Saturday, November 28, 2009

THANKSGIVING WEEK!

Bowls for Hunger. Notice the tiny bowls but trays full.Devree with Kayleigh hidden, Jackson, Mary standing, Maci, Matthew striped shirt and Noah.
Tyson getting ready to sing looking spiffy. He had on a cumberband on too!

Jacob looking serious and looking spiffy getting ready to sing.
Here is Kayleigh.
Becky, Liz, Kayleigh and Devs. Jeff Young and Jeff Hamblin with a cup in front of his face.

Here is Jeff with his tray of sampler soup.
Todd, Jeff and Jeff sampling the soup.

Kelsey, Shay and Dane at Bowls for Hunger.

Noah sitting, Matthew and Mary at the Bowls for Hunger.
Todd, John and Lafi at Applebee's getting ready to sing.

Dad, Mary and Karyn at Applebees.

Amanda at the Mexican Restaurant for her birthday with the sombrero to sing Happy Birthday!

Kelsey and Liz at the birthday lunch.
Devree trying to get out of the picture for Kayleigh and Jessica at the lunch.
Chris and Mom with her back at Thanksgiving.
Becky cooking for Thanksgiving.

Mary and Shelley with Austin and Brenna.

Trevor on the right around the table goes Matthew standing on a chair, Kelsey, Jackson, David (the only picture I have of his whole family because they weren't around when I had my camera) standing and Dane at Thanksgiving.

Todd and Dad at Thanksgiving.

Maci and Brenna eating Thanksgiving.

Karyn

Karyn and Laffi


Playing Hand and Foot with the guys playing Puerto Rico.

Well we had a wonderful week in Missouri (MO) for those of you who don't know the abbreviation I always use. Thanks so much for John and Mary for picking us up at the airport and dropping us off again. They are such gracious hosts and let us stay at their comfortable home. I was happy to see all of the changes they have made and applaud them for all of their hard work in finishing the basement. Also for the fun that Mary had in accesorizing her upstairs. AWESOME! Todd and I never got around to finishing our basement in Fernley.

We got to see Linda, Anna, Janae and Daila on Sunday and that was a treat. Ben was working so we never got to see him because their family went to Ben's family for turkey day.

Lafi is a great addition to the family and we are happy for Karyn. He grew up on Oahu and has many relatives in Laie so we reminisced. It was fun to hear him sing Karaoke. Amidst the many drunk people at Applebees, he was a shining star with a very good voice.

Many celebrations were had when we were there including 3 birthdays we celebrated. Liz, Amanda and a friend of the family. We also went to bowls for hunger which is a cute program done at the Elementary School. Tyson and Jacob sang. The clay bowls made by the children were bought and then the local restaurants brought in soup to fill the bowls. Each of the classes donated a basket of items for the homeless and those were presented. Trevor got to present the basket from his class.

Three movies were watched. The guys took the kids to "Planet 51" while the ladies went to Applebee's. Noble got to see a screening of "Old Dogs" with cousin Liz. But we all went to see "The Blindside" and that is an excellent movie for all to see. Thanks again to Jaynie Richards for watching all of the kids that were too little or just didn't want to go to the movie. I feel so bad because I didn't get a picture of this saint of a woman for the blog. She is the one that has been so supportive of Devree through all of this journey through cancer this last year. Thanks again SAINT!

There was much fun to be had, playing with the cousins and catching up on those we haven't seen for a year and a half. Little Ethan was still in Amanda's tummy when we saw them last. He is a cutie and Julia (age 4) said the cutest thing. Devree was getting ready for bed and she took off her wig but she needed Todd to put the medicine in her eye and tape it closed for the night. (I was off with the girls at Applebees) Anyway Devree asked Julia "Will you please get my Dad and tell him I need him?" Julia found Todd and said "The cousin needs you." Todd asked "Which cousin? The cousin with brown hair?" Julia replied "No. The cousin with no hair." Isn't that precious?

We had another lemon situation that turned into lemonade. Flying out, when we had a lay over in Chicago, they forgot to put Devree's walker on the plane. So Devree of course cried about it but ended up walking around for whole time before they found it and returned it several days later. She is doing pretty well and really only needs a four footed cane to help steady her. There were a few times I was like "Oh please don't fall Devree."

Our Thanksgiving feast was amazing. I have never seen so many desserts in my life! There were probably 20 choices. Jaynie made a cake, it was Liz's 16th birthday and Shelley brought 3 different kinds. Thanks to Chris and Shelley for coming. Their kids are adorable too. I know Todd and I ended up making 14 pies the day before and there were still lots of pie the morning we flew out. Todd bemoaned the fact that he hadn't gotten enough pumpkin pie and there were still 2 untouched pies on the counter in the laundry room. The thing I loved the most was the "Thankful tree" we made and everyone put what they were thankful for on leaves. We had a ton of leaves and lots of things that you can't even imagine were on the tree. Mary, Becky and I laughed at quite a few. St. Jude's was the number one thing we were thankful for though.

Tomorrow Devree and I fly out to St. Jude's for her first checkup. I will be blogging to let you know how things go.

5 comments:

walkinourshoes said...

Wow! That is a lot of fun stuff that happened. We saw The Blindside, too and loved it. We are thankful for St. Jude's, too. We can't wait to hear the update. Sure love you all.
Love, Craig, Koe and Kylee

soggycheerios said...

Sounds like you guys had a good time. Can't wait to hear more about it. Hope all is going well at St. Jude's, we're missing you around here, I'll check in tomorrow for an update.

Connie

The Voelkel Family said...

I'm SO SAD that I missed so many wonderful memories in the making. But I AM glad that I got to see you for a short while.

(P.S. You called Dave "Jeff" in the photo going around Mary's table starting with Trevor.) ;-)

angelicindy said...

Everything looked like so much fun! Thanks for posting pictures; it makes it feel like our MO family isn't so far away :)

Shana Hamblin said...

Thanks Linda for helping me out. I had to look at the pictures very tiny and I am sad that I did not get any pictures of you and your beautiful girls or Amanda, Julia and Ethan!!! I wish you could've been there more too! I will look at your blog and see what you are up to. I corrected the blog now!