Turkey Talk

Thanksgiving was about a week ago, and we are still eating leftovers of big proportions :) We were planning for about 25-30 people to come over, so I wasn't really sure how the food would work, but looks like I was stressed for no reason (as usual). We had 24 people come, but we also had plenty of food!

We did a thorough cleaning of the house and porch before Thursday night, and the boys were more than happy to help us wash our sleeping pads turned exercise mats. They were helping me scrub them at first and then they turned them in to a slip and slide :)

Water + Soap= Bubbles= HAPPY BOYS in this house :) They love to play in and with bubbles!

Emit below is drinking the water that the water hose is 'peeing' :)

They were fantastic little guys the day or two leading up to our big dinner. We were trying to clean, cook and prepare for everyone coming over, so it was a bit crazy, but they were so good!

LOL, they are enjoying some DragonTales below...old cartoon that they have found on Netflix that they really love. It's so funny to see the stuff that really grabs their attention.

So, Thursday night!! We usually do a late lunch for turkey day in my family, but since Bahamians don't celebrate Thanksgiving... it is an AMERICAN holiday (just a reminder)...everyone still had to work. It actually made it kind of nice to have all day for the prep and cooking part though.

I never got a good photo of the spread of food, but Ann Ligon and I split the job. She and I both prepared our usual meals (and doubled up on some of the recipes...or tripled in some cases to account for the extra folks), and just combined the meals to make one large feast. We ended up with 3 turkeys! They got two and deep fried them and I baked mine. They were yummy :) This shot below was taken after lots of folks had already come through the line...but you get the jist.

No, it isn't the elegant, picture-perfect, nicely decorated table that I would LOVE to have set up for the holiday, but it worked well for our group. AND, this was one of the easiest cleanups I've ever had after Thanksgiving thanks to all the foil pans and disposable containers! The sweets are below :)

I read a devotional the night before we had this gathering and it was perfect for the occasion. It was talking about how we often want to serve others and do something for them, but when we do stuff like this we also tend to turn the focus on the hosts and the presentation and all that jazz. It's not always bad, so I'm not saying that...if I could have put on a really pretty display, I would have. But it was reminding us that when we serve others we need to focus on be hospitable, not hostesses. Meaning we focus on their needs, not on making ourselves feel good about everything we are doing and how good it may make us look and feel. Not sure if I'm even getting the point across here, but it really hit home with me the night before our big party and helped put it into perspective our goal for this fellowship and our reason for reaching out to our friends and neighbors. 

You know Dallas can't pass up an evening with a house full of folks and the boys not sleeping to break out Rock Band! It was a big hit... lots of folks joined in playing and singing and had a good ole time (ALCOHOL FREE I might add)!

Joss and Emit thought it was soo cool that they were staying up late and playing in the dark. We broke out some flash lights and walked all through the yard looking at the spiders in the trees (which are a daily pit stop in our outdoor play time), we looked up at the planes flying above with the lights, the stars, all that fun stuff. We had all sorts of chairs setup outside in the driveway for everyone to sit out there and hang out too. 

I didn't have a lot of time to walk around taking pictures, and definitely wasn't able to get really good pictures in the dark lighting and all the commotion, so hopefully these will give you a little idea of our festivities. It was such a blessing though. We had 5 different nationalities represented. We had Americans, Bahamians, Haitians, Uruguayans and even Germans! The German couple was here on vacation earlier in the week and we had hooked up with them because they met up with some folks that went to Grace in Nassau. They left the island on Monday and went to Eleuethera, and flew back Thursday night just to come to the dinner. So yeah, it was a pretty cool group and a lot of fun!! Next year we've got to add our bonfire...we never got around to that this year. 

 Above is our sweet friend Esther! She and her husband are part of our church and bible study. Love the Butlers!!! They are such a sweet couple and great friends. 

We found these helmets in the shed the other day, and thought we'd have a little safe fun for a change :) We found these just in time too because Joss just learned to ride on two wheels yesterday...I'll post on that soon!

These were such a hit the other day and fun little toys to play with. 

Oh, how I love these little expressions!! 

According to Joss and Emit, if you are carrying anything (could be a book or a bookshelf) you are Super Strong! And Emit, more-so than Joss, will run around saying, "I super strong, mom!" if he's carrying anything for me. Usually it is a handful of toys that I've asked him to put away or if he's helping me get something. Guess it is his little way of motivating us during the hardwork :) 

The boys do this thing these days with saying that something is "Wilwie, wilwie, WILWIE" big or long or fast, etc. They are saying the word 'really', but it always comes out sounding like 'wilwie' and it always comes in at least 3 parts. When they get 'REALLY' carried away with it they stretch it on a lot longer. "That track is wilwie, wilwie, wilwie, wilwie, wilwie, wilwie, wilwie, wilwie, wilwie, wilwie, wilwie, wilwie, WILWIE long!"

Above you see Joss' work on a place mat. I'm SO proud of him with all this kind of stuff. He really is doing AWESOME! "Awesome Joss-some" (as we used to say all the time). The only one I helped him with is the very first '3' where you write the number in the box. I was showing him how to do it. The rest of the numbers he wrote all by himself by just looking at the other numbers there on the page. And his name at the top...ALL BY HIMSELF!!!! :)