Sunday, November 22 - Saturday, November 28, 2020 - Family Gathering for Thanksgiving/Early Christmas
After getting all of the presents wrapped for the grandchildren Dean and I took them to the garage to store until Thursday when we will have our combination Thanksgiving/Christmas with our family. Brett was already making plans to come home for the holiday. Matt and Megan decided to make the drive from NY to Kansas. They will arrive tomorrow night. Jarred had a few days of vacation so he and Emerson are coming to Oswego tomorrow as well. It will be great for the younger grandkids to be able to spend time together for a week. Other family members will be here Thursday.
I believe in what I call God moments. I spent several days over the last week or so trying to find a place for us to meet. We wanted to use the community center here in Oswego but both of the rooms were booked. I can't tell you how many places I called before I called the neighboring city of Columbus where I finally found a meeting room available. I planned to drive over to look at it, but before I left I received a call from the City Office here in Oswego letting me know someone had cancelled and we could have the building here after all. What a blessing?
Matt had rented an Air BnB here in Oswego but could only get it for Monday and Tuesday night. On Wednesday they planned to go to a motel in Parsons for the night. After they arrived Monday he learned the people who had it rented for Wed and Thurs had cancelled so they were able to book it for their entire stay time in Oswego. Jarred, Emerson and Matt's family of 5, and Brett and his family (4) were also going to stay there. It was going to be really tight.
We gathered at Matt's shortly after they arrived on Monday. It was so good to see them all. It wasn't long before Jarred and Brett showed up too. It was a beautiful day, so we took the kids to the park so they could run off some energy after being in cars for several hours. What a time the five younger kids had. The City recently added some very nice playground equipment and they all enjoyed it.
When Brett learned from Matt that someone had cancelled at the Air BnB Matt had reserved, he wondered if the Harvest House might be available too. I called the owner Kim, and sure enough she had a cancellation for it as well, so Brett & Emilee booked it for three nights. So God worked out all of our issues and allowed us to spend some great quality time with Brett, Matt, Jarred and their families. Jarred's wife Andrea had to work, so she and Baby Hayden will drive to Oswego Thursday morning for our Thanksgiving/Christmas gathering at the Oswego Community Center.
It was fun to watch them and of course I took tons of pictures. Get ready for picture overload:
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| Emerson and Jameson communicating - Logen, Sarah and Josh playing together as we all watched. |
Moving on to the park --- where the kids had a blast and that includes the big kids too! |
| Emilee and Jarred came down this slide - not a good idea - they came down faster than they imagined. Sarah hit the ground on her tummy, got right back up and was at it again. |
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| They LOVED the merry go round and talked Daddy's Matt & Jarred into pushing, then Josh took over to entertain the girls. |
Megan and I left to make a grocery store run, while the others stayed at the park to let the kids play for awhile longer. Before they left one of Matt's classmates, Andy arrived at the park. A few years ago someone came up with the idea of "Lighting Up Riverside Park" with Christmas Lights. Andy and his family were there to decorate their spot/tree. The boys had a great time visiting and catching up with Andy and his family.
Back at Matt & Megan's place we made dinner and enjoyed lots of fun and laughter with the grandkids.
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| Jarred was having fun with Sam. Sam wanted him to chase him and he squealed with delight when Jarred finally caught him. |
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| Josh had to get in on the fun too - and Uncle Jarred quickly obliged. He's the youngest of Dean's four boys and still enjoys being the "baby" of their family.....always having fun with the kids. They all love him. |
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| Well then Josh and Sarah got in the mix while he was trying to wrestle Sam. Quite the antics with this bunch. |
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| Josh taking on Uncle Jarred. |
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| And here's Uncle Matt with the little girls watching a movie on his phone. |
Dean and I brought the three little girls back to our RV where they slept on a blow up mattress on our floor in front of our fireplace. Sarah was already asleep by the time I took this picture. Logen is behind Emmy. I didn't realize it was so dark until later.
There are more fun times ahead in the next three days.
