Thanksgiving

This year we celebrated Thanksgiving at Jennifer and Will's. Jennie always does a fabulous job with the table decorations.
 

Will cooked 2 turkeys. One he put in his smoker and the other he cooked in the oven. Both were delicious and we made soup out of the leftovers.

We had a very special Thanksgiving this year as we had many of my relatives joining us. When we were children or families always got together for the holidays, but that hasn't happened for many, many, many years. Thanks to Alissa, first cousin 1X removed, for coming up with this great idea.

Jennie turned out to be Rylie's good buddy today. A you can see they had great fun while eating dinner.

Here's the 3 cousins Carole, Karen and Kristi. We are very close in age and whenever we get together we take a picture of the 3 of us. This has happened since we were small and our parents took our picture. As adults it took us awhile to realize that we always lined up in order of age. Hmmmmm, looks like that makes me the oldest.

We included Julie and Danny in this picture even though they are several years younger than the 3 of us.

Auntie Dorothy is amazing and has always been the life of the party. If she spots a piano the music begins. For as long as we can remember she has made up little songs about anything and anyone that might be around. Oh, what fun memories these are.

I love this picture Jennie took of Aunt Dorothy's hands. It makes me wonder how many piano's she has sat down at and how many songs has she played.

Family: Amber, Jerad, Jodie, Alissa, Rodney, Rylie, Nick, Danny, and Kristi

Karen and Kristi

Project time! I like to bring a project for the girls. This year we made a beaded Christmas ornament.

We are working on our genealogy and trying to figure out just what all the relationships are. So, as confusing as it may be here are Jodie, Jennifer, Alissa and Amber and how they are related. Jennifer and Amber are sisters. Jennifer, Amber and Jodie are cousins. Alissa joins the group as a second cousin.

Luke with Baby Reed, Dan, Alissa and Max

Auntie Dorothy and my cousin Karen.

Amber's Baby Shower

Jennie did a wonderful job on the decorations. Since Amber is decorating the nursery with the alphabet Jennie used that theme for the shower.

The goodies and treats were not only fun to look at, but very yummy!

 

Presents and more presents!

Baby things are just so darn cute.  Amber got a wonderful selection of things that will come in very handy once this little boy, yes it's a boy, arrives.

  Amy and Amber showing their baby bumps.

Amy is due on November 28th and Amber is due January 25th

 Amber was happy that so many of her friends were able to attend the shower. Thank you everyone!

Christmas Cactus

My Christmas Cactus always likes to bloom around Thanksgiving. This year it was loaded with blooms. There are still lots of buds in the picture below. An odd thing is happening this year. Once all the flowers were done blooming and fell off the plant is starting to get more buds! It must be sooooo happy, or just very confused.

Clam Digging

Clam digging at Moclips. It looks like a beautiful evening, but what you can't see if that the wind was blowing so hard that it practically knocked me over. You may wonder why we are digging in this weather and also at night. Well... razor clam season is only open a few days a year. Unfortunately those days happen to be in the winter and during the winter the low tides are always at night. I think it is planned that way so fewer diggers turn out.

 However, I am amazed at the number of people that do show up for the digs. We are all dressed to stay warm and dry, but there are people out digging in shorts and a t-shirt. Must be the true clam lovers.

 The men take care of this part of the cleaning process.

 We  had a darling house. It was called "The Carriage House" and as you can see was right on the beach. These are always such fun get aways.

 Carole, Ron, Robin and Brad