Thanksgiving in Arizona

We had a great trip to Arizona for Thanksgiving. We were able to spend 10 full days there, and we saw so many friends and family and places. We are so thankful we were able to go be with family for such a great trip.  Here are a few pictures of what we were up too... ( I apologize for my phone camera now, we made this trip with just carry-on luggage, so the nice camera didn't make the packing cut! )

Here we are all waiting at the airport in Atlanta for our flights to leave. Happy are we!!  We flew out on Saturday before Thanksgiving and the girls loved riding the "peachy" bus from the parking lot to the airport because we were the only ones on it and it was nearly as bouncy as a trampoline! We were on separate flights, so Tim and Kennedy left first on a direct flight to Phoenix, and Emma, Audrey and I were on a later flight with a connection.

 

We arrived in Phoenix about 2 hours apart, but we were all glad to be "home"!  It was early afternoon AZ time, but dinner time for us, so the first thing we did was stop at In-N-Out Burger for the best, cheap burgers we love!  We arrived and got lots of hugs from Grandma and Grandpa and cousins that have all grown like weeds! Of course, our kiddos have grown too, a fact of which I'm in denial of every day :)

 

On Sunday, Gaga and Papa spoke in their new ward (they've been in San Tan Valley for 8 months now) to introduce themselves. They shared great messages, and had us laughing and crying and feeling the Spirit.  After church we went on a "tour" of our old stomping pad.  We drove by the beautiful Gilbert Temple that will have it's open house for 4 weeks in January and February, then be dedicated to the Lord for sacred ordinances on March 1, 2014.  While we were there, Tim called his "people" to see if we could sneak a peek, but it is like Fort Knox right now.  They even have the grounds closed until the open house, and so we were sad that we couldn't even walk around it. I have such a tender spot in my heart for that temple, it is visible from our old house in Gilbert, was on my running loop.  It crinkles my heart that we won't be in the literal shadow of that temple, but we feel it's presence in our hearts.  Once we move to Huntersville, our nearest temple will be 90 minutes away in Columbia, South Carolina.

There was a week of rain that cleared out just before we arrived, so the sky was absolutely crisp and clear and clean.  The Superstition mountains were georgeous and I didn't realize how wonderful it is to look out and see for miles and miles in the distance, without the obstruction of trees. But, after a few days, I began to miss my beautiful southern pine trees...

 On Monday, we had a lazy morning, learned how to use Papa's awesome massage chair and headed out to eat at Fily-B's (only on Gilbert/Baseline) to get some delicious Green Chili pork burritos (of course the kids ate Wendy's...).  They don't know how to make my kind of Mexican food in the South. It's just too bad. We have to make our own, so Filiberto's was a nice rest to eat and enjoy good Mexican food with out making a mess of the kitchen.

On Tuesday, I went to lunch with Heather and my Mom at Joe's Farm Grill for Heather's birthday. It was fun to spend some time with just my sister and mom and talk for a couple of hours without kiddos....ya know. Good food too, I'd never eaten at Joe's Farm Grill, but had heard great things about it. 

Tuesday night all the Harper cousins came over for a pizza party at Gaga & Papa's house. We all fit!! They were concerned that we wouldn't fit in their "downsized" house, but we were there and comfy and the kids had a ball just being kids together and catching up with each other.

On Wednesday, I worked in the kitchen a few hours while Gaga and Papa were at work. I made my contribution for the Thanksgiving meal of Frog-Eye salad, homemade whole wheat rolls and cranberry relish.  I'm glad I cooked on Wednesday, because it took much longer than I anticipated, and it was so nice being able to relax on Thanksgiving morning.

We woke up Thursday and got the turkey ready for the fryer.  Turns out, after years of not being prepared with the oil being hot enough, the contrary happened... The oil was too hot, so when the turkey was lowered in, it started boiling like crazy! Tim took the temperature, and it was off the thermometer above 500 degrees! Fortunately no one was hurt, and the turkey was roasted in the oven and even tasted better than we expected.

