Thanksgiving with the Vest's 2011

Thanksgiving 2011 was spent with the Vest Family. We anticipated this event all year long because Grandma and Grandpa gave us the assignment early on in the year to memorize "The Living Christ" as a family to kick off the Christmas Season.

We enjoyed a yummy dinner with contributions from everyone. Mom and Dad did the turkey, vegetables, stuffing, gravy and cranberry sauce and stuffed mushrooms. Scott and Annette made the mashed potatoes. Chad and Jenn brought the cranberry fruit salad. We brought the sweet potatoes and Cornucopia Salad. Wade and Sara did the rolls. Stephen and Emily did the Vegetables in a Cloud. We all brought pies. I think there were enough pies for each person to eat their own. :)

Dinner was amazing. I LOVE Thanksgiving Dinner. All of flavors come together so well. I love when we each get to contribute something to a meal. Sara did something fun with the rolls this year. The night before Thanksgiving she asked us all to name something we were thankful for. She wrote them on strips of paper and then placed them inside of the rolls. When we ate our roll on Thanksgiving we had to guess who said what. Most of us without a major sense of humor told of serious things, but there are a few who told of serious things they were thankful for, but in a funny roundabout way.

After dinner was over, the women cleaned up the kitchen while the men took the kids to the park. We had pie and then we gathered together to have a kick-off to the Christmas season. My mom asked each family way back in January or February to memorize parts of "The Living Christ." We couldn't put up a fit about having our family memorize a couple of paragraphs because she memorized the whole thing by herself. I think she memorized "The Family: A Proclamation to the World" too, but I could be wrong. Anyway, she's ambitious. It really was a neat experience. My parents ended together and were very emotional as they said their part....

"We testify that He will someday return to earth. "And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together" (Isaiah 40:5). He will rule as King of Kings and reign as Lord of Lords, and every knee shall bend and every tongue shall speak in worship before Him. Each of us will stand to be judged of Him according to our works and the desires of our hearts.

We bear testimony, as His duly ordained Apostles—that Jesus is the Living Christ, the immortal Son of God. He is the great King Immanuel, who stands today on the right hand of His Father. He is the light, the life, and the hope of the world. His way is the path that leads to happiness in this life and eternal life in the world to come. God be thanked for the matchless gift of His divine Son."

We ended with each family telling a story from the scriptures about the Savior's life.

I love my family. I love my immediate family with my husband and children and I love my parents, siblings, their spouses, and their children. We all have such different personalities, struggles/challenges, interests, and talents. There are things I love differently about each of them. I am grateful for their sense of humor to help lighten me up when I get a little to serious about life. I am also grateful for their dedication to the Gospel and the desire to do what's right. They inspire me and are excellent examples to me. None of us are perfect, but I believe that each of us are really trying to do our best.

Temple Square

During our trip to Utah during Thanksgiving, we took the opportunity to go to Salt Lake City to see the Christmas lights on Temple Square. It's always a treat to visit the temple where Joseph and I were married. What a beautiful place. We timed our trip just perfectly. We decided that we would arrive early at Temple Square, enjoy the Visitor's Centers, have dinner, and then catch the lights right when they were turned on. We were then free to head back to my parents so we could avoid the crowds. Our plan worked marvelously and we were able to enjoy a nice meal at the Lion House Pantry before the crowds came rolling in. It was a delightful day. We were even able to catch the "Joseph Smith" movie for the first time. It was very powerful. We are so grateful for our faith and the blessings that we enjoy because of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. When we arrived back in California, we went to the San Diego Temple for Family Home Evening. What a contrast in climate! We are grateful to live in this beautiful area during this season of our lives.

Sledding with Cousins

The kids had a great time sledding at Joseph's mom's house. They stayed out in the cold for hours. Even Isaac spent plenty of time out there until his little body froze and he had to come in for some warm cuddle time with mom. It was cute to see all of their rosy cheeks!

Thanksgiving 2010

We had a tasty Thanksgiving with Joseph's family this year. My parents went to visit Wade and Sara in Arizona, so we stayed in their home and spent the holiday with Joseph's family. It was a treat to be with everyone!

Family Home Evening Notes

There's alot of catch up to do here on the ol' blog, and the holidays feel/are just around the corner. I feel so behind, but things aren't slowing. I had to stop for just a minute to jot down a thought. Often I find things the kids write down, and hang onto them until I can get to the computer to write about it. I'm ready to throw away a piece of paper, so it's time to record what it says.

Brynn was in charge of our Family Home Evening lesson on Monday night. She chose to teach us about gratitude. She wrote out what she wanted to talk about earlier that day.

Give Thanks to Everyone

Thanksgiving is a wonderful holiday, but you should remember it as a day to give thanks, in other words, gratefulness. It's great to be thankful for something. It makes your heart feel good inside when you thank someone for giving you a useful blessing. Always think how nice it would feel to give gratitude to one of your most known friends. Even when you are in hard times, give thanks and admit that its better than nothing. (Have family tell about a time where they gave thanks for a simple thing). Draw a picture of the blessings you got on Thanksgiving Day. *Bonus* Tell who you thanked.

I love our sweet Brynn.

Another sweet moment from Brynn. She tried out for the third grade play. She sang an original song that they had learned in class. (I'm not sure who wrote it). You could only try out for one part. She was so good! Seriously! She gets her talent from her dad, because I would never have the guts to sing a solo like that. Anyway, she was so awesome. She came up with actions and everything. We didn't really make that big of a deal about it at home by way of practicing or anything because they learned all of the words at school. I wasn't worried at all because I knew she would be the best and she was so confident. Well a few days after tryouts she came home and said, "Oh and mom, they announced the parts for the play today...and I got the understudy for the (I-can't-remember-the-name-of-the-part). I was seriously FLOORED! "WHAT?!?!?!"

She was so collected and so I tried to pull myself together. She said something like, "It's okay though, I get chosen for alot of things, and I've been able to be the lead lots of times, and I get chosen to help the teacher alot, it's good to give other kids the chance to shine." The next part really made me smile, "It's good for me to be able to feel what the other people feel like when they don't get chosen, you know, like for the ballet show or stuff like that. Now I can know what it feels like, and it's okay and I can help my friends feel better cause now I know. There are going to be other things in life that are disappointing and I am going to have to know how to deal with them."

Hello?! How old?

I am terrible, but this is what I said to her, "Brynn, I know you were the best. They probably knew you would be able to handle the disappointment and so they gave it to her, because NO ONE could have done a better job than you! You owned it!" I'm awful, I know, but seriously, the mother bear comes out!

Um, okay, how old are we people? She was acting like the almost 33 year old and I was acting like the just barely 9 year old. Maybe it was more a lesson for me than for her. She has such an old soul. I love her so much!