Giving Thanks

We have so much to be thankful for this holiday season. Wonderful family, friends, an amazing husband and a happy baby girl.

Margaret and I were hard at work these last few days getting the house ready for Thanksgiving. She was such a trooper and behaved most of the time. If only she had taken more than a 30 minute nap!!

At least it was a long enough nap to get the centerpiece done. I am pretty proud of myself. Just wish it would stay like this forever!

I was a lil distracted while setting the table

which will explain why I set it wrong :) I realized it when we sat down to eat but no one said a word. It drove me crazy. Kept thinking to myself did I really just do this. Oh well!

May be next time instead of working on the centerpiece during her nap, I should set the table.

After getting the little one to bed, it was time to prepare the food! JB injecting the turkey with some HOT marinade. Next time I will not use the hot sauce it called for. Way too hot for me!!!

The roasted turkey soaking in the brine.

Thanksgiving morning, the Alexanders came over for breakfast. It was so much fun watching the cousins together.

Here goes nothing. . . This was not only our first Thanksgiving but first time ever cooking a Turkey. Definitely did not take as long as we anticipated but it was wonderful!

Daddy taking the fried turkey out. By the looks of it, we just knew it was going to explode like Lampoons turkey :)

Tada! The finished product!

We had soooooo much food to eat! Two turkeys, rice, gravy, cranberry sauce, sweet potato casserole, stuffing, green beans and biscuits!

Not to mention the fabulous dessert. Chocolate Chip Pecan Pie, Pumpkin Rum Cake and a yummy dessert Jenna dropped off. Thanks again Jenna!

It was so good to have MomB at our house for Thanksgiving and am glad she made the long trek into town. We enjoyed getting to spend time with her.

(Ok so the pictures downloaded in the wrong order)

Suppose to be . . . peakaboo (below pic) . . . There she is (above pic) :)

This pretty much sums up how we were by the end of the day . . . EXHAUSTED!

We couldn't have asked for a better day . . . (well if my family was here it would have been even better! Sure did miss you guys!!!) Thank you Lord for such a wonderful day and blessing us with such an amazing family! We love you all!!!

Early Thanksgiving at the Farm

Before heading to the farm, we had a date night at the Riverkeepers Oyster Roast. Thanks again Memo for keeping Margaret!!!

Never too early to learn to drive at the farm. If only we still had the jeep!

We were so glad Mimi joined us Saturday night.

2 for 1! JB shot his first deer. Two does with one shot. Congrats daddy!

Papa and his camo girl

When I was pregnant with Margaret, Papa knew it was a girl and called her his little camo girl.

We rode around the property and found the cows. Margaret was not real sure what to think of them.

She loves books. Right now she would rather flip through books instead of play with toys.

Her favorite ones are the ones with mirrors. She will lay on the floor with her head over the mirror just looking at herself. It is too cute for words.

We had so much fun with Uncle Dick. Missed Aunt Megan and Aunt Liz but can not wait to see everyone at Christmas.

8 Months

(and 1 week and 3 days old)

Margaret was given a baby gift last week. We had fun practicing for Christmas.

I think she liked the ribbon more than the paper

but after some determination, she did it!!! With mommy's help of course :)

We had a long few days so decided to go to the zoo. It was a great getaway just the two of us. It is amazing how much she has grown in the last 2 months since the last time we went.

She could not take her eyes off the giraffes. She enjoyed watching the other kids feed them.

We experienced quite a show. The 2 jaguars were not too friendly that day and we were a lil too close for comfort.

We did get to see a 3 month old jaguar cub which was sooooo adorable.

Margaret loved the monkeys. One of them sat at the window and had a conversation with her.

We had a great day. Saw lots of animals that were sleeping last time and vice versa. Great place to be so Margaret could talk as loud as she wanted and did not bother anyone.

We can not get enough of the great outdoors! But I must say we are ready for some cooler weather. Hard to get in the holiday mood when it is 80 degrees.!

Dada when are you coming home?????

We have been running lots of errands to get ready for Thanksgiving and if you can tell, Margaret does not mind.

It is getting harder to take her with me these days. She use to sit facing me or sideways but now she is trying to stand up and direct traffic. Think she is going to have to get strapped in from now on.

Miss priss is growing up so fast. She isn't crawling yet but scooting around and getting into everything. If she sees one speckle on the floor she is determined to pick it up! She has started a few new things this week - when she is excited she scrunches her nose and her eyes; I have yet to capture it. When she is frustrated or upset, she scrunches her face, makes a fuss sounds, and looks around to see if we are paying attention. Think we have a drama queen on our hands.