Always Thankful for a Good Family, Part 1

I am part of many families. There's our little family of five, my immediate and extended family, my husband's family, my work family, my friends family, my children's school family, my daughter's daycare family, well, you get the idea.

While I may take those families for granted at time, I like to think I know just how lucky I am for all the families I have. And every year, like millions of others, it's nice to look around and remind yourself just how lucky you are.

Thanksgiving 2013 at my sister's house:

My dad, Violet and my Grandpa Pud

Violet and her Grandpa Kevin

My brother Troy working hard as always. ;) Just kidding, he is a very hard-working guy. 

Violet and her cousin Theron looking so beautiful in their dresses

Love this photo of my mom and Bo, they both look so happy to see each other!

Let's eat! The food line begins.

Sister-in-law Keri supervising the kids' tables. She's due in March.

Hahaha! My favorite little ham, nephew Hudson

My beautiful grandma reading a card for her 65th anniversary. It's not until Christmas Eve but we decided to start celebrating a little early. 

---------------------  (Note: I wrote this on Monday night but for some reason it didn't publish)

I'll post more Thanksgiving photos later this week, and I also have Mazy's birthday photos ready to publish. We had a blast at the Iowa Energy basketball game last night -- the boys were so excited to be there. As we were walking into the arena, I heard someone yelling my name and turned around and it was Mazy's best friend's mom. At that point, Mazy still had no idea that his friend was even coming to the game. He was so excited! More on that when you see the photos.

It snowed about 3 or 4 inches in total last night. The roads weren't great, especially when we had to drive a half-hour to get to Violet's babysitter... Ugh. But it was worth it. She had a good time and we knew she was very well cared for. She made friends with her babysitter's grandparents, who described Violet as "a real handful! but very friendly and a good eater." Ha! Translation: she was into everything! But she charmed the grandpa, like she does most men. He said she reminded him of the character "Boo" in Monsters Inc. I can see that. 

My aunt Sherie invited us to a birthday supper on Wednesday for my cousin Luke. The boys will be thrilled to attend; they love Lukey! Thursday night is my holiday party at work so I'll be at that until late. Friday I have the day off! Whoohoo! I get my haircut at noon, and then meet my sis for lunch and shopping in the East Village. What fun! And to top it off, I ALSO have next Monday off! I had a bunch of days I needed to use before the end of the year or I would lose that vacation time, so I definitely used it! So after that, there's just four more work days left of 2013 and then Christmas break!

Jeez this month is speeding by... There's so much more I need to cram into it, like a Christmas baking day, a night at Jolly Holly Lights, watching The Christmas Story with the kids, watching A Charlie Brown Christmas with the Kids, wrapping presents for under the tree,