Thanksgiving

This year, we once again hosted the whole Chadwick clan for Thanksgiving, making it our third time. It always makes for a little stress, but I absolutely love having my house full of people that I love. My parents came on Monday night. My dad helped me out by taking the kids up to Ogden on Tuesday to pick up my niece, Heather. I was able to clean without worrying about the littles. It was so nice! Tuesday night, we hired a babysitter, and my parents treated Brian and I, along with Heather, to a BYU Women's Volleyball game. They even spoiled us with concessions! It was lots of fun, and BYU won!

On Wednesday, Brian and I frantically tried to finish up downstairs, making beds and finishing up with the bathroom. Thankfully, I had made a freezer meal the week before, so we had dinner for everyone without much effort. Emily, Chelsea, and Taryn arrived on Wednesday evening with their families. Rachel LOVED having baby Elijah around to love on:

 And Michael did too, though mostly he loved having lots of cousins to play with

 We put all the kids over 5 in our playroom for a massive sleepover. I wish I had taken a picture of the wall to wall sleeping bags! Emily and Pete stayed in Ethan's old room with Henry, and Taryn and David stayed in my studio room with their two littles. Chelsea slept in Michael's room with Amber, my parents stayed in Rachel's room, and Rachel stayed in the laundry room. Ethan and McCallan (along with Cal's girlfriend) arrived on Thursday morning, making the group complete (well, complete except for Thomas, who is out of the country).

 Everyone pitched in for an excellent meal. Chelsea and David helped me get the turkey ready, and it was super yummy! We had mashed potatoes, corn, green beans, pudding salad, green salad, rolls, sparkling cider, and I even made candied yams for Brian. It was SO yummy, and I miss that meal already.

  

 With our large expansion of 4 kids a few years ago, we had to start another table. We put Amber, Rachel, Henry, and Aaron around our little kid-sized table, and the older kids sat at the bar.  

  

After dinner, we played Times Up over and over again, ate pie, and played more Time's Up. It was such a blast, and at one point, we were all in tears from laughing so hard. 

 Rachel and Michael got up super early everyday, and despite our amazing efforts at getting that big crew of kids to bed by 8 every night (and we were mostly successful, one night, they were even all in bed just after 7!), the week was exhausting for Rachel. Thursday night, I watched her nod off in my dad's arms: 

 In the middle of all the noise and talking, she just conked out. It was right before bedtime, so we carefully put her in jammies and tucked her into bed.

 All too soon, Cal, Cassidy, and Ethan had to head back to Logan. Cal had to open on Friday, and Ethan had to work on Friday as well. We enjoyed having them while we could.   

Chelsea had to take off on Friday for work, and after she left, Friday turned into a craft day, headed up by Emily and my mom and dad. They made clothespin ornaments and salt dough ornaments:

 I ran out of paint shirts, so Henry got to wear this little bag number:

 After dinner on Friday, we went to Thanksgiving Point to see the holiday lights. We reserved a wagon for the occasion, and it was FREEZING! We sang carols, snuggled to stay warm, and enjoyed the lights:

 And Brian and my selfie skills seem to be getting worse--in our defense, it was really cold and dark!

After the wagon ride, we came back and warmed up with some hot chocolate. Kids got on their jammies, Rachel loved on Elijah some more

And we tucked all those kiddos into bed. My mom, Emily, Heather, and maybe my dad? helped finish up painting the clothespin horses and making manes and tails for them. The next morning, my parents, along with Chelsea's kids, and Taryn and David headed back up to Ogden. Emily and I did a little shopping, and Brian installed an electrical outlet in the garage so that our freezer could be on its own breaker line. We finished the night by watching "Scrooge", and it was nice to watch it with another fan in the house (We grew up on it, but our husbands don't quite love it to the same degree that we do).

Sunday morning, Emily and her crew left. We combed the house looking for stray socks and other items, reuniting them with their owners at Taryn's church building in Ogden, where we had a reunion and threw out jokes like, "Hey, long time no see!" After all those festivities, we came home to a quiet house, grateful for the silence, but also grateful for the wonderful week of noise where our home was filled with so many that we love. 

November

Here's some highlights from our crazy November:

Remember how I said that Halloween triggered Disney Princess inspired hair, particularly from Frozen? Here's Anna on November 1 (Rachel is sitting on my lap while I'm typing this, and she even said, "There's Anna!!!" when she noticed her picture.) 

  

 Our biggest accomplishment in November was paying off the rest of our student loans--specifically mine. Brian's were bigger and had much higher interest rates, and so we paid them off a while ago--maybe a year or more. That was a big day. Mine weren't gaining any interest at all, but we still wanted them gone. Before paying them all back, we made this chart, each square representing a specific loan amount. Our plan was to reward ourselves with a cruise when we paid them all off. So, this chart may not mean much to you, but it represents a huge burden lifted. I've had some of these loans since 2004, and it feels so nice that they are gone!

 I have similar pictures from our Wymount days of Michael helping Brian do dishes. I just love these:

 Rachel joined a league of Vampires:

 Michael had one of those rare moments where he fell asleep in the car.

