Thanksgiving......

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving and we have kindly been invited to one of Ben's colleagues to celebrate.

For those who don't know what Thanksgiving is (I wasn't sure)

Thanksgiving Day is a harvest festival celebrated primarily in the United States and Canada. Traditionally, it has been a time to give thanks for a bountiful harvest. While it may have been religious in origin, Thanksgiving is now primarily identified as a secular holiday.^[1]It is sometimes casually referred to as Turkey Day.

Thanksgiving or Thanksgiving Day, celebrated on the fourth Thursday in November, has been an annual tradition in the United Statessince 1863, when during the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed a national day of thanksgiving to be celebrated on Thursday, November 26.^[1]

The event that Americans commonly call the "First Thanksgiving" was celebrated to give thanks to God for helping the Pilgrims ofPlymouth Colony survive their first brutal winter in New England.^[2] The first Thanksgiving feast lasted three days, providing enough food for 53 pilgrims and 90 Native Americans.^[3] The feast consisted of fish (cod, eels, and bass) and shellfish (clams, lobster, andmussels), wild fowl (ducks, geese, swans, and turkey), venison, berries and fruit, vegetables (peas, pumpkin, beetroot and possibly,wild or cultivated onion), harvest grains (barley and wheat), and the Three Sisters: beans, dried Indian maize or corn, andsquash.^[4][2][5][6] The New England colonists were accustomed to regularly celebrating "Thanksgivings"—days of prayer thanking God for blessings such as military victory or the end of a drought.^[7]

A typical Thanksgiving dinner consists of turkey, gravy, stuffing, cranberry sauce, yams, mash potatoes, corn on the cob, green bean casserole and pumpkin pie for pudding.


I was going to take along my pumpkin bread but not sure I want to inflict that on anyone so I have gone for the safe option of sweet potatoes in maple syrup.  There is another popular dish where you mash the sweet potato and them melt marshmallows on top, I'm sure the kids would've loved that.

It's cold......

We had a little bit of snow last night and this morning at 8am it is only minus four - brrrrrrrrhhh

I've finally had to cave in and put the heating on in the house as the kids look freezing.  On a good note it means the workmen won't be out today so we will have some peace and quiet and I can get the car out of the garage.  Although I'm not sure we will be going anywhere as Madeleine is looking a bit pale.

The kids are off school this week and yesterday the girls went for their first playdate with their best friend Isabel.  They all had a lovely time and didn't want to come home which is a good sign.  Jonah now has a friend two doors up and it's been great that we can call up for a spur of the moment playdate.

Slicked back hair.....

.....in preparation for the girls ballet show.  

The are performing in 'The Nutcracker  Sweet Suite' (yes it is called that) and the girls are Spanish Dancers.  I just about managed to get their hair scraped back into a bun with the aid of a ton of hairspray and gel.  Hopefully I'll do a better day on performance day.

I think they were doing the Russian Dance here.

Practising their dance.

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Here they are in their costumes, they will be getting red roses in their hair which they are very excited about.  Madeleine kept her hair pinned up all day but Olivia ripped hers out the second they came out of rehearsal.

Tutus for Christmas....

I've started to make the girls Christmas presents and they are getting a fairy princess box each.  So far I've made Madeleine's tutu, she's my purple princess and I'm really pleased with how it's turned out.  I just need to trim it up and add some ribbon and hopefully she'll be happy with it.

Pumpkin bread....

As we have so many pumpkins lying around I thought I'd have ago at making some pumpkin bread today.

I used a cinderella pumpkin as this is supposed to be a sweet one.  First of all the boring job of peeling and chopping.......

Then I made all of this in to a puree but think I should've grated some of it for a bit of texture.

Ta da........

It's not too bad but I'm not sure I'd be brave enough to give it to anyone but my family.

A lovely day for the beach.....

Ben checked out the weather report for Sunday and it said it would be clear down on the coast.  Well we headed off down there and arrived to this......

As always the kids couldn't care less and had a ball playing on the beach.

Jonah and his giant seaweed

Ben and his seaweed whip

Nanny and Grandad

Sad day....

..... as Nanny and Grandad left this morning.

I guess I'll have a bit more time to update the blog now but not today as my arthritis is playing up and I'm struggling to type, my hands look well and truly crippled.

Rainy day.....

It was a bit of a miserable day yesterday so we went over to the Pearl District to do a bit of shopping.  I bought myself a new pair of Keen walking boots and then we popped over to REI, another outdoor shop and the kids got to have a go on the climbing wall.

First up was Olivia

She's a very good little climber and was very confident on the way up.

She made it all the way to the top to ring the bell but found it a little scary coming back down so a bit of coaxing was needed.

Next up Madeleine

We thought she'd be a little more nervous than Olivia but she surprised us all and was up to the top in no time.

Then last of all Jonah

He was very confident but we still wondered if he would make it all the way to the top....

I blinked and he was at the top, he was very fast at climbing.

He even managed to have a go at abseiling which the girls were a little bit nervous to try.   I definitely think we'll be taking them back for another go as they all seemed to really enjoy themselves and it kept them entertained for a few hours on a rainy day.

Jonah's ready....

for the snow.....

Just need to get him a winter coat and then he's already to get out in the snow to play. He's very excited and we've been checking out sledges already.

Lego boy....

Jonah bought some more Lego with his birthday money, Lego Atlantis.  He locked himself away in my bedroom for hours whilst building it and we didn't hear a peep from him, great stuff!!!!!!

His not so helpful little helpers

Atlantis

Forest Park

This is the largest forested natural area within city limits, in the whole of the United States, it has 5,100 wooded acres.  

The kids really enjoyed it here, apart from Madeleine who has a bit of a cold and wanted to go back to the car.  Jonah, Maxi and Olivia ran most of the way and I had trouble keeping up with them.

Orange fungi

Olivia and Jonah

Let it snow.....

The weather can be so interchangeable here and we saw our first snow on Sunday.   We took mum and dad for a drive up to Multnomah Falls and Skarmania Lodge, the weather wasn't too bad and there were only a few showers  so we thought we do the loop around Mount Hood.  Oh my, when we reached the top of the pass we came to snow and then as we dropped down the other side we hit a blizzard.  The kids were very excited and the girls are convinced Christmas is here!!!!!  I'm really looking forward to getting out in the snow, not sure we'll learn to ski this year but there's lots of sledging and tubing runs for us to have fun in.

Happy 40th to me!!!!

It was my 40th on Sunday but we spent most of it Trick or Treating with the kids.   I did have lots of lovely goodies though and a very nice day.

Just wanted to thank everyone for my lovely gifts, oh and if you look closely you can see my sister on the laptop she got to share my birthday pressie unwrapping.

My fabulous new knitting bag and Union Jack Tote bag

My very own Nerf gun

Trick or Treating.....

The kids experienced their first American Halloween on Sunday and oh my word did they have fun.  Little Maxi was literally dragging his bag along it was so full of chocolate and sweets.  In the end we had to carry it home for him.

Monster March......

On Sunday we went to the annual Llewellyn School 'Monster March'.  Normally about 500 people turn up in costumes, mainly children from the school and neighbourhood but this year it was a spectacular turn out and there had to be at least a thousand people there.  Ben is planning our costumes for next year, I think we should go as the Von Trapps.....