Thankful for Thanksgiving...

There was a lot to be thankful for this Thanksgiving weekend...and for more than just a meal.  I hosted Thanksgiving this year, I work up early and took our brined turkey out of the Lowe's bucket and got it ready for roasting...7 hours later, it was beautiful!!!  It was so nice to have a home full of people, Mason, Arrielle and MJ (Arrielle's sisters dropped by to say hello too), My dad and Mike, Mike's kids, Megan and Shawn and Elliott's friend Brian (who is like my third son).  Megan and I chatted as I finished the meal...I love getting moments with her.  She can be a tough nut to crack!  In my haste to get everyone fed, I realized after they all left that I did not offer them all anything to drink!!!  Whoops!  

After most everyone had gone home, except Mason and Arrielle (and MJ) we started to watch some movies...all day I had not been feeling great.  Mahoney gives kisses now, which means she is a lot better at spreading germs, and she shared her cooties with me.  By 7:15pm, I excused myself and went to bed, and slept right on through to the next morning.  I had to work the next two days and that rest helped a lot.

Sunday, I had asked Mike to come with me to see Shawn's performance in the Nutcracker ballet (put on by a local dance studio).  The performance was amazing, even though Shawn's part was very small, I was entranced by the ballet.  I was excited that Mike accepted the offer, I rarely get time alone with Mike.  Like I have blogged about before, we always know that the other one will always be there, even though we can be so different at times.  We talked a little and decided to make an effort to have "dates" every other month or more.  I was especially happy since it was Mike's idea.

I had to make a stop on the way home from the show, and as we got back in the truck I got a call from Arrielle...she was crying.  She could not get a hold of Mason and she was bleeding heavily and thought she was in danger of losing the baby. Her sister was on her way to get her, and I took on the task of finding Mason, who was at our house...but his phone was dead.  I got in touch with Lee, he told Mason that Arrielle needed him...and Mace was off. Lee kept MJ, and a few minutes later I got home.  Poor Mason went to the wrong emergency room and it took longer to get to Arrielle.  I turn to mush when I hear Arrielle cry, so I was already a mess.  The next few hours felt like forever. Thankfully, Arrielle's sister was texting me the play by of the emergency room visit.  An ultrasound showed baby to be still in the perfect position, heartbeat was great and her cervix was still shut tight.  No reason for the bleeding, the doctor says sometimes it just happens.  It scared the crap out of us though...you never realize how much something means to you until you think you might lose it.  I was so happy and thankful to see a disheveled Arrielle, when they came to pick up Mahoney later that evening. She and baby are still doing good.

Sunday night capped off my month of thankfullness...but honestly I and thankful and so grateful for my family, my friends and for this year of big changes.

 We put our tree up early, and Mahoney loves the ornaments.  All the breakable ones are up high, and everything within her reach is plastic or unbreakable.

 I love this picture, it is MJ eating Thanksgiving dinner.  More specifically, she is eating the pink stuff my mom loved...and that was pretty much all she ate!  My mom would have loved that MJ liked the pink stuff!!

This is our kitty Texas, I think he likes Christmas almost as much as we do...he loves to sit under the tree.  He is almost 17 years old now, so I let him do it as often as he would like!