Gearing Up!

Yes, we are GEARING UP for Thanksgiving tomorrow! I tried to do parts of my recipes today so I'd have less to do tomorrow. I finished one recipe - dessert, which is most important anyway. I made a TON of squash today for Brianna since I was making a squash casserole for tomorrow. I even tried to figure out how much money I saved by making her food instead of buying it. I paid $1.99 for the amount of squash I bought, and it made 11 of the 2.5-oz boxes that you buy in the store. Two of those boxes cost $1.05 (approximately) so I definitely saved a bunch of money!

We spent the day hanging out with our family from out of town, I made a quick trip to the store, started the squash casserole/made Bri's squash, started a sweet potato casserole, and made raspberry cheesecake bars. We ate out at Moe's for dinner. We'd never eaten there before. It was good but probably not somewhere we'll go on our own. Stephen and I went to the hospital after eating at Moe's - not food poisoning, don't worry! A friend from church is in the hospital after a serious stroke and we wanted to see her. Unfortunately she will be in the hospital during Thanksgiving. She was in good spirits tonight though, for her condition. I do ask for prayers for her family - the Burks - because I can't imagine having a relative in the hospital right now. Sometimes I take my family's health for granted and after mom being in the hospital years ago you would think I would have learned from that. I'm so thankful that my whole family and Stephen's family are here for Thanksgiving, and we'll be able to spend a late Thanksgiving with some other members of his family on Friday. What a blessing! We turn Thanksgiving into such a stressful day sometimes, don't we? I, for one, don't care if we have a turkey, ham or KFC, I just like getting together. Although with the turkey I get to fight mom for the wishbone. She always gets the big end, somehow. Cheater.

After the hospital we stopped by mom and dad's to pick up the bags from Tracey. Ooooh boy, it was like Christmas! She has never even met Brianna but oh man did she set aside some goodies for that baby! There were a couple of toys that Bri is going to LOVE!! Unfortunately when we got home tonight Brianna was ready for bed but I am breakin' those toys out tomorrow! She got Brianna a Christmas ornament and she got me a great one as well. I usually blog about our Christmas ornaments every year, so I can't wait to post pictures of them. She also got a really cute outfit for Brianna, and I am particularly thankful that it is long-sleeved. Would you believe I went through that child's clothes today and she has only a handful of long-sleeved outfits? I will have to pay special attention to that at yard sales from now on. I also received a huge packet of coupons! Yay!! Brianna also got some books which she will enjoy - we try to read a couple of books with her every day and two Wee Sing tapes and songbooks!! We have several Wee Sing books and tapes here but we didn't have either of these - Christmas and Bible. I can't wait to also break those open! I make her do the hand motions already. So thank you, thank you, thank you for everything Tracey!

Brianna has woken up and is crying, and I've got to work on those casseroles tonight if I want less to do tomorrow so I should probably get off of here. Hopefully I will have some great pictures to post in my blog tomorrow!

A friend of mine earlier in the week had a health scare occur with her husband. Fortunately all of his tests came back normal, but I urge everyone to hug your spouse tonight. I have no clue what I would do without Stephen and I don't even want to imagine it. I could go on but life just wouldn't be as sweet. Plus, I can't change the brakes on my car.