Giving Thanks

We had a fun Thanksgiving with all of the Hansen Family except Donny and Christine!  It was crazy that everyone decided to come to where the highest concentration of us live (the Wasatch Front) (me, Allison, Derek and Melissa are here, Katrina's in St. George, and Jonathan in Idaho.  Mom, Dad, and Jenae came and met Jenae's boyfriend Joseph here; he goes to BYU-I) and have fun family time at me/Allison's houses.  

One of the things we were in charge of was appetizers, so I supervised the girls' creation of these:

THen we went up to the MacKays and Karl and Melissa did a balloon-tying class!  Super cute.

The kids put on a skit/sang various songs.

and the young couples hung out:

while Maris go to know her cousins a little more!  So cute.

I guess owen did too!  

We went and sang at a rest home, it was sweet.  Then many dishes were done

and we all gathered and said one thing we were grateful for, in age order youngest to oldest.  It was really great.  Spiritual, and funny, and a reflection of everyone's personalities and the year they have had.  I said Maris was grateful for books, when we asked owen what he was grateful for he said  "Me-wis"  you know how he says Maris in his cute little voice, it was SO sweet!  Katelyn said she was grateful for friends and I can't remember what Whitney said she was grateful for, but it was cute.  Then I can't remember what everyone said but I remember a few: Jenae was grateful for Mom. :)  Joseph was grateful for our family. :)  Jonathan was grateful for miracles, including when he and Joseph spun out on ice on the way here but made it safely, Karl was grateful for the Commandments? Phillip was grateful  for Katrina and she was grateful for HOPE (Phillip FINALLY has another job, a good one, yay!!), Allison was grateful to know the second coming is real, Eric was grateful for the outdoors and all of God's creations (he said he's camped this year in snow, rain, high mountains, sand dunes, tunnels, meadows, and it's all amazing and beautiful. He's cute and awesome.), I was grateful for good health, Kent was grateful for a job that allows him to focus on what's important in life, Mom was grateful for all of us?  I can't remember!  But earlier that day she did talk about going to the temple for Grammy and Pa and Grammy's sisters and how amazing it was.  Then last Dad said he was grateful for the missionaries who taught his ancestors the gospel, and for their faith to come to America.  

It was a really special time.

The next day we came to our house (Grammy, Maris and Lydia)

and we decided to buy a ping pong table at a black friday sale and have a ping pong tournament!!  I need to take a picture of the bracket, it's still on the wall.  It was SO FUN!  One of the best games was Allison vs Katrina in pool play, they were really evenly matched so it went on forever and Phillip and Kent were getting so into it cheering their wives on!  Haha.

Derek vs Kent in the semifinal

panoramic shot showing Jenae and Joseph hanging out in the reading nook too!

Eric vs Joseph in the other semifinal

The final- Eric vs. Kent!  With Joseph as scorekeeper.

Eric won hehe!  He was like "thanks for coming everyone so I could kill you all in ping pong, haha"

that night we had a game night

And played around the world ping pong!  So fun!!  Kent won that one.

It was a Happy Thanksgiving.