Confessions of a Red-headed Stepchild: Thanksgiving Week

Thanks to a previous arrangement with Ares' dad, I was able to keep Ares all of Thanksgiving week! This was excellent news, considering we had four Thanksgivings... FOUR! Plus, Kyle had to work all of Wednesday night, get only a little bit of sleep, go to two dinners, then go to work. Poor guy was very tired after all this. Here is what happened from Nov. 25 - Dec. 1.

Monday: I watched little Miss Emma, so I had Kyle Ann come over with Jude for a play date and Thanksgiving activity. First they played, then I had them have a picnic lunch in the girls' play tent. They thought this was so awesome!

Then it was time for the kids to make their hand print turkeys. They all had a lot of fun doing it, and I of course couldn't miss out on the fun, so I did a couple turkeys as well on Ceri and Brigid's paper.

Tuesday: This was Ares' last day of school before the holiday, and I had promised his teacher that I would volunteer. Kyle had the day off so he watched the girls while I went. I volunteered for 3 hours, and then hung out at my Mom's until it was time to pick Ares up from school. Then we headed over to spend time with Janice and Wayne since we weren't going to be able to see Wayne on Thanksgiving. We had a delicious dinner, and the kids spent some wonderful time with their grandparents, and finished the evening off watching Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.

Since there was no school for Ares on Wednesday, he asked if he had a sleepover in the play tent.

Wednesday: With there being no school, and Kyle not working until the evening, we took the kids to Pump It Up. The girls were not old enough for the jumpy castles, but they had a lot of fun playing with the other stuff for their age group. Ares had fun playing with the other kids and all the different jumpy castles.

Since Kyle was working that night, and Thanksgiving was going to be at my aunt's house that was near my Mom's, the kids and I had a sleepover at my Mom's. After dinner, the kids decorated turkey sugar cookies.

Thursday: Thanksgiving Day! We watched the Macy's Thanksgiving Parade, and then went over to my Aunt Mary's house for dinner. Kyle had been asleep at his mom's so that the kids since it was in between his work and Mary's, and he would have a better chance of getting actual sleep there. He met us later on at the dinner.

The funniest thing then happened. Granddad and I were joking with Ares that if he didn't eat his turkey we would make him eat the turkey heart. Ares actually agreed. Granddad ate it before Ares could though because he likes the heart. I told Ares he could try the liver if he wanted, and he actually took a bite of it. It was a struggle to get him to eat his turkey, but he willingly ate the liver. Weird :p

After dinner and dessert with my family, we went to Kyle's brother's house. Unfortunately we weren't able to stay long, but I'm glad we got to see him, Janice, and Matty.

Friday: I went over to my Mom's again because she was nice enough to let me have my lunch with my best friend Cassidi who came in from Colorado. We got to catch up while Ares and Cassidi's son Charlie played.

Later on, the kids gave Kyle his birthday present and cards they made early because Ares couldn't wait for Kyle to open them on his actual birthday. As you can tell by the pictures, Ares was super excited about it!

Afterwards we all helped my Mom decorate her Christmas tree.

Saturday: In the afternoon we went to the Martin family Thanksgiving. Bret and Val hosted it, and they did a wonderful job! Thank you both so much for welcoming us into your home for this. The kids had so much fun with all of their aunts, uncles, cousins, and their Great Grandma. Ares even got to ride in a go kart with his cousin Kris.

(I told Ares he looked like Jason Mraz. Ares didn't know who that was so he kept wanting me to tell people he looked like Jean Valjean from Les Mis when he was dressed like this.)

Sunday: After an interesting morning, we had the Harpenau family Thanksgiving, and we celebrated my cousin Taylor's 21st birthday. Everyone had so much fun together, it was great!