Thanksgiving 2013

Still in my jami's at 9:36 am.  And I think I'm loving it.  There is a deep feeling of something I'm missing though and I'll know what it is.
For 34+ years (with a few of those off because of work), we made our annual pilgrimage to Snowflake, Arizona were we would be surrounded with all of Doug's family.  As the years went by and families continued to grow, our seeming comfortable sleeping arrangements ended up being in 2 homes and every available floor/couch/bed space called and spoken for.
        You get the idea.

If you did NOT get up to Snowflake early, you could possible lose your 'spoken' spot.  That really depended on if the person kicking you out of your spot wanted to meet your wrath.  There were a few 'stare-downs'.  That aside we would love being there with all - and the all was occasionally 40 people or more!  It was an amazing feat to have all the food cooked, served, and eaten in an orderly manner.  Alan and Linda's garage became the dining hall with 6 or more round tables set up for us all to squeeze around.  It was great.  And then after dinner - and of course before as well - we would find our way back outside, sometimes to a finger-numbing cold, to play volleyball.  That is what I miss the most. I loved how we used the water hoses for our court lines and because of the coldness they sometimes would not coil out all the way and our lines were somewhat wavy.  I also deeply miss the Thanksgiving Day planning of what stores we would go to for Black Fridays' sales.  Our choices were, Walmart, Kmart and Ace Hardware. Walmart was not there at the beginning of the 34 years and our choices were nil.  It used to be just the women would wake up early 5-6am and leave all the others to fend for themselves and hit the crazy busy Showlow Walmart to get the great sales.  Elbows, shoving, cutting in lines....the whole thing....it was tradition.  Even if we ourselves weren't going for anything, we would be there to help clear the aisles, hold places in the lines and even supply oxygen if needed.  Kmart wasn't the madhouse that Walmart was, so it was a breeze.   Later on as the years went by, husbands started to join in the spirit of Black Friday.  Looking back now, maybe it was to control our spending rather than just the fun of being with us....hmmm......
For the past 2 years my family stayed here in town.  Last year we got together with a son-in-laws family, meeting at a church building for food and then games.  It was nice, just not the norm.  Not being with aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents....it really is different.  Now that Doug's parent have both passed away, we felt it wouldn't be the same in Snowflake -and now we, Doug and I, must take the 'grandparent' role and establish our own Thanksgiving Day and all of the traditions.
Yesterday, was just that.  Family, Food and Fun.  After dinner we went to the retention basin and played bocce ball, crochet, and corn hole.  Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves.  But wait......NOW for the MAIN EVENT!....we love Table Tennis.  Really we can't get enough of it.  Yes, some of us are not so talented at pinging or ponging, but we love it all the same.  Even as spectators, this game brings out the competitiveness of us all.  We cheer for the underdog, unless it is your spouse, then you almost HAVE to cheer for them. (Although these are NOT us in these photos - I'm sure we made many of these same faces).
 

This year, after several years of a desire to do this, I finally re-wrote words to a song.  The song I re-wrote is Carol of the Bells....but ours is Carol of the Balls......
I will work on showing your our video when it is all edited.  This might take a while, but stay tuned, it will be worth your time.