 I dragged the kids with me to go voting. The voting booth volunteers gave stickers to Michael and Rachel. This is what Rachel did with hers:

 Our ward participated in a special humanitarian project where we took a Burundian refugee family's house and re-modeled it over two days. People donated time, money, furniture, tile, paint, lighting fixtures, appliances, and talent to make it happen. They asked me to take their family pictures. Apparently the family had never had their family pictures taken professionally. I met them at Temple Square to take their family pictures, scurried back home, and then processed them and tried to get them printed in time to have them framed and on the wall for the big reveal to the family that night at 6. It was a crazy endeavor, but through some kindness by the people at Inkleys, I was able to pull it off. The kids loved seeing their pictures up on the wall, and the single mother was really touched. Brian helped out at the house all day on Saturday installing lights and other things. It was such an awesome experience and helped us be so grateful for what we have. I dragged Rachel with me to Temple Square for the photo shoot. We grabbed a snack at Deseret Book across the street after we finished and while we waited for our ride back home. It was a fun little date with my girl.

 We try to read lots of books to our kids. Sometimes we're better at it than others. This particular night, we were successful. I love these little moments where they hold still and snuggle me while I read them a story. Michael is reading so well that so many times lately, he steals my thunder and insists on reading the story. I love how much he loves reading, but I miss having more turns! 

 And we have lots of moments like this:

  Rachel loves her accessories. 

In November, we also had our first snowfall. Michael went outside to play in it with Eva. A little while later, he came back into the house, asking for a carrot. "Did you make a snowman?!" I asked, surprised. I didn't think there was THAT much snow. Sure enough, using just about every snowflake, they made this cute little snowman.  

 Adobe has passes for their employees and families for various venues in the area. You just have to sign up for a night, and it's yours for the night. On the 10th, Brian got us tickets for the Aquarium. We got their around 5:30--and found out that they close at 6p.m. every night. So, we did a rushed walk-through, but it was still fun.

 The kids loved the penguins.  

 And the other animals, including the poison dart frogs, and the model of the poison dart frogs.

And we had more moments:

 Rachel and I have lots of snuggle moments while Michael is at school.

And what would life at home be without some baking and beater licking?

 Our biggest project for the month was finishing our downstairs bathroom. I wanted it done in time for our Thanksgiving guests to arrive, and I was constantly looking at the schedule, working with our many contractors to make sure it was finished on time. We hired a plumber, a drywaller, and our neighbor was kind enough to install our white cultured marble surround. Shayne helped Brian install the travertine floor, and the four of us all pitched in to paint. We even let Rachel join us this time:

 She got really messy and wasn't good at sharing her roller. I didn't invite her back for coat number 2, but it was fun working down there with my kiddos.

 Brian and I went to go see the last installment of the Hunger Games movies, and it didn't disappoint. I sobbed through one part--sometimes it is hard when you know what is coming. Brian and I read this series out loud together back in Wymount. In fact, it was the first book I read in my first book club. We finished the whole series in probably two weeks, which is pretty impressive considering Brian had 4 jobs and was going to school full-time.

 Michael and Monkey put on an informal concert in the living room.

 We read more books. Michael went downstairs and brought up all our Christmas ones. He was just a LITTLE bit excited about Christmas.

 We worked and worked and finally got the bathroom ready for our guests. We still have a few things to caulk and touch up, but it's mostly there, and our downstairs guests were pretty excited to have a bathroom. We kept it a secret until they arrived--and they were patient with us ignoring them while we frantically finished up.

 We hosted my entire family here for Thanksgiving (more on that in another post).

 Other big news, our ward split in November, and we moved to a new building, also not in our stake. We now have church at 2:30. The primary president was in the new ward they formed, so our Primary had to be completely reorganized, and I got called to be the secretary in the new presidency. We had one week to get it reorganized, and it was a lot of work! Despite the split, we still have around 130 kids in our primary. (Primary is the organization for the children aged 18 months to 12 years old, and it includes Sunday school, singing time, and activities and cub scouts for the older children. It's a lot.). Between our basement, prepping for our Thanksgiving guests, and reorganizing the entire Primary--making sure we had the right amount  of classrooms and teachers--November was incredibly stressful! There were tears and exhaustion, but I think we've about fallen into a good swing of things--until we have to adjust everything for the new year!

On Sunday, November 29, we attended Taryn's ward in Ogden so we could be there for Elijah's blessing. This meant I missed our 3rd Sunday of our newly formed Primary. I was nervous and worked hard to give them all the things they would need while I was gone, and tried to forget about it and enjoy church in Ogden. My parents and grandparents had all the kids sitting next to them on the pew, so Brian and I had a very quiet sacrament meeting, and it was wonderful.

After church, Taryn fed us all lunch, and as we were heading out the door, I got recruited to take pictures. I was so worrried about Primary that I forgot to bring my nice camera. So, cell phone shots it was. Here's four generations:

  After lunch in Ogden, we headed home. Everyone had all left from Thanksgiving, and we were excited to clean up our house and get back to normal. We cleaned up and set up our Christmas tree:

 Everyone helped fluff out the tree.

 And the kids helped arrange our Christmas village.

We decorated the rest of the tree for family home evening on Monday night. 

And Brian, with encouragement from me, observed no-shave-November. He enjoyed the break from shaving a little too much and hinted that he might just keep on during December. I said no way. He was good enough to start shaving again on December 1, but here's his one month's worth of growth: 

Beard or no beard, I think he's a pretty handsome guy. Aren't I so lucky?

I can't believe that November has already come and gone. It's been a bit of a whirlwind around here, but all in all, we have to say that things are going well, and we feel incredibly blessed. We have so much to be thankful for this year. We're grateful for our warm, comfortable home. We're grateful for Brian's job. We're thankful to be surrounded by so many wonderful people who are so caring and compassionate. We couldn't have picked a better spot to settle down. We're grateful for wonderful family--on both sides! And we're so grateful for two wonderful kids. During this holiday season, we are especially grateful for our Savior, who makes all the good things in our life possible.