Thanksgiving & Santa Land

We spent Thanksgiving in Louisiana with my family and had a blast! I've got a large extended family, so it's always loud and crazy when we get together. My grandparents always host and spent the weeks leading up cooking and prepping. They get up super early and get everything going so we can eat by noon. And that isn't a small feat when you're feeding 50-60 people. For real, 50-60 people. And that's not even all of us!

We had three tables of food and it was all so yummy! Holidays are always so much fun and so interesting with people tucked into every corner eating and chatting. It makes me wonder how in the world we all managed to fit in my great-grandmothers tiny house for holidays past. I remember as a kid going to her white house for special occasions and finding people everywhere. She had the tiniest dining room where we would lay the spread of food and then we'd all find a spot on her cold wooden living room floor and eat with our plates in our laps.

After our mid-day feast we headed to my brother-in-laws family and enjoyed another yummy meal, including fried turkey...SO.STINKIN.GOOD. It's so nice that my brother-in-law's family always includes us in family get togethers, they're definitely like our family too!

Here are some pictures from our visit in LA. I love the pics of Rowynn and my dad. He has a thing about always picking flowers for his granddaughters! The one of Rowynn in the top right corner is her trying to blow on the dandelion. I love her sweet little lips puckering! And the one at the bottom left is us looking at the cows across the street at my parent's house. Told you we live in the country.

Finley playing in the leaves and some pictures of some of my wonderful family!



That night we stopped by a friend's house to admire all her pretty lights. Yes this is someones house. As in their front yard....wowzer!

On Saturday my parents, sister, brother-in-law and our family drove to Tyler, TX which is about halfway between Dallas (where we live) and Many (where my parents live). We planned a little fun trip for the kiddos. We made sure our hotel had an indoor pool so the girls could swim. Finley LOVED that, Rowynn, not so much...

So we swam, shopped, ate, let Finley bounce at the mall (that's becoming a tradition of ours at this mall). We then headed to Santa Land which was awesome! It's a drive-thru park with a TON of lights, Christmas trees that light up and her syncd to the music, and so many neat little things! It was so much fun. Rowynn was hilarious. I swear she was having an outer body experience! She was jumping, raising her hands, shouting at the lights, and giggling! To say she loved it would be an understatement. Finley really loved it too. They both squealed and had wonder in their eyes. It was so much fun!

Finley swimming with Papaw, being fearless at the mall, modeling her new Cars shirt (that she LOVES) and riding on Papaw's shoulders

It was so much fun! I love my sweet family.