It's Beginning to Feel a Lot Like Christmas

Since I have been sick all week, I have watched a lot of movies.  We have started our Christmas movies.  So far this week we have done The Santa Clause 2, Christmas in Handcuffs and Miracle on 34th Street.  We MO34S the night before Thanksgiving because it does start on Thanksgiving day you know.

Brian is even starting to get in the Christmas mood.  We have listened to a little bit of Christmas music so we decided it was the day to put up our tree.  I just finished putting my living room together last week L.  My wall that I just put together no longer looks centered.  We had to really move stuff around to make room for the tree.  I love my tree this year!  The pictures don’t really do it justice.  You can’t see all the ornaments and the shimmer.  I found the ornaments at Sam’s and found these little twirly things at Target that I pulled apart and made them work for my tree for two bucks!  Thrifty!  Mom, you would be proud.  I wish you could see it in person.  It has been a quiet day but we have watched football all day and worked on the tree and I think that is just what the doctor would have prescribed.  

Sorry, I didn't rotate this one.  Mom, this is for you.  This is the fall stuff that I had in my entry with the stuff that my mom sent me. I found this lantern for cheap and was going to paint it but the light green had a fall feeling and matched my fall stuff.  Thanks for sending this mom!

Thanksgiving

We had thanksgiving with the Gardner’s this year.  We really like them and had a wonderful time.  We made homemade rolls, Snicker salad, and a small turkey breast.  We ate at 2:00 We played kickball outside and then played games.  We were there until after midnight.  Like I said, we had a blast!  We missed being home, but at the same time being with them reminds me the most of what we would be doing at home. 

Yesterday, Black Friday, Brian and the Garnder guys went shooting and I stayed with Elizabeth.  I was going to go with Brian but I have been sick all week and there was enough guys going that I felt like I could stay and not feel like I was ditching Brian.  Us girls ran some errands and got drinks and waited for the guys.  We came home for a couple hours in the afternoon and watched some football and then met up with them again to go bowling and played cards.  We have taught them how to play Canasta.  Thursday night we played 4 handed Canasta but last night we got to decks and played 6 handed.  It was different, and it really was pretty fun!  The girls lost… BAD… BOOOOOO!

Chicago!

November 12^th was our stake temple day. They wanted us to do the 1:30 session but Brian and I wanted to go really early and get to spend the day in Chicago. We left at 8 ET and we got  to Chicago in pretty good time.  It takes about two hours but it is in CT so you actually get an extra hour to play!  I think it the whole trip, there and back, we spent like 15 dollars just in tolls.  Any-Who… we thought we were in Chicago, the temple can’t be that far away right?  Well it took us an extra hour to get there.  I guess we should have looked at a map before we left to see if we could find a way that you didn’t have to go basically right in the middle of the city.  The temple looks a lot like the Boise temple. 

After the temple, we parked at a Park-And-Ride and took the subway in to town.  We spent most of our time around Michigan Ave and Navy Pier.  It was super busy.  Yes yes, it is a city so it is always busy, but with it being a Saturday and in the holiday season, it was busier than normal. 

Brian really wanted to have a Chicago hotdog and Chicago deep dish pizza.  We went to Puccini’s???  Something like that.  We really liked it!  It was good, lots of options and CHEAP!!  We will definitely go back.  For dinner we had Giorgino’s Pizza.  We had to wait for 1 hour and 40 minutes to get a seat.  Then it takes like a half hour for your pizza to cook. 

We enjoyed Navy Pier.  It was really windy!  We believe it when they call it the windy city!  We rode the Ferris wheel and enjoyed looking around.  There is so much to do!  We think it would be fun to make a trip one Saturday a month.  

Our Halloween

October 29th is our traditional pumpkin carving date.  This year was very sad for me that I was not home to do it with my family.  So, it was up to me and Brian this year to make the most awesome pumpkins!  

Brian was put to pumpkin clean-out duty

Our pumpkin book said so cut the bottoms of the pumpkins off and we decided it really was easier to do it this way

All Ready to Go!

I chose to do the kitty.  Brian did the other two

The semi finished product

The FINISHED Product!

 Aren't we all so cute?

Brian thought that someone in our neighborhood would come smash our pumpkins the first night but on november 7th they are still here!  (We need to through them away....)

My Birthday Cake!  Yummm

On Halloween night we went to the Garnder's house.  We had the BEST time.  We played capture the flag and the old people beat the high school kids.  We were proud.  We woke up a little sore the next day!  We found our new game night family.  Super fun!