Thanksgiving!

Every year when daylight savings time ends, I can't help getting a little excited, as it means Thanksgiving is right around the corner. Thanksgiving is one of my favorite days of the year. My family has a long-standing (18-year??) tradition of heading to a family friend's for dinner every year. The family friends are another family with daughters close in age to me and my sister (we know them because the dad of that family used to work with the dad of my family). The guest list has quite expanded since we first started going, as their older daughter is now married with two young boys.

Anyway, the night was really great, as usual. My favorite memory was when the mother, Marilee, my sister and I were peeling potatoes. Scotty (Marilee's older grandson; I think he's five?) said to his mom: "Grandma's playing with her girlfriends." Love it!

That night, my sis stayed at my house and we were up at 5 a.m. to head to Target and hit up their Black Friday sale. We went mainly so I could get Guitar Hero World Tour Complete Guitar Edition for my Wii; it was $40 off. Having done our BF outings up in Lynnwood the previous years, we expected the Northgate area by my house to be completely clogged, so we decided to walk over instead. Of course, just our luck, there was plenty of parking available. Once we got in, I headed straight for the video-games area, while my sis went to pick up some $5 DVDs. The Guitar Hero games were almost flying off the shelves, but I was able to snag one. After we paid for everything, I decided to head downstairs into Best Buy to see if they had Rock Band on sale (as I bought GH, I started thinking that it'd be more cost-effective to get RB, which comes with all instruments, rather than keeping the GH I had bought, which only had a guitar). I talked to a Best Buy dude, and he said without hesitation, "Buy Rock Band." "RB 2" is out, but not yet for the Wii. And apparently the only difference between 1 and 2 is the music (no upgrades to the instruments), so I only need to buy the disc once 2 for the Wii is released. So...we trekked back up to Target so I could return the GH I'd bought maybe 30 minutes prior (likely Target's fastest return ever!), and buy the on-sale RB instead.

Finally, my sis and I headed to the mall. We stopped in JC Penney to pick up this food-warmer thing for my mom. Then, at about 6:45 a.m., we started the walk back to my place. It was a bit of an ordeal, as we had to lug both the Rock Band box and the food-warmer thing. Now we know to bring a car next time! Oh, and of course, we found out a couple days later that my mom didn't want the warmer thing after all; she went to look at it at Penney's later in the day on Friday, and decided the burner spots were too small.

After getting home around 7 a.m., we both went back to sleep until about 10 a.m. My sis headed out a few hours later, and then I hooked up Rock Band and ended up playing it for like three hours. So much fun!! But then I had to put it down so I could head out for some grocery shopping, as I was hosting my family and some family friends for dinner Saturday night.

Anyway...that's the gist of my long weekend. Saturday night's dinner gathering was a success -- all the food turned out great -- and my sister and I got quite a kick out of watching the older adults try various games (including, yes, Rock Band) on the Wii. Sunday was a recovery day, doing dishes and watching a lot of football.

And now it's suddenly December, which is crazy. The weather here is gray and wet, but definitely milder than I'd expect for this time of year. Though, I guess we've been getting more extreme weather in January the past few years.

Hope everyone had a great holiday!