so thankful

As I write this, I'm in my jingle jammies, wearing my Christmas penguin socks, working on Christmas cards, watching Home Alone 2: Lost in New York and I just finished a bowl of vanilla ice cream with crushed peppermint cookies from Trader Joe's. Fa la la la la, la la la la.

But I'd be remiss if I didn't pay tribute to Thanksgiving, which was absolutely delightful. Here's the recap, before I launch into pics:

• My parents came on Tuesday night (sans Tyler, boo) and got here just in time to kiss me goodnight
• Wednesday was spent lounging around the house, until we kicked it into gear to get our feast on the table. We did Thanksgiving on Wednesday night, since my parents had to leave on Thursday night and didn't want to make the drive in a comatose state.
• The meal was fab: fried turkey, sweet potato casserole (with the nut topping), A+ stuffing (thanks, Mom!), cranberry sauce and salad. My mouth just watered.
• Thursday morning, we stayed in our PJs until we were smelly. We watched the Macy's day parade, drank a lot of coffee, laughed, watched football and snacked on pie. Then my mom and I turned the kitchen upside down with cookie recipes. And my dad and Andrew put up Christmas lights (thanks, dearies!)
• After a walk around the neighborhood and some oooh-ing and aaaahhh-ing over the lights, my parents hit the road.
• Friday morning, we made our way to Concord for round 2: baked turkey, corn pudding, stuffing, broccoli casserole and a few other things that I'm sure I'm forgetting because there was a spread and I blacked out after my second serving corn.
• Saturday morning, I met Martha for coffee (yay!) after YEARS of being separated. Maybe not years, but it was close. And we're soulmates, so no time apart is healthy. I love, love, loved catching up with her over Caribou Christmas coffee.
• Saturday afternoon was spent at Hobby Lobby, for our annual post-Thanksgiving shopping spree. Laura and I always get a little carried away by all of the 50% goodness, but it's so worth it.
• And then there was pizza. And Elf. And the Christmas season has been officially kicked off.

And on to the pictures, which were all taken here at home. The only pics I have from Concord are from the fashion shoot we had with Aunt Shelly, but I can't post those because she was modeling her wedding dress for the big day in December. But trust me, you would love them since they were beautiful and entertaining and at times, involved paper angels and other various props. But like I said, on to the pics...

I told you there was good food.

And beautiful pies.

And festive table settings.

That's my dad, trying to untangle my wind chime that got knotted up during a recent storm. He spent HOURS working on it while we cooked. Thanks, Dad!

And the baking. Oh, we love cookies :)

I was going to list what I'm thankful for this year, but it's late and this is already long/wordy and Carolina is losing. So I'll put it off for later. Until then...

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PS: I made some soup with the leftover turkey and some turkey stock that my mother concocted and left for us. Oh.my.word. If you only knew how good it was, you would be SO jealous.