Happy Thanksgiving Time

Hola!

Thanksgiving weekend is such a nice break from routine.  The kids only go to school for 2 and a half days.  I ask what favorite dishes everybody likes for Thanksgiving dinner.  Some people travel.  People think about family and friends.  You get to socialize with people you haven't caught up with for awhile.

David stayed in Provo -- he'll be home for Christmas, though!  He had Thanksgiving dinner with the Goodmans, my Aunt/Uncle/cousins.  I'm so glad they invited him! :)

PIE NIGHT.  We started our weekend on Wednesday night, with our traditional "Pie Night!"  Too bad I didn't have the camera out for all of the desserts that were brought.  But we had apple pie, pecan pie, double-pumpkin pie, chocolate pie, rhubarb pie, and lemon meringue.  Those are the ones I remember.  We actually had about 16 pies.  After everybody left, we counted 46 people who came, and then there were 4 of us Whitesells, bringing the grand total to 50.


Sadly, because of talking to people the whole time, I did not get any pie.  But we do have leftovers!  I had pie for breakfast AND lunch today. :)

THANKSGIVING MEAL.  Then the actual day of Thanksgiving, there is no better way to start the day than a Zumba class!  Yess!  I got my muscles moving and blood pumping.  Our teacher threw in a couple of fun holiday (?!) songs with a warm-up of "What Does the Fox Say?" and ended with "Any Turkey Can Tango." Go ahead, you know you want to click the link for the first song.  You'll think it's a pretty intense song and video. :)


Then, it's to the kitchen and plan the meal!  Well actually I have been planning the meal for the past week: 1 good thing is that with a close grocery store, you can run to the store every day, if you want.  and 1 bad thing about it, is that you can run to the store every day, if you want! Ha.  Our family's favorite dishes are:


Turkey
stuffing
mashed potatoes
cranberry sauce (jellied kind)
sweet potatoes (no marshmallows)
rolls
green bean casserole, with the fried onions on top?  We have it once a year.

The experiment was to cook the turkey (breast) in the slow cooker!  Yep.  It worked out fine.  Angela is staying with us here for the weekend (our "adopted" daughter/friend -- she goes to college 90 minutes from here).  She's vegetarian, so we put vegetable broth into the stuffing...

My friend Marcine just had a baby 3 weeks ago, and we invited them to come.  Her husband Eduardo is from Portugal, and they wanted to bring something to the dinner table...I said "what about something Potuguese?" 

OK, so they brought these yummy bread pocket things, filled with spicy meat...oh they were heavenly!  They are LIKE empanadas, but they are called "richou" or something close to that.  She did pay for it in time, however.  Having never made these before, she did not know it would take her 3 hours, for Pete's sake!  But they were SO good. (because of the time she'll probably never make them again! oh, well.)

SNAKE and BUNNY.  We had another friend & her daughter come, and they were enamored with Max (bunny) and Komodo (snake).  They asked to hold them a lot, and "can you take my picture with them?"  It was a lot of fun.

Komodo is a mild-mannered pet, but sometimes we think he's a little less than bright.  He just thinks he's smaller than he is!  So he started through Frank's belt loop, in his pants,  and...the biggest part of his body is bigger than that belt loop!  We thought we might have to cut the belt loop. Snakes can't slither backwards, of course.  This one may be a little blurry. but we got a picture.

Much to our relief, he made it through.  Somehow.

Today, of course, is a shopping day!  Well, for the others.  To me, it felt wonderful to NOT go out, and just stay in.  Organize a little for Christmas, clean up, catch up...a lovely day.  Maybe we can take in a movie tonight.

Hope your weekend is going well!  Love, Kari :)

Kudos to Teresa :)

This post is to focus on our junior in high school, Teresa!  I'll say "BRAG ALERT," so you know that
it's all about her.

Teresa just celebrated her 16th birthday, and that's a pretty big deal.  We took a group of her friends to the Olive Garden for lunch.

Teresa has had a pretty good semester so far.   School is...school, of course, but her passion is volleyball!  If she could play volleyball every month of the year she would be a happy camper.