We gathered at Jake and Tanya's house at lunch time. Grandma and Grandpa Jensen were there in good spirits, Jim and Mary Sorg were also there for the first time, which was so fun to see them. Lots of good visiting and eating was going on. So thankful for Family!! 

 

After we had eaten lots of yummy Thanksgiving delisiousness, we had to play some "duck-duck-goose" and "musical chairs" and do some full-belly-boogie-ing!  Thanks to the "hip and in style" cousins we learned about Teen Beach Movie that had lots of fun songs to dance to. (I feel so out of the pop-culture scene, I'm thankful for family and friends that keep me in the know!!)  Daisy and Paytin knew all the words and did a great lip sync show for us, and Gaga pulled out her awesome boogie moves for all the kids to see!

  

After pie, we all retreated to our houses to watch Christmas movies, our choice was "Elf." I never though "A Christmas Story" could be replaced, but it now has a tied-for-first-choice buddy.  

Friday morning, I didn't go shopping. I repeat... I DID NOT GO SHOPPING!!  Black Friday and the sales were calling my name, but I wouldn't have saved enough to warrant checking baggage back to Atlanta.  So we did the next best thing. We slept in, ate turkey and frog-eyed salad, and decorated for Christmas!!  Gaga and Papa live on Loop of Lights, so we had to help get the house ready.  They found our forgotten Christmas tree we left when we moved to GA, and decorated it on the front porch.  Tim and I helped put up lights on the house, and the girls helped Papa decorate the tree inside.  No joke, 5 houses down from their house is the Griswold House!! I wish I had a picture to share, but the lights weren't turned on yet. To say the least, I couldn't tell what color the house was, it was completely covered with green light cords!! I hope I can see a picture of it!!!

On Saturday we had family pictures with my long time friend Aften Wright. She has done our family portraits since Kennedy was born (which is when I met her) She does fabulous work, and I'm so thankful for her. She is such a dear sweet friend. I wish we could have spent more time together.  

After the pictures were taken, we all gathered again at Chris and Katy's home for chicken noodle soup. It was delicious of course, and then we just relaxed and visited for a few hours. It was just so wonderful to be with family and reconnect and visit.

The pictures should be on the blog within the next few weeks, or after we have settled in North Carolina!!

We hoped to make it out to the Mesa Temple to see the lights, but being an hour away was just too far to swing it. So, that evening we watched "A Christmas Story" of course :)

On Sunday, our only boy cousin, Jacob Harper, was ordained to the Priesthood.  It was such a special experience to have us all together there for that. Crazy how after 5 boys, and 12 grandchildren (so far, Aaron is still single) that there is only One grandson.  Of course, he's the favorite grandson :)

 Jill Harper came over for dinner. She is just basically awesome, and she and Tim have a great friendship. She's the cousin that we really never knew until 2 years ago she moved to Arizona from Montana.  We really want to adopt her as our children's surrogate parent, because she is just amazing. We are looking for a job for her in NC so she can come live by us again!!

She decided to play hookey from work on Monday and we spent the day together.  We went to the mall and looked at puppies, talked, rode on the coin-op "fun bus" and even did Photo booth with Tim and the girls.  Of course we needed to eat some lunch, so where better than In-n-Out burger again. We stuffed ourselves with awesome french fries and fry sauce and animal-style burgers. Then we went to see the new Disney movie Frozen and it was Fantastic! Disney did a great job of poking fun of disney princess tradition, and it was just great.  Afterwards Jill took the girls home out to ice cream and home to play with her amazing doll house and collection of accessories. Tim and I had a few things to do without the girls in tow, but we met up with them at Jill's place about an hour later.

 On Tuesday morning we headed to the airport at about 6:30 am. We had long flights ahead of us, and losing 2 hours on the time change put us home all together at 7pm.  We were exhausted to say the least, but so thankful for the opportunity to take that trip before the chaos of moving again.  It was a good distraction as we wait for the time to come where we are moving, which is our next great adventure.  Hopefully I can get a post about what we're doing as we get ready to move by next week. The movers are coming in 1 week to pack it all up, and this last week has been a crazy roller coaster. That's for the next post!!