Light covereth a mulitude of faults...

The tree is up - it's always chaotic. It takes me much longer than anyone (including me) thinks it should to get out the boxes (unload them from the garage closet), rearrange furniture (Rose is in her Christmas spot in the corner),and fluff the tree (it's not the greatest, but it's skinny and that's what we need). By the time everything was ready to go this year, it was a day later than when we started. We let the girls put things up wherever they want and to be honest I don't love the tree without the lights turned on, but turn the lights on and...... it is beautiful. To us anyway. Whenever I look at pictures of our house, it always looks empty, which surprises me because there are some days when I want to throw everything out it is so full in here.
I complain loudly sometimes about CAY and his pack rat ways...have I mentioned he still has all of his college paperwork???? Including his homework????? But every once in a while, it is charming. Here is an example of the charming, his saved Christmas ornaments. The gold ball was from an elementary school teacher,the gingerbread man is from Marlene in 1978, and the airplane was 1992.

We had a great Thanksgiving. We went down to my Uncle Michael and Aunt Karan's. They made a FEAST and they even let us take leftovers home to New Jersey the next day. They always make us feel so welcome and the girls never want to leave. Everyone is back to work and school now - just three weeks till Christmas break!