Thanksgiving At Great Grandmom's House

For as far back as I can remember it has been my family's tradition to spend Thanksgiving with my grandmom (my Dad's mom) my aunt and my cousin Jane. Growing up that always meant five hours in the car driving to her house. I'm so glad that she moved into a retirement village here in Abilene back in October of 2004 so we can see her all year long. For Thanksgiving each year since Grandmom has lived here Cousin Jane has come to visit us. Cousin Jane usually arrives at my parent's house on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving and then we all have dinner at Grandmom's house that evening. Here are a few pics from this year's Thanksgiving Eve dinner.

Benjamin is holding up one of his favorite foods in the whole wide world - a pickle! They are a great thing to bribe him with to get him to eat his sandwich. After dinner Cousin Jane, Dad, Poppo, and the boys all piled on the couch. Benjamin has my phone (a Blackberry Curve) and Poppo is looking with Dad and Nathan at Dad's new Blackberry Bold. The Bold is pretty cool but I'm quite content with my Curve. I've had it since January and am just now figuring out how to do some things on it. Gratefully I am married to my Blackberry support line.Nathan is doing so good on his reading these days. He amazes me. I know that with many of his books he is so familiar with them that is a combination of reciting and reading but quite often he is really picking out the words and reading them. Too cool!
The boys have a box of toys to play with at Great Grandmom's house. Grandma keeps it stocked for them. It includes these big building blocks...and a Thomas the Tank Engine flannel graph board. Both boys have quite a repertoire of songs they sing these days. On this particular evening we captured Nathan on video singing the "AWANA Cubbies Song" and...

Benjamin singing "Popeye The Sailor Man." Okay, so it is actually more of a duet with Nathan. Toot, toot!

Note: We spent Thanksgiving Day at my parent's house but that will be the subject of my next post. Right now I'm just showcasing all the pics from Great Grandmom's.

On the Friday after Thanksgiving the boys and I ate lunch with Great Grandmom in the dining room at her retirement village. (Dad had to work.) She enjoys showing off her family (especially the super cute great grandboys) to all her friends.

Here we are all enjoying a walk back to Great Grandmom's house from the dining hall on this beautiful fall day.

Benjamin will sometimes skip his afternoon nap but not on this day. Grandma's lap was just too comfortable.

Too precious!

After dinner Friday night I gave the boys a bath in Great Grandmom's guest bath, their first ever in that location. They liked the hand held sprayer. Splish splash!

After bath I snapped another pic of everyone on the couch. (Dad had joined us after he got off work.)

I love this pic of my guys!

Before we left we got video of the boys wishing everyone a "Happy Thanksgiving!"

Benjamin is one bouncy boy! He says his "Happy Thanksgiving!" but he doesn't do it standing still.