Thanksgiving Weekend

Thanksgiving Dinner: We had a quiet dinner at home with our little family. No turkeys here. We had a delicious prime rib roast, no-knead rolls (Big Daddy: "These may be the best rolls I have ever eaten in all my 32 years."), mashed potatoes, sauteed yellow squash and sparkling grape juice. I also made a cherry-topped cheesecake for dessert. Y.U.M.

On Thanksgiving night I took Big Sis to Disney on Ice. We'd never seen it before, and I purchased the tickets after seeing a commercial on TV the previous week (I'm impulsive like that). It was awesome! We had great seats, the show was 2 hours long, and she was riveted the entire time. It also didn't hurt that she got a special treat of a snow cone in a special princess cup. Then we discovered she is the only kid in America who doesn't care for snow cones. And yes, she is wearing her Alice costume from Halloween. Why not?

My favorite part was a bit from It's a Small World. Not only is the song so catchy that I am still singing it 4 days later, but they really did the ride justice by capturing the look and feel of it.

Army guys from Toy Story.

The finale with all the characters.

On Friday we headed to Omaha, and the Children's Museum. This is a sculpture outside the entrance. When you sit on the metal seat it plays bits of 4 or 5 different songs about Omaha.

The obligatory John Deere ride along.

Artist-in-residence doing a percussion jam.

At the end of our day, Dog from Word World showed up. Sorry, I'm a little light on pictures. Big Daddy has banned me from posting pictures which include him. I think he's afraid I might post something incriminating which will hurt his run for the Presidency in 2065.

What else did we do?

On Wednesday morning (and by morning I mean 1 am) Big J woke with croup. We spent the next few nights running the humidifier, hanging out in the steamy bathroom, and generally being wide awake between the hours of 2 and 5. He's better now, but is still stuffy/coughy/grumpy.

Also on Wednesday we bought a new (to us) car. I told you: me=impulsive. It's a Saturn Vue.

Friday morning (5am) I headed to the mall to do a little Black Friday shopping. Last year I hit most of the big stores - Target, Old Navy, and Toys r Us, in addition to the mall. I just wasn't into it this year. Wal-Mart had a few things advertised that I would have been interested in, but I was not about to ram myself through the Wal-Mart crowd while juggling an infant. Even I have limits when it comes to getting a bargain.

I tried to go get my Iowa driver's license on Saturday morning, but they were closed. Attention State of Iowa: It's not that difficult to update your website to reflect Holiday business hours. Probably much easier than having to deal with the enraged citizens who drove 22 miles at 9 am on Saturday morning to get to the one station in Ankeny where you can issue a new driver's license. I don't really care that you will now be open on Monday morning. That doesn't make up for the fact that I spent early Saturday morning cutifying myself in preparation for the dreaded driver's license picture and it was all for nothing. After all this trouble I better not have to take the dang driving test. Thank you.

I cooked all weekend. Prime rib, dinner rolls, breakfast burritos, cinnamon rolls, cheesecake. It was so good, but I am glad I don't cook like this all the time.

And now I am off to drink a cup of hot chocolate while watching it snow. Perhaps the snow will put me in a Holiday mood. I've been having a hard time catching the Christmas spirit this year, and my non-decorated house isn't helping. But Big Daddy is loving it.