A delicious party

I suppose I should consider myself lucky. Lucky that I have so many thoughtful friends and lucky my mom cares enough about me that she schleps me all over creation to make me happy. This week was no different - story time, cookie bookie club, music class, and a special treat - a cookie decorating party - complete with personalized aprons, special cups, honey sweetened frosting, and raisins for decoration (there was talk of sprinkles and candy, but I didn't see any. Surly my mom didn't keep it out of my reach)!  I'll spare you the details of the rest of the week (that's for another post) and, instead, leave you with these pictures. They say a picture is worth a thousand words, so I'll just let them do the talking. 

A very merry thanksgiving

We traveled back to Illinois once again for a celebration of turkey. Wait. That's not right... A celebration of noodles. Um....not that either. Of course!  A celebration of thanksgiving. And just for good measure, we threw some Christmas in there too. 

I gobbled up lots of good food and family time!

If case you wonder throughout the pictures exactly what my shirt looked like, you may see this. My mom always feels the need to pat herself on the back when she puts stuff like this together... 

Packing for the trip just wouldn't feel right without at least one meltdown!  "Mimi Papa House!!!!"  How dare, how DARE they tell me where we were going and not immediately teleport me there?!?!

After a grueling 12 hour trip - complete with traffic and snow - we made it to Mini and Papa's house!  You see, this place is true magic as it possesses a few of my favorite things. Toys? Check and double check. Grandparents? Check. Cousins?  Check! We boys sure do have a good time together! Of course, we do rest a lot. 

Then came the food. And lots of it!  We has TWO celebrations of turkey, I mean thanksgiving. 

And then came the gifts! After all, this post IS titled a very MERRY thanksgiving...

In addition to my food, family, and fun, I also got to watch basketball!  Two games to be exact. Laerin cheers at the games (cheers for basketball?  I thought you did that yourself when you make a basket...?) so we went to watch.  I desperately needed to play with the boys, but no one would let me!  Luckily my dear uncle Todd took pity on my and got me some delicious popcorn.

While Keagan and Chase are the greatest of fun at Mini and Papa's house, they are extremely boring at ball games...

Game two proved to be wonderful fun - once again popcorn, basketball, and cheering! 

And lovely Laerin snuggles. 

These are a few of my favorite things

Playing at turkey time

What is all this white stuff, Mother?

At long last, the wonderful snow came to visit again!  Cool, fluffy, white, and delicious, it make for the perfect play ground. 

But as any sensible person knows, you have to work hard before you can play hard. 

Work hard I did!!  I was very well deserving of a good play after all that shoveling. 

So I took my bike for a spin

It didn't work as well as I though, so my ever-so-kind father made me a track. 

After so much fun I figured I should do a little more work. So I kindly mowed the snow for my parents. They didn't bother to even throw a "thank you" my way!

So since they were so thankless I decided to just go back to playing. 

Which included LOTS of me jumping and falling on my stomach (on purpose, of course!)

And on my butt. The snow makes a much better cushion than the floor in the house. 

At long last, it was finally time to retreat inside...where a cup of hot chocolate and marshmallows was waiting 

Snow, you can come back anytime you want!