Thanksgiving Dinner

Thanksgiving was a pretty big deal for us this year. Very often we don't really do anything at all. I have super picky kids, we've never really had room to cook or to eat together - at least not in recent memory - and it just always ends up with me getting angry and my feelings hurt because I'll have spent so much time and energy only to have half of them turn their noses up.

This year, however, Hannah's boyfriend was coming over. Originally he was to be here all day. He's allergic to cats, and we have three of them, so that meant some fairly deep cleaning. Hannah took charge. We all pitched in and the front rooms have never looked better.

Now, keep in mind that the front two rooms have never been fully unpacked. I've been working on them a little at a time since we moved in. I'm putting up a couple "before" pics just so you can get the full impact of what was done.

The first photo was taken in June, right after I put the shelves up and started going through boxes so I could put the books onto the shelves.
This next picture was taken on the 4th of July, about 10 days after the first photo. I can only work about a day or two without taking a lot of time to rest, thanks to fibromyalgia. It really takes a toll if I overdo it. But, I'd made some serious headway. After that, I didn't take any pictures, since it really didn't look much different when I would finish a box or two, plus I started swapping out boxes from other rooms.Enter my MIL coming...we started doing more. Then Dylan, Hannah's boyfriend. Boxes from the flargle (Taylor started calling the room off the kitchen "the flargle" after nobody could figure out what to call it and it stuck) were moved into the front room to make room for our extra table. We brought down the tv from my bedroom and brought the Wii upstairs so the kids and Dylan could play while he was there. It turns out that it's a great place for the Wii, so it may end up living there.

And the front room?? It now looks like this.

I am so thrilled! Yes, it still needs a lot of work, but we actually have room to put up the Christmas tree.

So Dylan could only stay about 2 hours. Hannah went with him and stayed to help to decorate his house. She came back pretty late in the afternoon and we (mostly me, Cody and Meagan) finished fixing dinner. We were able to sit down to a real Thanksgiving Dinner together. Honestly, it was the best meal. No, not everybody ate, or even tried, everything, but we were talking and laughing and having a really good time as a family, and that is truly the most important thing of all.

Cody made the fruit salad, the noodle casserole, and the deviled eggs.