Saturday, November 28, 2009

Thanksgiving Gathering/Christmas Mess/Christmas Favorites/Christmas Fun All Make For Many Blessings

We celebrated Thanksgiving at Ray's sister's home. Susie once again went way above and beyond the call of duty! We arrived at Susie's at noon and this is what greeted us!

This was Susie's APPETIZER table:




And while we were all enjoying eating the wide variety of appetizers that Susie and her daughters (Jackie, Jill, and Erika) had prepared for us...

(Left to right: Our daughter-in-law Lori, our son Erik, our granddaughter Mia, and our oldest son Brian, our niece Erin is in the background.)

...and then spending time playing and relaxing in between courses...

Left to right: Ann (my brother Tom's ex-wife), Ellie (our youngest daughter), Scott (Jackie's boyfriend), Jackie (Susie's oldest daughter), Donald (Ray's brother), and Mikael (Susie's youngest).

(I think you know these three!)



...Susie was busy in the kitchen cooking a turkey dinner with all the trimmings!



Here's Mia modeling her little brown Thanksgiving dress:




Mia and I inspecting some beach glass that Donald found:



Here's my guy:


This is Susie's youngest daughter Erika (our youngest daughter Ellie is behind her):



This is the family dog Jada:



Here's Susie's son-in-law Rudy yelling at the TV:



And here's Rudy being Rudy!
(You can barely see poor Jackie being squished underneath him!)

Left to right: Ellie, Scott, Jackie, Rudy, and Donald
(Donald was on his best behavior and so of course then Rudy had to take up his slack and start in! If it's not one acting up it's the other!)

Here's Erin (Ann's daughter), sitting and enjoying a peaceful moment, minding her own business...



...and here comes Rudy making the rounds!


Here Brian and Scott are trying to catch a nap...



...but there's no chance of that with Rudy around!


Here's Jill's new tattoo (it says "I love my FarFar" in Swedish, FarFar is what the kids all called Ray's Dad, inside the cloud are red hearts and blue teardrops):


We all got too busy having fun and eating lots more and no one thought to take pictures of the main course and the gigantic dessert table. Suffice it to say we were stuffed!
And we had a great time thanks to Susie! It was a very Happy Thanksgiving!

The next day we decorated our tree!

Down from the attic came the boxes and the mess!


Jayden helped for awhile until he grew bored:



These are some of my favorite decorations. I try to put them up near the top and right out front.
These decorations were my grandmother's on my Dad's side and she said that they were in her family since she was a little girl.


I love these tiny Santas:


But I'm wondering why these Santas all have such sad faces?!




Here's a little tiny yarn scarecrow:


And this bell is one of many decorations that were my grandmother's too, it looks silver in this picture but it's actually a very pale blue:



And this is a pin that my grandmother gave to me years ago, she got it from one of the many Catholic charities that she used to donate to.
Sometimes I take it off the tree to wear on my jacket:



Last year we bought a very skinny tree because our living room is so tiny and the big tree we had didn't leave much room for gifts (or furniture, or people!), it really makes decorating so much easier:



We're almost done, we just have a few bare spots up top to decorate:


And now I'm like Jayden, I've grown bored with decorating and here I sit blogging! I better get back to to the tree!

12 comments:

  1. Beautiful Eileen! Suzie is a SUPERWOMAN! I feel stuffed just looking at all of the food. It seems that everyone had a great time and I do hope that it was the Packers that they were watching on t.v.! That's what Jake did. Watch the Packers ( His team) and eat! It was a good day for all of us.
    Your tree looks lovely. And I believe those little Santas look sad because they are soon going to be so busy!
    Thank you for sharing your Thanksgiving Eileen. It was beautiful!
    Love Di

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  2. Eileen...Tell Susie tht she forgot that I am a long lost sister...and that I expect to be at the appetizer table next year!!
    MY GOODNESS....what great-looking food...what fun it looks like you all had!
    I love the ornaments....especially the sentimental ones....I have those sentimental ones too...and I enjoyed looking at yours so much. Thank you for taking me with you through a beautiful day....
    Smiles from Jackie

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  3. Eileen, I have never seen so much food being called an APPETIZER...that was enough to feed an army. I can only imagine the main dinner and desserts...Susie deserves a medal!

    Your Christmas tree is beautiful Eileen, I put mine in place today, but haven't decorated it yet. We have an older one downstairs that I let the grandkids decorate by themselves, for Thanksgiving.

    Enjoyed seeing your family and cute Mia in her Thanksgiving "Brown" and the back of Jayden's cute head!
    Luv,
    Wanda

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  4. Oh my Susie must of been cooking for a week, it all looks so good....how many of there were you as it looks like she cooked enough for a Football team....do you and her take turns each year and is Susie Donald's wife, although I thought in one post you said he was single. Anyway it really looks like you all had such a good time and I love seeing families together enjoying each other.
    Love your tree, your decorations are beautiful. I have many lovely decorations from my mom, grandmother even from a couple of Aunts as well as some us kids made back in school that Mum would put at the back of the tree every year....then all of my own which we collected over the years....I always had a huge tree, Christmas has always been my favorite time of year, not sure if I am going to decorate this year as I won't be home anyway but at my nephew's....big hugs to Mia and Jayden:-)

    Tell Mia I love her little brown dress...

