikea opened at their normal 10 a.m. time. We secured the dresser and a few things we passed along the way, and were on our way back home by 10:18 a.m. All that time for a quick grab-and-go errand! And no discounts, boo.

As you can see from the room-in-progress picture, we did get the dresser built. It took three college-educated adults close to four hours to get through all 44 assembly steps. Whew – glad Mike and I did not attempt the assembly by ourselves!