Finished up the tree, today, and got the garland all hung.  We are festive!

It's Christmastime in the City!

We got the girls back this morning, so we got out Christmas!  The girls were excited to have their little trees to put in their rooms.

It's handy to have little bodies to go under this prickly tree to straighten out the tree skirt! 

We didn't quite get to all the tree decorations, but we got a good start!  Love Christmastime!

New Car Smell

The girls are still with Brad, today, so Derek and I had the day to wander.  And I ended up buying a car!  Holy Smokes!  Now I won't have to worry about the Tahoe detail getting messed up!  I have a car payment for the first time ever, but it's a good way to build credit, and its reliable with few miles.  I'm pretty excited!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving!  Derek and I started out the day with a brisk 13.1 miles...here we are before the half.  Smiling, and ready to rock!

And here we are after...still smiling, but clearly tired and weary!  Derek had a rough time with his knees.  This probably wasn't the best idea.  Jumping out of planes and helicopters doesn't really make your knees age well.  But!  We finished!

Funny little turkey medals...this is three for me!  I know plenty of people have done far more, but I'm pretty pleased! 

The girls left for Brad's last night, but I didn't get to this until today.  They had some pretty cute little leaves this year, and the tree looks festive!

Leiden's leaves included:  Elsa, Anna, and Olaf, blankie, thankful tree, herself, snowmen, diamonds, presents, holidays, Jordan and Armida, Emmit, songs, Minecraft, and Primary programs.  Silly girl.

Mac's leaves included:  School, birthdays, lightbulbs, earth, houses, getting messy, horses, clothes, Mama, Dada, church, video games, flowers, bread and water, TV and goofy shows, presents, Jesus, trees, and birds.

And Mimi's leaves included:  cats, monsters, blankie, glue dots, birds, popcorn, pumpkins, leaves, reading, numbers, snow, pie, and rats.  Chuckle...

There were also some guest appearances over the month, which only add to the cheer of the Thankful Tree!

I was super excited to make my yummy cranberry cream cheese dip for snacking today!  I forget how good it is.  But it's not really something you can do all year, because you need fresh cranberries to do it!

My mom set a lovely table, with pretty golden pears for each setting. 

I was the pie lady! 

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!  I hope you all had a wonderful day! 

Thanksgiving Eve

This car is looking AWESOME!  I had it detailed today, so I could sell it in its best condition.  It was pretty much a hot mess in the inside.  But it looks fabulous, now!  The only trick at this point will be keeping it clean with the girls.  Eek.

As it is Thanksgiving Eve, mom is hard at work in the kitchen, up to her elbows in raw turkey.  We joke that the kitchen is never so clean as the night before Thanksgiving, when you've seriously disinfected the place after raw turkey has splashed everywhere.  It totally grosses me out, frankly.

But, it is now soaking in its brine, readying for tomorrow! 

Derek didn't come into town until late tonight, so I was busy making pies!  Pumpkin, apple with sugared cranberries (so pretty), 

and Derek's mince tarts!  They turned out really well.  While I don't like how they taste, he said they were wonderful, and that's what I wanted! 

 The garage is a mess.  After Derek took the trailer out to take it down to Vegas, it badly needed to be cleared out, but I am just getting to it, today.  Mainly because someone wants to come and look at the toddler bed!  In just the last couple days, I had completely forgotten that I had it up for sale.  The text came, and I realized this was a perfect opportunity to get out here and clean up!

And I lucked out...the couple wanted the bed, and took it off my hands immediately!  Nice!

I'm getting ready to make homemade mince tarts for Derek.  His favorite pie is mincemeat, which his grandmother used to make for him.  I obviously have no idea what her recipe was, but I found a highly rated one and I'm going to attempt it!  It requires some lovely candied peels, which I'm doing from scratch.

It is a terrible travesty that red grapefruit looks as beautiful as it does, but tastes like red grapefruit.  It is one thing I really don't like at all.  SO bitter.  But so pretty.

Feast Day

SWEET little Meemers...she got to have her Thanksgiving Feast this morning at school.  She wore her cute little turkey shirt, and made both a necklace and festive headband!  This little girl is the best!

