Giving Thanks

This past week Rachel and Jordan were in town to celebrate Thanksgiving (and Christmas).  We had a great week filled with 5Ks, food and fun.

We started our week with the Color Run!  It's a 5K run where everyone wears white and as you run along you come upon color stations where people throw colored powder on you.  We had a blast and got some great pictures!  My favorite moment was at the yellow color station - as we ran through a volunteer was yelling "MORE YELLOW, MORE YELLOW" and when we got thru it and I looked back my mom definitely had more yellow...right down the middle of her face!

She had color in her eye and mouth!

BEFORE

AFTER

We also ran the Turkey Trot on Thanksgiving morning in preparation for the feast we'd eat later that day!  We only took a before picture for this race - you wouldn't want to see the after ;)

Then...we ate, and ate, and ate!  We also made our own mason jar glasses and rewarded ourselves with a bloddy mary after the race!

I have so much to be thankful for this year, I am definitely blessed.  I have a wonderful family that loves and supports me.  I'm particularly thankful for my mom this year, because she's always there for me.  I'm also thankful for a wonderful group of friends and a career that challenges me and that I enjoy. 

I did not photograph all of our Thanksgiving food, but I am excited to share the portion of the meal that I contributed to!  My favorite Thanksgiving food is stuffing - and this year I made a date, cherry and goat cheese stuffing. (For anyone thinking that sounds questionable...talk to Jordan...she thought her stove top was going to be better than mine...she was wrong).

I also made a bread pudding for dessert. It was delicious! 

We also celebrated Christmas over Thanksgiving since we won't all be together on Christmas.  I wish I had pictures of everything we did, because we had a lot of fun!  We played games and watched movies and did an ornament exchange.  Here are a few photos of the other gifts I received.  I have to show them because they're too creative! 

The new Pioneer Woman cookbook and a beautiful hand-crafted cutting board!

This antique spoon says "Be Strong" and is for stirring coffee, tea or hot chocolate - how great is that?

To go along with the spoon, a Christmas book, a tin of Grandma Jo's Hot Chocolate and a mug.  My mom also made me pajamas that match my mug! 

A dog treat cookbook and dog bone cookie cutter for Miss Maya - someone is a little spoiled!

The girls have returned home and we miss them already!  But I'm excited for the rest of the holidays because this is always a wonderful time of year.