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Friday was a fun day in between Thanksgiving and the Christmas celebration. There was plenty of time for some family fun.

It may have been November, but we still got out on the lake for a boat ride. The kids immediately found a seat in the back.

JJ managed to fall asleep in his seat on the boat. That can’t be comfortable.

Since we would not be together at Christmas, we exchanged gifts with Uncle J, Aunt ‘Chelle, Emmie, and JJ. Leah might have been excited about this clay charm-making kit.

Of course, there were Shopkins.

Aunt ‘Chelle had a fun nighttime activity. Put glow bracelets in water bottles, and use them for bowling pins. Molly got almost all of them on this roll.

Nice toss, Leah.

She also set up a ring toss. Leah’s aiming perfectly with this toss flying through the air.

By Friday evening the place was getting pretty full. Almost everyone had arrived, and that meant for a very crowded dinner table. The three brothers took up positions together at the end of the table (though they did not supply us with pizza).

All this is still preliminaries, though. The main event was still to come on Saturday.

For Thanksgiving day, we were joined by lots more family. It was a non-traditional Thanksgiving meal, since a more traditional meal was already planned for Saturday.

After leaving the cold of Maryland, we really enjoyed temperatures in the 60s in Alabama. The girls had a bunch of fun on Uncle J’s truck.

Who needs fancy toys when you’ve got a bunch of rocks.

JJ loved playing in the rocks as well.

JJ’s still in the rocks, but Leah’s stealing the picture showing off her dance moves.

Emmie was rocking out to the music. An empty cream soda bottle makes a great microphone.

Sisters, best friends, by a lake.

It was too dry to make an outdoor fire, but that didn’t stop us from making s’mores.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Every year, Jen’s extended family (meaning all the way out to second cousins of hers) gathers for a Christmas celebration. Occasionally, this celebration has happened around Thanksgiving. This year, they decided to celebrate Thanksgiving weekend at the family lake house. So, we flew down the Tuesday before Thanksgiving for some family time.

The crowd at the lake house grew over time. Our first night, it was just G’Mom, Grampa, Aunt ‘Chelle, Uncle J, Emmie, JJ, and us. It was great to be together the next day, as it was G’Mom’s birthday. So, her brother came to visit for lunch.

Emmie showed off her skills and gave us a violin concert.

Molly didn’t have her viola to play, so she borrowed Emmie’s violin. I was amazed that she played it very well. The strings of a viola are shifted lower than a violin, so she just played songs on strings in different positions from what she was used to without any trouble. I know I couldn’t pull that off on a guitar.

Then it was time for some birthday presents.

Jen made G’Mom a delicious pumpkin gooey cake in lieu of a birthday cake to celebrate.

Happy birthday, G’Mom! So glad we got to celebrate with you.

EA and Scott asked me if I could take some family pictures for them. It’s a busy time of year, but we found a good time that worked for all of us. Sadly, when I arrived at their house. it was cold and windy. We still managed to get some good outdoor pictures despite the dreary conditions, though we didn’t stay outside for long.

OK, maybe it wasn’t quite that bleak.

Excuse me, I’m coming through.

I think Charlie is happy to back in the warmth of the indoors.

I took a bunch more, but those are some of my favorites.

This year, the girls’ school had a Crazy Hair Day. They decided to go all out, thanks to a little help from their mom and Pinterest.

After becoming an expert in sock buns for Molly’s Leia costume, Jen quickly whipped up Molly’s donut hair. With the addition of real sprinkles, a few of Molly’s classmates were confused as to whether the donut was real!

Leah’s classmates kept asking her if those were real M&Ms in her hair. She had to explain that yes, it was real, but it was Skittles. Didn’t they read the box?

Molly made up this song about her hair for Crazy Hair Day at school.

Leah knew the right catch phrase for her Crazy Hair Day hair.

Then finally, Halloween arrived. Before heading out, we took some more pictures. And this time, Molly figured out how to make a straight face.

And we can be fierce.

And, of course, a silly one.

Then it was time to head out for some trick-or-treating. Our girls were excited to trick-or-treat with their friends.

As always, we took a picture with some of the neighborhood kids before embarking on trick-or-treating.

This year, Jen walked around with the girls while I stayed home to hand out candy (in character with my best English accent). I kept count of how many visitors we had, and I believe it’s a new record. We had 134 trick-or-treaters come to our door.

The girls and Jen had a great time as well, and came home with more than enough candy to donate most of it and keep plenty for themselves.

We got together with my side of the family the day before Halloween for a little preliminary fun. Here we all are.

Charlie, Aunt EA, and Uncle Scott were gnomes. I wonder if they could get me a good deal on a flight or hotel.

Charlie put on his Darth Vader outfit to add some dark side to our Star Wars party.

Leah also showed off some fierce moves for the camera with her staff. And Molly may have photobombed her at one point.

Charlie tried on one more outfit in addition to the costumes - this new fun dino romper. Aunt EA asked Jen to make a few winter rompers for Charlie. Jen, of course, was happy to oblige!

Jen doesn’t sew for little boys often, so she had fun trying a new dino appliqué.

We’ve been very busy, so we didn’t get around to carving pumpkins until 2 days before Halloween. It’s so nice that the girls are old enough to do much of this themselves. Nice scooping, Leah.

The insides of Molly’s pumpkin are amazing.

After completing the scooping, they both drew out their designs.

Then the girls cut out their designs. Molly’s doing a great job cutting out her owl. Not sure why she looks so angry doing it.

Leah’s being very careful cutting her pumpkin.

Here are their complete pumpkins - Molly’s owl face and Leah’s funny jack-o'-lantern. I asked them to try to match the expressions of their pumpkins.

Sadly, our church did not hold a Trunk-or-Treat this year. So, we crashed on at a different church (CrossRoads Church of The Nazarene). It was packed, and there was a huge line to do the donut-on-a-string, but that didn’t stop us from doing it.

They finished their donuts just in time to watch the dance contest. Then it was time for the costume contest, which the girls had been waiting anxiously for all night. Sadly, there was no family costume category. But there were age/gender categories. The girls competed in the elementary girls category. Here’s Molly parading in front of the judges.

I told the girls to show off in front of the judges to catch their attention. Leah decided to show off her skills with her staff, twirling it around as she walked.

While the judges were deliberating, Molly showed off her sweet dance moves on stage.

The event had lots of people, and the elementary girls category had the most kids of them all. I’d guess there were 50 kids up on the stage. Sadly, neither of our girls won the contest (though in my completely unbiased opinion they clearly should have).

Then we headed outside for the Trunk-or-Treat. This was a very snazzy version, where all the cars were not just decorated. They had games you had to play to win the candy. Unfortunately, these games took time, and the crowd was huge. So, every car had long lines to play the games. After 4 or 5 times waiting 10 minutes in the cold to get a piece of candy, we were all ready to be done. So, we went inside, drank some hot cider to warm up, then headed home.

Thanks for having us, CrossRoads.

The girls’ school had a costume parade again this year. Most of the families show up during the school day to see all the kids parade around in their costumes.

Here’s Molly/Princess Leia waving to her adoring fans.

And here’s Leah/Rey. Rey was a very popular costume this year (you can see 2 other girls with Rey costumes in the background). But none of their costumes were fancy costumes hand-made by Jen.