She and the other girls will be with Brad for Thanksgiving this year, but she indicated that she wanted to wear both the headband and the necklace for real Thanksgiving.  Sounds awesome, Meems!  I can't believe Thanksgiving is almost here! 

Primary Program

 Primary Program, today!  The girls all did an awesome job, and were super cute doing their parts.  This meant that primary today was relaxing, with a movie and popcorn, which then means vacuuming on Sunday afternoon after church!

These little sweethearts did great!  And they all three agreed to pose for a picture--even better!  I totally forgot to save their parts, so I don't have a record of what they said.

Mimi wanted to set out this afternoon and make a snowman!  The other girls didn't want to go out, so it was just her.  She did a pretty good job rolling the balls, but then lost interest before it was complete.  As far as I'm concerned, the fresh air was great, regardless!

It's snowing this evening!  Super exciting!  I hope it sticks and we have tons!

Half is Coming!

Long run, gearing up for the run at Thanksgiving!  Um...next week!  I'm behind on my training, but I should be fine for one run!  This one was rough, out 5.5 miles and back.  Not good for morale!

I'm super excited to run this half with Derek next week!  I think it will be a great way to start off Thanksgiving!

Mac is loving drawing lately!  She is drawing some awesome My Little Pony pictures, just looking at the ones online.  She spent a lot of time working on these, and they look great!

There's Rainbow Dash,

Fluttershy,

and Pinkie Pie! 

And I paid the bill for the repair on the Tahoe!  Ugh! 

Seriously.  This car needs to be sold.  So, I ran the gas out today...on a freeway on ramp, no less, after dropping Mimi off at school.  Sigh.  This meant a tow to Dwight's, where I was told it needs a new fuel pump, AND a new battery.  Evidently, if you consistently run your car to empty, your fuel pump gets ruined.  The battery was just a bonus repair.  Sigh...The fuel pump for the Tahoe is an $800 repair.  I am done!  When this repair is complete, I will be putting it up for sale on KSL!

Today, the toddler bed ACTUALLY went up for sale on KSL...it's been taking up space in the garage since we moved here from my mom's house.  I'm asking very little, so hopefully it will go quickly.  It's not something I want to move down to Vegas!

See the hazy air by the light?  Something on the stove was left a little too long, but we rescued the room from the smoke alarm probably just in time with open windows and doors!  Whew!

Man.  Totally messed up, today!  Left the key turned in the ignition of the Tahoe for hours after church, and when I went to go start it to go to Sunday dinner, it was dead.  I knew I needed to jump it, and have the tools, so I tried Derek, who wasn't answering.  Then I tried my home teacher, who wasn't answering.  Then I tried my friend, Alecia.  She came over, and we figured it out with the help of YouTube.  We managed to not only jump my car, but without electrocuting either one of us, ruining her car, or using the help of a man!  Chuckle...mainly because there wasn't one around to help.  ;)

This evening was the LAST of the birthday celebrations, with a giant coconut cake from Sam's Club!  Love them! 

Snow Day!

The girls were thrilled to have snow!  They were super excited to run out and play around in it.  It was also a good time to inventory snow gear, and see who still has what and who has grown out of theirs!

Poor Maycie...she didn't have any gear with her, so we made do the best we could.  She had to do her best in a pair of too small cowgirl boots and some extra snow pants I had lying around for Leiden when she's a bit bigger. 

Somehow eating the snow is the preferred activity. 

Or burying heads in it. 

Then Leiden had the bright idea to get out the snow cone syrups she got for her birthday and made the fresh snow tasty for real!

Our Thankful tree is coming along nicely, as we remember each night we are here to add leaves and things we are thankful for.  When we have guests with us, they are also invited to participate. 

This afternoon, Leiden and Maycie decided they wanted to make a cake!  They did the entire thing from start to finish by themselves.  I helped in one spot, making some homemade frosting for them to use, and they did literally the rest. 

The most fun is of course,  

The decorating! 

They were originally going to do My Little Pony figures drawn on the cake and frosted in, but they (wisely) chose to use plastic figures instead, and stick with a rainbow on the top.  They did get excited about the edible markers I have, and did some drawing and words on the sides.  What a fun afternoon for them!  I was impressed with their initiative and how well they did!