Happy Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving morning Glenn had fun playing games and relaxing before our delicious meal started.

He had fun playing with Grandpa Dennis' chess set, and playing cards with Cheryl.

He also learned a new hand game with Gramma J.

After all the food was done cooking and all the prep was done, it was time to eat!

We enjoyed a delicious Thanksgiving Feast with Gramma J, Dennis, Robyn, and Cheryl.  

We ate turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, apple yam casserole, green bean casserole and rolls.

How grateful we all were that day for good foods!

We are also grateful for so many things!  We are grateful for our families, our homes, our jobs, our memories, our experiences, our lives!  

Especially we were grateful that Cheryl was with us!  She has been so strong in fighting the breast cancer and going through all these treatments.  She has been a great example of patience and hope.  We love you Cheryl and are so grateful to have you as part of our family!

The next day is a day Paul's family sets up Christmas decorations.  It was a bit difficult at his parents' house because of the fire that happened May 2012.  They had only recently returned to their home after it was cleaned up and repaired from the damage.  They weren't sure what had survived and so weren't sure what decorations there would be.  As they opened boxes, they were happy to find most of their things.  After most things were set out, Glenn found some old tins to play with.

I don't know if you can really tell, but in the above picture, Glenn's left eye is all red.  He is allergic to cats and Paul's parents have 4 or 5 cats.  They were put away in one room the time we were there, but it's hard to get rid of any influence from the cats.  Glenn had had a slight cold when we first came down--remember how he wasn't feeling the best at preschool?  Well that cold got worse and complicated by the allergies and other things.  Glenn was struggling day and night to breath and to stop coughing.  I wasn't sure if it was just a cold that had gotten worse or if it was something else.  Finally, after too long, Paul and I took Glenn to the ER.  We had called an on-call nurse who could hear Glenn in the background struggling to breath, and she told us to go to the ER right away.  We were there from about midnight until 3:45am.  He got several breathing treatments and a steroid to help relax his lungs so he could breathe better.  By the time we left his breathing still wasn't in the normal range, but it was better than where it had been.  He was such a trooper to be there for so long.  He got to wear a cool dragon on his face as part of the breathing treatment.

(PICTURES FROM PAUL"S PHONE)

We got home around 4am Saturday morning and were exhausted.  We didn't get to sleep much because Glenn was up at a normal time and then Paul's parents were up doing things.  He did get a nap later--after a big tantrum as a result of being so tired and drained from his experience through the night and really his lack of being able to sleep well any night we were there.  But we made it through and then went to Cheryl's later to help her set up Christmas.

Glenn liked helping with the train track that goes around the Christmas tree.

He also liked playing the game called Sleeping Queens.

For dinner that night we all enjoyed several of Robyn's famous tacos!  So yummy!

And we had a delightful, unplanned mini-concert with Gramma and Cheryl.

(Gramma doesn't like her picture taken, so she always scowls at me.)  :D

It was so nice to have such beautiful music live in the home!

We had a nice evening at home together and we didn't stay too late.  Our little family was pretty exhausted from the previous night and wanted a good night's sleep.