Thanksgiving

We are back from our Thanksgiving break in Tampa, and slowly getting into the swing of things. The Salos (my brother-in-law's family) hosts Thanksgiving every year at their home. It's a perfect home to have a big dinner...lots of space and the dogs roam free in the back yard, plus lots of outdoor space to work off dinner! Katelyn was excited to have a playmate this year...18 month old Isabella, neice of Andy visiting from England. Poor Isabella might have felt a little smothered by K. They both ate so many crackers as appetizers, that they didn't have much room for dinner. Although, once the plates were cleared and cookies were layed out, K wasn't shy and ate 7 cookies!! Yikes. We enjoyed our afternoon with our family, and watched football, took a walk, just sat back and chit-chatted (and ATE!!). We left there around 5:30 and drove over to Uncle Dan's house to hang out and have dessert (but had no room left). Again, K was lucky to have playmates and raced around the backyard with Emily (4) and Evan (6), family visiting from Ohio.
Next morning, Black Friday, Bryan and I were up very early to shop. Mom and Dad agreed to watch K for the day so we could shop in peace (plus, buy her gifts). Our original plan was to leave around 6:30, but K had us up at 4:30 (the joys of sleeping away from home and eating 7 cookies the day before). I fell back asleep with her, but Bryan stayed up and we left at 5:30...still dark. Our first stop was Kohl's....always good deals and something there for everyone. Parking lot was very full, but inside wasn't bad at all. We had just missed the VERY early, aggressive crowd. We got some good deals and started crossing people off our list. Then we hit Walmart, a little more nuts but had better deals (good DVDs for $2.96). More to cross off our list, then we picked up Jen and Jeff and headed for Citrus Park Mall...our Black Friday Sister desitination for 3 years running. A great mall....very cute with every store you could want. We actually did more browsing than shopping once meeting up with all the sisters and some brothers-in-law in tow. We got some lunch at the Green Iguana (largest Tiki tent in tampa!) and hit Target, then home. In the meantime, mom and dad took K to her first movie, "A Bee Movie." They said she did well, was a little afaid of the dark at first, but enjoyed her popcorn. Dad was really looking forward to taking her to the movie theater. We were able to meet up with my grandfather for dinner at his favorite restaurant, Sam Seltzers. Dinner there was excellent and it was good to see my Grandpa out and relaxed. K held it together through most of the dinner, which was another plus. It was a long day, but a good one!
On Sat, Bryan took Rob to the UF/FL ST game in Gainesville, where they lucked out and had tickets to the suite. Both had an awesome time. Go Gators! I stayed back and had a Creative Memories get together at Michelle's place that afternoon, which was lots of fun....even when K accidently knocked over a glass of red wine (why!!) onto their carpet. Michelle and Andy were VERY forgiving!! I wanted to climb under a rock and stay there. So nice to meet her friends and be with other women (no sports blaring in the background, etc.). Again, Mom graciously offered to take K home while I packed up. Jen and I grabbed a quick dinner then went home.
Sunday we left pretty early and picked up Bacino, who spent her weekend with her son, Floyd (formerly "golden boy"). We've become good friends with the puppy's owners and they took her for the weekend. Bacino is still recovering for a very active weekend! We're also still recovering! Will post pics soon.