thanksgiving weekend

thanksgiving weekend is full of traditions and, quite possibly, my favorite weekend of the year (besides any days that are at the beach, duh!)

the last few years, we've cut down our christmas tree on the wednesday before thanksgiving. the last 2 years it snowed. this year it was so mild! some friends met us there this year...they have 7 kids...and our kids played tag (or some kind of game where they ran all over the christmas tree farm) and had a blast.

i somehow have NO pictures of thanksgiving day. what in the world?? i'll have to get some from my mom. we went to my mom's house. it was such a nice day. relaxing. delicious. and fun! my parents were such gracious hosts.

the next day we went to hershey park. this year we let the older 3 kids each invite a friend.

our kids are all old enough to ride some of the rides without us. we had a couple dates on benches while we waited for them to ride rides. (bonus that we didn't even need COATS! it was so mild!)

we ALL rode on a roller coaster at the end. a couple kids were scared. we made them go. and they LOVED it! it was fun to do all together!

on the way home, we took over cracker barrel for dinner. a sweet couple bought ALL the kids ice cream because they were so well behaved. isn't that so kind?!?

saturday we decorated. inside and outside. this might be my favorite decoration...i get simpler and simpler each year. less and less tubs. if i don't LOVE it, i'm not putting it out.

a new addition...i put this together over the course of a week or so. added a new thing each day. and didn't tell the kids what it was.

he's always LOVED the train.

and sunday morning we woke up to this. no, lincoln didn't do it (i know it looks like it in the picture. he's just always right in the middle of everything.) so we *got* to decorate the tree twice :/ only 2 ornaments broke. and it's stayed up for 3 days now...so hopefully we're good?

we had friends over for dinner on sunday night to wrap up a GREAT weekend. we have SO very much to be thankful for!