Our 2014 Thanksgiving and Meal Plan Week 37 and 38

 
I don’t know about you, but I feel as though the holiday season is FLYING by! Thanksgiving has come and gone and now we are only THREE (?!!) weekends away from Christmas. I must admit… I am feeling a little frazzled and behind on the entire game. I JUST started my Christmas shopping last weekend for the kids AND I haven’t started on Brian’s yet… nor, can I think of anything (isn’t that the WORST?). I have several holiday crafts I want to share still, but need to find time to blog about them. I feel as though everyone else started last month and I’m just starting now… BUT, I’m trying to chill, because I really want to enjoy this holiday season. My kids are only going to be little once and if we are lounging around in the evening and watching ABC’s Christmas Marathon, instead of me working away on some blog post… That’s OK. I figure, I am only one person and what gets done gets down. Plus, I need to remember to move that darn elf on the shelf before I fall asleep on the couch each night. *wink* Ok, so back to Thanksgiving… here is a photo at my brother and SIL’s house, isn’t it festive? I wish Miss Autumn was smiling a bit more, but she really hates me taking her picture these days and bribing her makes it worse. 🙁 But, at least she ‘tried’ to smile in this photo… ha!



The LONG weekend was great… it was nice to forget about homework and a routine for awhile. On the first day of our long weekend we got some snow and the kids got to go outside and play in it. They weren’t calling for it to stick, but it did… which made our day of baking and decorating cookies even grander.





The kids were out in the snow for an hour while I got the icing whipped up and colored for them to decorate the sugar cookies we made earlier that day.



We made these cute little critter cookies. I saw some critter cookie cutters from William Sonoma last year and asked for Brian to get them for me for Christmas (I collect cookie cutters). Of course, they sold out, so he found me a similar pair… probably for a lot less, too. There is a fox, moose, porcupine, bear… even a SNAIL. I mixed up icing in white, brown and orange.



For Thanksgiving, we celebrated with Brian’s side on Thanksgiving afternoon. Here we are getting ready to get to Columbia, MO. There is a Quik Trip by our house and I had to have a French Vanilla cappuccino, before we started the trip!



Brian’s cousins had some really sweet and BIG dogs. Autumn just LOVED them. I bet they went to bed that night with a hundred or so treats in their belly. 😉



The day after Thanksgiving we celebrated with my side. My brother set up two laptops with Minecraft, so they could all play together. I called it Minecraft-dork-a-palooza! 😉 He even had it so that one of the computers showed up on his big screen TV. Too cool!



My plate. I just finished off the last of the leftovers today for lunch. Oh, it was good.



We spent the last two days of our long weekend relaxing (kind of) and decorating the house for Christmas. We ran into some MAJOR headaches, but it all worked out in the end. Our 6 year old pre-lit tree was not lighting up in three areas and Brian tried to fix it for 2 hours. We landed up getting a new tree at Lowes (another prelit) and I LOVE it. For one, it doesn’t shed AT ALL… our old tree would shed like crazy. And, I was really wanting a flocked tree, but this tree is just tinted on the ends and some of the white lights are frosted. It really looks SO real… and, it has acorns on it. 



I felt SO bad for Autumn, because she REALLY wanted to decorate the Christmas tree and had to wait until almost 4:00pm, before we had the new tree set up. In the mean time, we set up her little tree in her bedroom and she was happy as a clam. I told her Samantha needed to wear her plaid Christmas dress, but she didn’t want to change her. Oh well.



Other problems we ran into when Christmas decorating were the lights for the roof. I plugged them in and checked them, before Brian went up on the roof… but, OF COURSE, once he got up there… they wouldn’t work. They have been kind of wonky the last couple of years, SO we just replaced them. Here is our outside lights, I really love the little Christmas trees that go around our walkway and the snowflakes in the windows.





Autumn by the lights.



After messing with the lights and setting up all the Christmas decorations, I decided I wasn’t up for cooking dinner. So, we had Panera Bread… I tried their butternut squash ravioli and oh my… their hot cocoa is the BEST. T.h.e. B.E.S.T.!!!




I then made some marshmallow dippers and treats with almond bark and peppermint for a cookie/treat and craft party the next day with a couple of friends that were going to come over. Unfortunately, one fell ill and a yucky ice storm blew in… so… we had to postpone. 🙁 But, these are yummy!



And, Elfie and Samantha returned… If you don’t already follow me on Instagram, you should HERE… I’ll be posting most of my Elf photos there. 🙂 Follow me HERE.



And, a quick flash back. Autumn had her Kindergarten Thanksgiving feast. See how she is eating a slice of pumpkin pie as though it is a slice of pizza?



And, Nathan had his annual turkey bowling at Cub Scouts. Yep, theres a real turkey in that bag.


And, I am still meal planning away!! Last week was SO busy that I decided to just group the last two weeks together in this post. I am really looking forward to the pumpkin chili this week. :d


This Weeks Meal Plan (Week 37):

Sunday – Dinner Out

Tuesday – Cub Scout Thanksgiving

Friday – Thanksgiving with My Family

Saturday – Baked Ravioli, recipe HERE
We’ve made this several times… it is easy to whip up and SO tasty.

This Weeks Meal Plan (Week 38):

Sunday – Frozen Pizza
We have some pizzas we got with a fundraiser, so I thought it’d be fun to try them out. We also got chocolate chip and peanut butter cookie dough, might bake some of those, too! YUM!!!

Tuesday – Pumpkin Chili and Cornbread, recipe HERE

Friday – Beef Enchilada Zucchini Boats, recipe HERE
I always love any recipe I try from Love of Family and Home, SO I thought I’d try this recipe… I am sure I won’t be disappointed. 

Saturday – Eat Out