Thanksgiving in Dandridge

The Girls- Thanksgiving 2014

Time for our annual pilgrimage to Mom's house for Thanksgiving!  We grabbed some Chick-fil-A on Tuesday night and left Roanoke around 8:15 (yes, p.m.  Are you sensing a travel theme?) to surprise Mom and Bubba with our earlier-than-planned arrival. Or to hope that Willa would sleep. Or maybe because I love rolling in to tiny little downtown Dandridge late at night, with its sleepy street lit up with its Christmas wreaths. It feels so homey, even though this is only their second Thanksgiving there. I guess the saying is true, that home is where your mama is. I pray my girls feel that way when they're 30 years old. :)

Here we come!

Harper in her Douglas Lake hat with Marmie

And boy did my mama have a house full. My brave Bub made the five hour trip down on her own again, and Mom and Butch's good friends and former neighbors the Cowarts came in on Tuesday as well. We have loved getting to know them over the past 5 or 6 years. Butch made it in on Wednesday, so then we were just missing our Sweeten crew. I sure missed laughing out loud, staying up too late, and shopping til we dropped with my sweet sister. We have some catching up to do when we are together over the Christmas break, so beware husbands and MarMar!  Ha.

We played a gazillion games (Phase 10, Play Nine, Dutch Blitz, Uno), made crafts, and ate too much food. It was delightful. ;) Olivia brought supplies for the kiddos to make handprint and footprint turkeys, and they were adorable. I look forward to putting them out each year and adding it to our (sad, limited) Thanksgiving decorations. It was so thoughtful of her to include my girlies with her Jacob.

 

 

 

 

Mom and Butch's Dandridge neighbors joined us for Thanksgiving. (Sensing another theme? If you are or ever have even a neighbor of theirs, you will likely end up at our thanksgiving table. Ha. There's always room!)  We had way. too. much food with way. too. much butter. In just the two dishes I contributed, there were two sticks of butter. And one of them was a salad. Impressive, huh?  We didn't have our usual lunchtime feast, and instead had a candlelight dinner. My little Marsha Stewart had it feeling so warm and festive.

 

 

We even managed to get a group photo before the turkey coma set in!

Ok, no really.  We did.  

 

Reading with MarMar after dinner

Trying out cool whip

More Thanksgiving craft fun

There was no Black Friday craziness this year, but Sam and I did venture out for a little afternoon window shopping downtown. It was nice to browse the little shops and drink a coffee together. 

We even bought a little dish towel at The Maxwell House that says, "Beware of the Free Range children."  Those two little barefooted babies of ours are much more "free range" than I ever thought I would have. I always imagine that I'd have tidy little prisspots, but I'm so thankful for the outdoorsy little country girls I received instead. They run barefoot, they play outside every day that's above freezing, that grab every animal/insect/reptile that will stay still long enough. So, I'm sure those who come to our house know there are "free range children" at our house long before seeing the fair warning on our dish towel in the kitchen. 😊

This week is always one of my most favorites of the whole year. And it was again, this Thanksgiving 2014.