Thanksgiving Round-Up

We had a great Thanksgiving. We celebrated Anna's birthday on Thanksgiving. (She turned 2 on the 21st.) We had a Curious George theme going, complete with streamers and balloons. Both kids were pretty excited about it. Now all Jack can talk about is how it's HIS birthday next. Yesterday, I tried to tell him that his Dad's birthday was coming up in a couple of weeks. He seemed pretty upset by that idea. "But Mommy! You said mine would be next!"

I took the easy way out an ordered a turkey breast from the local grocery store. (For the record, I can do the whole turkey thing. I just wanted to have more party time, and it was SO worth it.) I went and picked it up Thursday morning, and then popped it in the oven. Come lunch time, we just took it out and sliced it up in less than 5 minutes. Wooohooo!

Anna got some great presents. Curious George clothes, pajamas and slippers from Grandma Vicki and then a big pop-up Dora the explorer playhouse from my mom. Grandpa Steve send this really cool wooden sled. Jack got her Curious George shoes. Uncle Scott and Aunt Maggie got her an awesome dancing Mickey Mouse that plays Hot Dog. And then we got her a realistic baby doll that just happened to be named Baby Annabelle. (Actually, I scouted out the dolls and deliberately chose this one because of the name. Sure it cost about twice the other dolls, but how cute is it that they had the same name?!? Yeah, I'm a sucker!) She did love her doll. Though, at one point she kicked it out of its stroller and took its pacifier. (See the photos.)

It really was a great birthday and Thanksgiving. When Anna was opening her presents, she would do this gasp thing. Her mouth would be open in disbelief and her hands were out, shaking in excitement.

After presents, we attempted to bust open a monkey pinata. At the time, it was pretty chaotic. All the kids wanted to whack it repeatedly. Anna and Alex were both crying in between their turns. Meanwhile, we were just trying to keep them from smacking people in the head. In the end, Steve had to cut open the pinata with a knife and we pretended that Jack actually busted it open.

On Black Friday, Vicki and I woke up at 3:30 a.m. to go to the stores for some deals. We were doubting ourselves around 3:35, but five hours later, we were actually pretty pleased with our deals. We only hit three stores during that time...Kohls, Target and Toys R Us, but it was fun. At Kohls (they opened at 4), we got our stuff and then stood in a line that wrapped completely around the store. We waited in line for about 45 minutes, but we found plenty of good deals along the way! It was fun.

So a good weekend at the Tornio household. I'm looking forward to hearing about other Thanksgiving happenings. For your viewing pleasure, I put together a photo slideshow from Anna's birthday. And, I'm also putting on the little video I got of the pinata fun. You might want to watch it a couple of times to truly appreciate it. The crying in the background is coming from Anna and Alex as they're having to wait their turn. And at some point, while Vicki is trying to contain Anna, she knocks her Grandma down!

Link to pinata video...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Akz3v8clK8

Slideshow...