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  5. Eileen, you must think I am really dumb, you said Susie is Ray's sister so of course she is Donald's sister as well....only me.....LOL

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  6. Thank you everyone for your comments to me on my recipe post, and on the kitten post, and on this one too! I appreciate it so much.
    I haven't been commenting back on my own posts much because we've been busy visiting, cleaning, and decorating! We just got in now from my niece's apartment (lots of fun!), I'll post about that another time.
    And then setting up a post is so time-consuming too!

    Di, Susie really went overboard on Thanksgiving and she admitted it too. No one had room for a turkey dinner! And, yes, it was the Packers on TV!

    Jackie, we did have lots of fun, and Susie always has so much food!
    Our tree is so tiny now but I try to put a mix of old and new on it, there are so many that just didn't make the cut though!

    Wanda, I could not believe all the food Susie had!
    That's a nice idea to have a tree for the kids to decorate too!
    It's funny that you said that about seeing the back of Jayden's head! That's how I feel about him this weekend, we've been so busy with things he's not involved in I feel like I've hardly seen him this weekend. He and Katie didn't come to Susie's on Thanksgiving and then we got home late and he was already in bed. Yesterday we were out shopping, and I cleaned a lot, and he was busy with his Mom and Dad, and then today it was the same, and tonight we went out and when we got home he was in bed again. It was nice to see him for the little bit when he helped decorate though.
    He had a fever tonight so he couldn't come around the other kids.

    Hi, Bernie, last year I did Thanksgiving here and Christmas, this year Susie was going to do both, but we decided she will do Thanksgiving every year and I will do Christmas.
    Susie and Donald are Ray's sister and brother. Susie's husband is Doug, I'll have to get a picture of the two of them together so you can see. Donald is married but his wife almost never comes around anymore, she's either working or with her family. I think she'll come for Christmas though.
    We do have a good time when we all get together. We used to do it so much more often (pool parties in the summer and game nights in the winter), but this past year we've really slacked off!
    And thanks so much, Bernie for visiting and commenting on my other blogs, that was so sweet! You always leave such nice comments!

    Okay, I'm beat. I'm off to bed and I'll 'see' you all soon!
    Love to all,
    Eileen

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  7. You had me at those appetizers! Whew! And double whew! Eileen, you did such a super job with all those photos, makes me feel like I'm meeting everyone except for only Jill's shoulder and tattoo...very nice sentiment there but I would have put it on a jacket or plate. It's pretty weird that I am NOT a tattoo fan in any way and yet all three of my kids think it's fine and dandy although Ria doesn't have any (her hubby does though), Mario has only one small one on his lower back and then Laura has lots!

    Just love love love that picture of you and Ray and Mia, such pretty people!!

    Can't imagine being able to eat anything after those appetizers...well, maybe the dessert table as my sweet tooth is so strong.

    Your tree looks so nice and I'm so proud of you for getting a jump on decorating...this is the earliest I have every decorated in my entire life. I used to think that it was not proper to do anything until December but the past two years have been too exhausting that way so right now there are three HUGE boxes of nativities in the hallway and the bookshelves are bare as well as the etageres, so that is a small start but there are lots of boxes still in the garage!

    Give Susie a pat on the back from me for that awesome meal and give yourself a hug for all that you got done decorating and for a super post!!

    blessings and hugs,

    marcy

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  8. What a full and fabulous Thanksgiving Day you were treated to! (I can't imagine eating ANYTHING after the appetizers. Thanks for identifying family by name. It was fun to put names with everyone. Felt like I was a part of it!

    Your Santa decorations are treasures.

    (Can you tell I'm in a rush?) I need to come when I can stay longer :)

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  9. HI Eileen-
    oh my, such a bounty of Thanksgiving food and family love - I SO enjoyed all the pictures. AND - I love your Christmas tree and the ornaments are beautiful. I have all collector ornaments and I love all their meanings. This is all so exciting. I hope to post some pictures soon. t is very busy here. Amen.

    Love to you
    Gail
    peace.....

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  10. Oh Eileen it looks like you had a wonderful Thanksgiving. We did too. We went to Anne and Mike's. They always make everything so special. We are blessed ♥ What a nice family you have. Mia and Jayden have won my heart a long time ago. They are both so sweet. Your Christmas tree is beautiful. I love it. It is a memory tree and those are the very best. I love to hear about other peoples decorations. It's so neat. One of the best things about Christmas. Sharing. Love to you and your family Eileen.

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  11. Hi, Eileen... looks like a really fun time and such good food! Family holidays are always so special, and you have a lovely one.

    Jayen is always so cute, and I loved seeing him decorate the tree. Speaking of trees, it is beautiful.

    Sending you love across the miles...

    XO,

    Sheila :-)

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  12. I love your skinny tree! I wish we had one. That would be perfect. Amazing seeing all those appetizers too. I can't even imagine what the dinner must have looked like!!

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