HAPPY THANKSGIVING

I spent all of last night up with a sour stomach that even Pepto couldn't ease...... and then the porcelain throne welcomed my offerings at about 6:30am this morning.  

What?

You didn't think you'd ever read a Thanksgiving post that started out like that?   Well...  it happens.

So I went back to bed after that - slept only a couple hours and then was up with the kids because DB had gone to my Mom's to start cooking crazy early before the roosters were even up  (we're talking like 5am) ...

My mom came to pick up the kids and I after 10am.... we were eating around noon (that was the plan, we ended up eating more around 1) ...  and then play things by ear...... but .. my mom wanted to hit Toys R Us by 5pm.... when the opened.  Pretty much everything on the kids wish list was on sale!

So...... here are the food offerings ....  DB cooked this year which he was crazy excited about.  He said to me "I've been waiting three years for your mom to let me cook" ....  yep, she got up to cook, he showed up, so she played the role of drill sargent... ha ha ... and looked at Black Friday ads ....

Meanwhile - while he was cooking....... I was in the "kids" room watching all the rugrats.  Yeah - sure, all but two were mine, but who's counting?  

Papa got them all a puzzle to do ........ this is the picture........

This is NOT a kid friendly puzzle...... it had crazy pieces with ten sides!

So all the kids took off to play outside - except Nathan and Noah who would come and go.  Nathan was having a day ... he was stimming a lot ...... so I pulled out his head phones and leap pad and he settled right down....

 Noah was just complaining he was hurting ...

And so I just kept working on the puzzle........... by........ my......... self...........   My mom comes in at some point and I am missing two pieces for the border ...   she says "That's all you got done?"   I was like "yeah, this puzzle really isn't for kids" ....   took me at least 2 hours just to get the border ...

She found the two missing pieces easy ....... (sigh) ....

At this point, the migraine I had been fighting for days came back full blast, and no one was really interested in it...  so I just put it all away keeping as much of the border together as I could.......

(edit) ...  My Mom and Step Dad worked ALL AFTERNOON ON IT (Nov 29) and finished it tonight ...

She was shocked and kept saying it was a lot harder than it looked........ ha ha....... what did I say?

Everyone ate and I didn't - I went to and my stomach just lurched....... so ..... yeah...

I ended up hanging out with Nathan a lot ...

He spent a lot of time like this  too........

So ... the kids played outside a lot... Cal had made a new friend with one of Papa's friends fiancee's son (did you follow that?)

 (below) Calahan, Noah, Baby & Jake

Oh and Kaedyn broke his glasses!

It got to the point where Nathan and Kaedyn were just DONE .....  so we went home.   Forgot the fact we didn't have Nathan's carseat in the car, so Nana drove me and the Littles home, and Dad took Cal and Noah.   Once home - we unloaded - got things taken care of - and left Cal with the kids to go to Toys R Us...

I love our views :)

There was a crazy line that ended up wrapping around the building.   We got there shortly after 4 and just decided to stay in the van until they opened - instead of waiting out in the cold.   Well, they opened (this pic is when they opened) ... and we went to the end of the line that was still wrapped around the building....  

This is what our cart looked like.

They had the check out line wrapped in and out of the game isles and half way down the store in and out of the isles .. up one isle, down the next, like a zig-zaggy road....  well when we went to check out .... we asked where the line was and when to where we thought the end of the line was (there was a break in the line) ... so we got in line.......

........... turned out that we were only about 6 isles down the chain gang line....... and it was like 20 isles long...... um... whoops.   But there was a huge break in the line .....  we didn't see the guy all the way down there with the huge ass pole with a sign on top that said "END OF LINE" ........ until.... we claimed our spot, and we weren't going to admit it....   well, Mom wasn't going to admit it.  

Then we get up to the cash register and this poor tiny little girl is checking us out, and she's clearly shaking a little from nervousness, apologizing left and right and CLEARLY it was the poor girls first experience with the craziness that is the "Black Friday Weekend" ... I kept wanting to say to her...  "take a deep breath, it's okay to take your time."  

She was traumatized for life, I know it.....

No one was trampled and no one died.....