it's the most wonderful time of the year

I guess I haven't shared photos here since the beginning of November. I didn't take too many until the end of the month, but here are a few from one of the last warm days of the year, the 8th of November. We took the boys over to the park, and they had a blast playing in the sand!

Here's Nick, in bare feet, even:

And Ben with one of his construction vehicles:

Later in the month, Benjamin made this Pilgrim hat at preschool (and also the hand turkey on the door behind him):
We were very blessed to have family here with us for Thanksgiving! They all arrived on Nov. 25th. The following day was Thanksgiving Day. Here we are at our feast... Emm, Dad, Nick, Mom, Nathan, and George (somehow we managed to squeeze everyone in at the table!):
Christine, Fran, Emm, and Dad:
George, me, and Benjamin:
Homemade pie is a must at Thanksgiving!!
I used my tripod to get this group shot. Amazingly, it only took 2 shots to get a good one!
That night, we had our first round of Christmas for the season! George's mom brought us many wonderful gifts!! Ben couldn't wait to start opening them, LOL:
A present pile:
A skillet for Chef Nick and a hair dryer for Emm:
Ben gets ready to open his big gift (a wooden parking garage):
Fran and Ben:
One of George's gifts was this cool railroad sign to go with his collection:
Among other things, Emmalie got this BIG jewelry chest:
One of my presents was this adorable (and very heavy!) Isabel Bloom sculpture! :)
On the 27th, we had Christmas Round 2, with gifts from my parents and Christine. They also spoiled us with many awesome gifts:



Because everyone needs a moose hat:

That afternoon, several of us drove over to one of the nearby forest preserves and took a walk around the lake:
Nick, Dad, George, Ben, and Christine:

We saw several groups of large birds migrating... we think they were tundra swans!
That evening we all played a rousing game of Pictionary... too fun!

On the 28th, Nick used his new skillet to make a pancake breakfast for all of us, yum!
We decorated the house for Christmas over the next two days, and bought our tree. On Dec. 1st, we put all the ornaments on:



All done! The tree really was lovely...
...and then the next day, it fell over, smashing several of our blown glass ornaments. :( We were all sad about that. We got it back up, though, and re-decorated. Hopefully it will stay that way now!