Since Brett & Emilee's AirBnb is larger, we gathered there today. On Tuesday mornings a food truck called Aunt Julie's donuts parks outside. We arrived around 7:30-8 to have hot donuts, juice and coffee. It was another fun day hanging out together.
Wednesday the three families headed to Joplin. They took the six kids to Ocean Adventures in Duquesne, MO, did a little Christmas shopping and had lunch together. Dean and I stayed in Oswego. I still had several things to do in preparation for tomorrow, and I was so glad I chose to do that. It was a busy and very full day for us - well into the evening. Dean went to Matt & Megan's AirBnb and I joined them for dinner, plus they had a little surprise birthday party for Papa Dean. He was sure surprised when Matt's family gave him a Chiefs shirt.
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| In his new Chiefs shirt with granddaughter Hayden watching him. |
I headed back home pretty quick, and fortunately Dean soon followed to help me finish the things I needed to do before tomorrow, including taking three pans of cinnamon rolls to the community center to set in the oven to rise overnight. We spent quite a bit of time building the saran wrap balls. One for the smaller children and one from the older KIDS!
Thursday, Thanksgiving Day. Dean and I were up early to gather all of the items we needed to take to the community center, presents from the garage, food, water coolers to make drinks in and a number of other things - too many to list. Misti was already at Haleigh's. She needed a few things dropped off as well on our way. Fortunately, she is only a block from the Community Center! I made chicken and noodles, rolls; and Misti made macaroni & cheese, and green bean casserole. I also made a pecan pie. Heath & Jarred's family brought pumpkin pie and cookies. I can't remember now what else we had but it was all good and I think everyone enjoyed it.
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| We had to stop by the garage to pick up Santa's stash of presents and food. Lol! The sun was coming up and their was a heavy frost on the ground. |
We had a great day together. Of course opening presents was a big highlight but something all the kids (big, little and in between) enjoy is playing the saran wrap ball game. I buy several $1 gifts at the Dollar Tree, Dollar General or similar stores where items are very inexpensive. Each ball has a gift card in the center, which is wrapped, over and over with saran wrap, adding in candy or gift items as we go. I buy several $1 bags of the small wrapped candy pieces - adding in one or two here and there between the $1 items. After our first year, it was apparent the smaller children needed one of their own. For the adults, they have to put on a pair of gloves and work to unwrap the ball, while the person next to them has to roll a couple of dice. When they get a double, the person unwrapping has to stop immediately, then pass the gloves to the next person, and on and on it goes until someone finally gets the gift card. We do not make the children wear gloves. Winners this year were Heath and Jarred's daughter Emerson.
It's a lot of fun, with much laughter and excitement. While at the dollar store I bought several headbands orginally planning to give them to the kids to wear, but decided to have each family take their picture wearing one of them. It was a fun thing to do.
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| Jarred's family |
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| Heath's family |
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| Matt's family |
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| Brett's family (except for Logen who was with her dad today) |
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| Misti & Haleigh |
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| Guess who? |
Heath, Matt and Jarred and their families headed to Wichita after our time together, while Brett and his family headed to Carthage to spend the rest of the day with Emilee's family. They will join the others in Wichita to spend time with their mom in the next day or so.
It was a great day and I could not have done it without everyone's help. I appreciate all they did!
Friday, November 27 - Happy birthday Dean! For his birthday, he wanted an overhead heater for the garage so we headed to Atwood's in Webb City where he found exactly what he wanted. After that we drove around the area, something we enjoy doing.
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| I love Webb City's praying hands, with our country's flag flying alongside. God Bless America! |
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| Alba, MO - a small town outside of Webb City. I do love water towers. |
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| Former School Building. I believe the year on the plaque was 1907. Such a beautiful building. |
Saturday Nov 28 - our highlight of the day was going to Marc and Jen's to take the kids their gifts. We had a nice visit with them.
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Jaxson shooting at a target with his new nerf gun. When he hits it the target flips down - his present from us.
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Another great week!
we are in lockdown. so a really quite Christmas, maybe next year.
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