Highly Successful Thanksgiving!

On Tuesday I woke up feeling a little sick but since I was finally able to get my flu shot, I went and got it. I think that was a bad choice. I ended up getting really sick that night- aches, headache, throwing up etc. But, after some great care from the good doctor Dave (and some good pregnant safe medicine) I was feeling much better by Wednesday night and was able to do all the Thanksgiving activities we had planned.

We started at 5:45 am Thursday morning to head out to the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.

This year we did it right and got there on time to meet the awesome Alsop family who had front row seats waiting for us...

the kids were so happy to see their buddies again and the time went by way too quickly

they even had donuts and hot chocolate to share with us :)

We saw a lot of famous people this year in the parade: Cyndi Lauper, Jimmy Fallon, Mitchel Musso, Carly Simon, the smurfs, Kathrine McPhee etc.

above is Miss America and the winner of the NYC marathon

these are the people we really came to see though and I'm so happy it all worked out!

Mike and Amanda came up from Virginia to spend the weekend and it took them 10 hours!!

So, they recovered while we went to the parade and then since Dave had to work we went and met him at the hospital for some good ol' cafeteria Thanksgiving turkey :)

Dave was able to get work off on Friday so we headed into the city via the Brooklyn Bridge

(we've walked this thing a lot lately...but I still love it)

We had lunch in Chinatown and then some delicious rice pudding at Rice to Riches - the vanilla with butterfinger/graham cracker powder was the best- good job Amanda.

We walked from south Manhattan up to 59th st. and saw

the Empire State Building

the Christmas windows at Macy's

Time's Square w/a stop at M&M world and ended up at FAO Swartz with little POP burgers for dinner. It was a GREAT day and I was impressed the kids were able to walk that far!

On Saturday we celebrated Thanksgiving and this is our turkey before...

and AFTER!!

(don't mind my big shirt that makes me look really large)

It was fun to cook with Amanda, Mike and Dave all doing their part

and dinner turned out just like we wanted it to with all those flavors in perfect combination that should only come together once a year to make them extra special.

This year we carried out the Mumford family tradition of making "face cookies" and tried really hard to make the cookie look just like the real person...

what do you think?

these are a great activity if anyone wants the recipe and you can use them as place markers for your table setting since the stand up on the gumdrop stick

It was a great family weekend and we have so much to be THANKFUL for.

We LOVED having Mike and Amanda (and wolflaser, the baby to be) here with us-- thanks for coming guys!