Thanksgiving Day...and the Christmas Festivities Begin!

Our Thanksgiving, and everyday prayer, hung by our little table: "Oh Thou, who has given us so much, grant us one more thing - a thankful heart."

Before we get too far into the Christmas season, I wanted to post a couple of fun things. (warning: this is a bit long, but I had to fit a lot in.) Thanksgiving was different this year without Robb here, but it was a good day and our hearts were full of THANKS. Lauren made a delicious apple pie for us, as part of the food that we took to our dear friends' home, Willy and Lewis.
Here Lewis is getting the boys' table set and ready for them to eat. Kody, Jayce, Drew and Dawson.
Willy and my good friend Amy (also Willy's niece) sign Amy's "Thankful Tablecloth". Each year whomever she eats with signs what they are thankful for.
This is Preston and Kade, Willy and Lewis' grandson. These little ones have something special in common....they were born about 7 minutes apart, both 4 weeks early and spent several days in the same NICU. It was fun to see them together! Kade is a cutie!!

On Friday after Thanksgiving, we went with Gramps and Nana on the Thunder Mountain Train ride. We rode about an hour on a very old train that is now just used for tourist events. It was a very fun time. Even though there was no snow, the singing of carols, stories and Santa helped put us in the Christmas mood!
Gramps and the boys look out the window.
Our sweet Gramps and Nana! Our kids so love to have them come to visit!

The cute singers that led us in Christmas songs.

And today (Satrday) we headed to the mountains with some friends to find a Christmas tree. What a great time we had, with the snow falling down and the kids sledding down the hills. Above is the Orr family who brought the 4 wheelers that we all enjoyed.
These are the adults (well, Preston is on Robb's back in the backpack)....
...and these are the kids! Can you believe that out of all those 12 kids, 11 were boys! Lauren takes it all in stride...she is used to boys and loves playing with them.



Thanks to lots of layers of clothes, snow suits for kids and baby, hot cocoa, and hand and toe warmers, we all had a wonderful time. Robb and I are so thankful for our fabulous friends to share life with and we were glad to take this day to enjoy relationships and make memories. We hope to not schedule our days too tightly so we can enjoy many more fun events this Christmas season. We are trying as a family to not focus on the gifts (sort of hard in this culture sometimes), but rather on The Gift! Happy December! (The following video clips are of Preston and Gramps, and then Lauren and Drew playing at their vioin Christmas concert last night.)