We Came. We Ate. We Conquered.

Thanksgiving has come and gone, friends, and what a holiday it was! We met some of Chris’s family in Gainesville on Thanksgiving day and ate until we couldn’t ate no more.

This is me before I stopped ate-ing. I have pecan pie in one cheek and chocolate cake in the other. Like a chipmunk.

It was really nice to see Chris’s family. We haven’t spent a holiday with them in a while. This is Chris’s Grandma and Granddaddy Brown. You should meet them. They are what we call in the South “the salt of the earth.” Granddaddy Brown is a farmer and fisherman, and Grandma Brown is one of the best cooks you can find.

We also got to see Chris’s Aunt Neely and Uncle Randy and their way too old son, Severin. I remember the first time I met Chris’s family, Severin wasn’t even 10 years old yet and now he’s in college. Way to make me feel old on the day before my birthday, Brown Family… The Brown family are Gator fans. Isn’t that sweet and optimistic?

Let’s have a moment of silence in honor of the beat down that the Seminoles gave them this weekend.

Thank you.

Neely and Randy have a house in Gainesville that they use for football weekends. Since Severin was at school and couldn’t get away for the holidays to come home to Pensacola, the family used the football house for Thanksgiving this year. Their house is fully stocked, but Grandma Brown brought a van full of her cooking supplies anyway. She was rocking and rolling in her borrowed kitchen!

Our kids are pretty well behaved anyway, but on Thanksgiving this year they were absolute ANGELS. Seriously. Those turkeys played quietly with their bag of activities and games we brought them all afternoon. Grandma Brown gave them little treats to play with, too, and they were in heaven! It was so nice to be able to catch up with family and not have to worry about how the kids were acting. Those kids are keepers, I tell you!

We headed home late in the afternoon on Thursday and made it back just in time to tuck the wee ones into bed. Chris’s mom, Jackie, and her partner-in-crime, Charles, came into town that night, too, so we got to hang out with them a little bit. The kids were so excited to have Grandmomma and “Chahhhles” in town! We spent the rest of the weekend with them, shopping and eating and watching football until our eyeballs were numb. And, do you know, I did not get ONE picture?!?! That must show what a good time we had! Not even time to pick up a camera! That’s what holidays are for, isn’t it?

I missed seeing my own family this Thanksgiving. My mom was in Atlanta with Ginny’s family, and I called them every few hours this week, just to make sure I wasn’t missing out on anything fun. But it is nice to be with Chris’s family on holidays, too. They are my family, and I miss them when I don’t see them for a while. We all do.

Tomorrow is my birthday. The big 3-1.

Ouch.

But I’m so distracted by work tomorrow that I haven’t even really thought too much about my birthday. I accidentally scheduled my formal evaluation for tomorrow. Your formal evaluation is where your administrator comes to watch you teach for an entire class period and evaluates you. That evaluation is always important, but this year it feels even more important because I have a new administrator, so I’m not sure what he’s going to be looking for when he comes in to observe. It is also more nervewracking because it will be the first day back from a week off school, so I fully expect my students to be sleeping with their eyes open all day tomorrow. Never what you want on an observation day.

All of this is to say that if you could send prayers and good thoughts my way tomorrow around 11:00, I would GREATLY appreciate it. Chris and the family are taking me out for margaritas and Mexican food tomorrow night to celebrate the fact that I am aging (ouch), but I will also be celebrating that my observation is done! Ole!

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Dear Aunt Neely – Sorry I stole all of your iPad pictures from Facebook.  That was very stalker-creepy of me.  I’ll send you payment for copyright in the form of cookies at Christmas.  xoxo