The official season, sadly, is over.  Sad for her, sad for her mom and dad.  It is so much fun to go to these games!  I really and truly look forward to them -- they are fun to watch.  Wayland is a pretty small town, but our coach has done a great job over the last 6 years, to create a good program for these girls.

"TK" and her dad

This was the first year the girls' volleyball team has qualified to go to the MIAA (Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association) Tournament at the end of the season!  So that was very exciting.  The girls played really well.  They only played one round, but they were seeded against the defending state champions.  They played really well.

Tonight was the Awards Night for fall sports, and we learned of some other honors the girls on the volleyball team achieved.

All-Star and Coach

At the MIAA tournament:
The team received the MIAA Good Sportsmanship Award.
They also received the MIAA Scholarship Award.  (They combine and average the GPAs of all of the team members.  Weighted GPA for the entire team was 3.84.)

Better still, it was an excellent night for Teresa, individually!

1) She received the Dual County League All-Star Award.

with this year's captains

2) She has now completed 2 seasons on the Varsity team, so she received a letter for her Letterman's Jacket.
3) Her coach also announced that Teresa will be captain for next year, her senior year. (Traditionally the volleyball varsity team has 2 captains. That will be the same next year.)

We are so proud of her.  Congratulations, Teresa!

Halloween in New England

Hello!

If you consider the location of our group of states, we are pretty far north in the United States.  Question of the Day: which states are included in New England?  (Go ahead, list all six from memory! And DON'T google it... I won't give you the answer until the end.)

DECENT WEATHER.  It is possible to get ANY type of weather here, on Halloween night.  Snow, sleet, wind, heavy rains, c-o-l-d temperatures. Last year it was Hurricane Sandy, and some towns officially postponed their trick-or-treating.  But this year...we lucked out!  Yep, it was relatively mild (temperatures in the 50's?) and only a little sprinkling of rain.

MINIONS. Kara and a few friends decided on being 'minions,' from the movie Despicable Me.  They found a Do-It-Yourself video on Youtube, to learn how to make these costumes.  They were really cute.  And Kara went down to the last detail, including gloves, goggles, and borrowing just the right boots.

I'm including pictures, of Kara and the whole group.

These girls wanted to be minions, and another part of the "group" wanted to be superheroes, and others were Patriot cheerleaders.

There were about 15 who went out together that night.  Yes, they are in the 8th grade.  I have decided that "Halloween" is not about the candy.  It's about having a reason to plan and create costumes, get together and socialize.  Any excuse for a party, right! :)

FANCY FINGERNAILS. Oh, and I can't forget Kara's nails.  Remember how I said you can learn how to do anything on Youtube?  Well, these "Minion Fingernails" were also taught in a video.  Very cute and funny!

(Yes, one might wonder: should someone, in fact, spend an hour doing their nails?  Well, I personally shouldn't. But I just can't bring myself to discourage her.  In a few short years Frank and I will be staring at each other on Halloween night saying, "Sure wish the kids were here, scrambling around for costume accessories and entertaining us!")

So we let our middle-schoolers and yes, even our high-schoolers dress up and trick-or-treat.  And if older kids come to our door, we also give them candy!

REFEREE. Teresa also went out with a friend--she was a referee (??!? yes, well, she actually IS a referee, so she already had the "costume.")  I didn't get a photo of them but she was wearing what you think a referee should be wearing.

RED SOX AT HOME.  I can't finish the post without a plug for the Red Sox winning the World Series! It was a big deal. The game ended at 11:30 p.m.  People stayed on the Fenway field until 3:00 a.m.  They had a parade Saturday.  It was a good boost for Boston.  Not that they haven't won the World Series something like 3 times in the last decade, but they did it at home this year.  With the Boston Marathon bombings last April, groups and individuals all over Boston have been doing lots of special things to show unity and support to the people who live here.

Here are the headlines after the win:

"Boston Strong" is a common slogan since the bombings last April.

So there you have it!  I better sign off.  Have a great week, and Happy November!

Love, Kari

P.S. QUIZ ANSWER: The 6 states of New England are: Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island.  How'd you do?