The Turkey Trudge

For Thanksgiving break we got a whole week off, plus two days. 

It was wonderful and a very much needed break.  

We got to visit both of our families...that is one of the perks of having both of our families living in Utah.  

While we were visiting my family we had the WONDERFUL opportunity to run a 5k Thanksgiving morning...

lucky me!!

If you know me at all you know that I HATE to run but I promised my mom who had organized the whole thing that I would run it.  Well to make things worse I got a HORRIBLE cold--sore throat, bad cough, and itchy ears--but I decided that I would still run that dumb race because I gave my mom my word. 

Well Thanksgiving morning came along and it was 7 degrees outside.  It was so cold, I thought I was going to die.  I started out running but after a few minutes my lungs felt like they were going to explode and my throat was burning so I stopped running. 

My sister Kaylee stopped with me and soon Ben came back and we walked together.  We were in last place because I couldn't breath at all, but then Ben suggested we cut through a field to catch up with everyone.  It took some convincing but finally we cut through and found out that we were no longer in last place!!

Cutting through the fields rejuvenated all three of us and for the rest of the race we had a great time talking about what other fields we cut through to come in first place. 

After that Ben thought it would be funny to change the arrows on the cones and Kaylee was gathering up the cones along the way.  I had two mischievous children on my hand, so out came my motherly skills. :o)

We did run some parts of the race but for the most part we just enjoyed being together and causing a ruckus! 

One of the coolest things that has happened this past year is Ben's grandparents received their mission call to serve in South Africa.  They leave on December 13th (I think).  We are so excited for them and they will be such awesome missionaries.  Thankfully we got to be there for their farewell address in church and we got to see them one last time before they head out.

Ben was also super excited to get a 5 generation picture!  He has been wanting to take one since Reese was born but we have never had everyone together since them.  So his grandparents farewell created the perfect opportunity to take one.

Thanksgiving was great.  I am so grateful for my family, they are such great examples to me!  I am especially grateful for Ben and the wonderful husband that he is to me.  I am thankful for my little Reese girl!  She brings so much joy into my life.  I am so extremely blessed with wonderful in-laws too.  I seriously couldn't ask for better in-laws. 

The Lord has definitely blessed our family this past year.  

We have so much to be thankful for.