The Elwell Family Adventures: Thanksgiving Elwell-Style

A timeline is the best way to show the Thanksgiving craziness in our family.

Tuesday: Aunt Natalie drove through a snow storm and arrived to CLE safely! Thai food dinner is our tradition when she's in town and the new restaurant we tried was a winner. Delish.

Wednesday: Jack & Jamie go to work. Aunt Natalie takes over parenting and drives C & J out for some quality cousin time. (There are 14 Elwell grandkids total.) Thank you!

Thursday: Happy Turkey Day! Jack ran the Cleveland Turkey Trot to get the day started. Then we all met up at Grandma's for the afternoon/dinner. I wish this picture could capture how huge this turkey was. (over 20 lbs, I think!) Thank you to Grandma Peg for hosting the entire family at her house. Tons of food and lots of family fun.

Kids table.

Cousin wrestling. Ben & Rylee are the oldest cousins and are great with the little kids. It was so great to see them for the holidays.

Grandkids picture & Christmas exchange

Every year after Thanksgiving dinner, we do Colin's birthday cake. Happy 6th birthday, Colin!

Friday: We woke up to 8 deer walking through our backyard. Spotting deer never gets old in our house.

Christmas decoration time & the elf is out. Oh, I should also add that Colin knows the Santa secret. Long story, but the way he was talking, we didn't want Justin to lose out on some of the young fun quite yet. So Colin now helps us move the elf every night and Justin still has some Christmas fun.
Colin knows not to tell anyone else about the Santa secret, even those older than him. Let's hope this all works out.

Cousins bounce house party - Happy birthday to cousin Chloe! I had to turn away when Colin was put in charge of holding baby Danny. How is my child old enough to hold a baby?

Elwell women: Natalie + her crazy sister-in-laws.

Saturday, November 30: Colin officially turned 6. For his birthday, he requested, "doughnuts for breakfast, a hike and Cheesecake Factory for dinner."

So lucky to have presents! Remote control lego train set, easy bake oven and a remote control helicopter. He was loving every moment!

Remote control helicopters are cool. Jack & Colin love flying it and Justin & I hide and duck when they do. =) By the way, Colin rolls his own jeans up like this. I always have to unroll them 1-2 times before we head out! =)

The sun came out for our birthday hike. On the hike, Justin told me that for his birthday, "I want to watch TV and rest instead of hike." He has since denied making this statement and insists on a hike for his birthday as well. =)

Afternoon play time with Reagan & Brooke. And for the record, I can still do (an assisted) back-hand spring! I have a video to prove it too. =)

Cheesecake Factory Dinner. Party of 18 please. Thank you everyone for making Colin's birthday so special. What a day!

Sunday: Otherwise known as "pajama, don't leave the house" day.

Colin woke up at 7am and built his train lego set all by himself. Even the remote control parts! It was great to see him work.

We introduced Aunt Natalie to monkey munch.

Then, Jack & Natalie left for errands/family time, and I was supposed to go grocery shopping. But instead, the boys and I stayed in our pajamas the entire day and played legos. The boys asked to stay home for the whole day and it was so easy for me to agree. I couldn't have asked for a better way to close out Thanksgiving weekend!