Thanksgiving

** So I obviously didn't finish my Month of Thanks challenge... time got away from me and even though I didn't post on my blog, I was still thankful during the month!  Instead of catching up though I'm just going to move on :) **

I went home to Utah for Thanksgiving November 18-26 and I had such a great time.  It was definitely a much-needed break from work!  I don't have pictures of everything I did (and some are just cell phone pics), but just know lots of time was spent with family and friends and it was a great holiday!

Saturday I met up with some high school friends for a baby shower.  It was good to see them again... some I hadn't seen since graduation!

Saturday night I went with my parents to Abravanel Hall for "The Childhood of Christ" performed by the Utah Symphony.  It was the story of Mary and Joseph journey from Bethlehem into Egypt with baby Jesus.
  The music was in French with English subtitles, and the music was so beautiful.  Tamara Mumford sang the role of Mary... this was fun for us to watch her because she grew up a few streets away from my family (I grew up knowing her as Tammy Castleton).

Sunday was my new nephew Porter's baby blessing.  It's weird that I never even met him until he was a month old.  But he sure is cute!  Here I am with my two great sisters-in-law, Chloe and Emilee:

 

While I was down in Provo, I got to see Lori & Todd's new house being built:

And an amazing sunset:

 

We had fun messing around with the smile detection setting on my camera:

Tuesday I met up with these fun girls:

 Rachel, Kenzie, and Kristina were my first set of roommies clear back from freshman year of college at USU.  We have been pretty good about getting together regularly since then, which is awesome!  Sometimes it's not more than once a year, but it's always so fun to see them (and now some of their kids)!

This is the only picture I have from Thanksgiving day, but it sure is a cute one!  I got Porter this cute little outfit, and my parents also happened to get the matching beanie.  We didn't plan it, but he was all dressed up for the holiday, thanks to us:

My niece Brooklyn (who just turned 5) drew this picture for me and I absolutely love it.  She is so creative that sometimes it just cracks me up:

I asked her to tell me about it.  This is what she said: "We are pioneers.  It's me and Bob.  We love each other and we love Natalie.  And we have little babies too.  Bob is my husband.  We met by going to the bank and eating bananas and we were driving home together.  I put stars and a clock to Natalie and I can draw a '5' and I love Natalie.  It was rainy and sunny and we were there."  I love it!

The day after Thanksgiving we took family pictures, which I absolutely LOVE.  I will put those up separately though because they deserve their own blog post!