Turkey, Gravy, and Distress-ing

The past two weeks have been a little hard and not quite as I'd pictured. We've spent all our Thanksgivings in Rexburg with James's parents and grandparents, but this year I convinced him not to travel so I could invite my 3 siblings who are at BYU-I.

They arrived Tuesday night, so I didn't get a lot of sleep. I did all (or most) of the cooking that day, and Katie took a nice, long nap in morning, which was convenient. The kitchen was a total wreck, but Mara helped me clean it up.

Things got a little more stressful Thanksgiving Day. The turkey was done early by 2 hours, so I had to rush like mad to get the rolls done and make sure everything was ready. Our menu:

turkey
sausage cornbread dressing
gravy
mashed potatoes
rolls
cranberry sauce (ew, from a can. Only Myles likes it.)
green bean casserole
candied yams (which everyone likes but me)
apple pie
pecan pie
French silk pie
pumpkin pie

I made everything from scratch (minus the cranberry sauce and one pie crust, which was graham cracker instead of a regular crust.) I think I spent 8 hours in the kitchen altogether. It was intense.

The meal was great, but the rest of the week was a little depressing for me. Moms just don't get vacations. Everyone else wanted to stay up really late (though James not as late, but still later than me.) I had very little sleep, and everyone got to play computer games, go paintballing, and go shooting. Now, I don't like computer games or paintballing, but I have a great time shooting. However, I was at home with all the kids. I felt a little taken advantage of. However, James and I had a great date on Friday to see Catching Fire, which is an amazing movie! I had spent the day crying about one thing or another due to lack of sleep, so my eyes were really puffy. :(

I took everyone to see the dinosaur bones on Saturday. They thought it was pretty cool. Sunday we blessed Katie and somehow survived all of church with the kids! Kenny cried a bit in nursery, but due to sickness (not always his), he has only been twice now. They are great with him, though, and I think he will do even better next week. We blessed Katie, and I failed to take a picture, but she didn't wear a dress. She wore a white boy's outfit with tights under it, and she was asleep for her blessing, so no one saw anyway since she was swaddled. Her blessing mentioned that she'd be a strength and comfort to her brothers. I thought that was really sweet.

I thought this would calm down a bit this week. James has been staying late every day. We got a MEGA snowstorm yesterday that dumped 18 inches of snow. James couldn't get the car all the way home since they hadn't plowed yet and it was too deep. Then, our heater stopped working. We were pretty cold since our house got down to 50 degrees. I had a terrible night of sleep, even with an extra blanket. James fixed the heater this morning by getting on the roof and clearing the vent. The sun came out, they plowed the road, and the house is warm again. James had a snow day until 3:30 when he had to go to parent/teacher conferences. I think it's totally ridiculous, because who the heck is going to show up?

Well, this has been quite the stressful week. It's funny how any of my terrible sleep hasn't been Katie's fault at all. She still does very well. She is also smiling! Of course I don't have a picture yet...but soon!

So in case anyone reads to the very end, this is what I take from the past week:
1. Hosting your own Thanksgiving is a lot of work. I'm not sure I'll take it on again for a very long time.
2. The schedules of college students and moms with young kids are not very compatible.
3. I still hate snow. A winter like this about 6 years ago is what ruined it for me. It makes me feel really claustrophobic.
4. I'm more grateful than ever for having a warm house!
5. There is always an end to the storm, no matter how dark, cold, and long it is.