Much to Be Thankful For

Yesterday we celebrated Thanksgiving with family and friends!  It was a terrific day with super yummy food contributed by all who came!  Originally we were going to have dinner at my sister's house but she was hobbling around since getting the pins and screws out of her ankles, so I offered our house!  And thanks to everyone pitching in, I couldn't have been more thankful!

Buck's sister, Jessica, and her beau JW (or Auntie Jess, as my kids too call her!), brought the turkey, stuffing, a ham, and my favourite, mashed turnips and apples.  Arren brought mashed potatoes and hash brown casserole.  My mom brought a lettuce salad, a jello salad and punch.  And I made sweet potatoes and cupcakes!  We had so much food, fun and laughs!  Our house was full of giggles from the ten kids, my neices and nephews Maryssa and Owen, Lily and Gilbert, Adam and Melodie's kids, Hayley, Dantae Lynn and Damian, plus our three kids!  They all got along exceptionally well, Damian, Calum and Armin played lego while Gilbert and Owen played video games, and all the girls went outside to explore!  When they came in the kids made a craft, a ritz cracker turkey with a hershey kiss body and candy corn feathers (thanks to Adam and Melodie for finding the super hard to find candy corn!)  The adults sat and visited around the table while the girls would take turns cleaning up!  I love our house for that, even if the girls are doing dishes and the guys are chatting we can all still be involved in each others conversations!  It was so much fun!

Dantae Lynn and Lily

Hayley and Damian

The example turkey that I made!

Adam, JW, Arren, Buck and Jared having fun chit chatting!

Dantae sat for quite awhile making her candy turkey's.

Lily the goof ball!

I had made gingerbread cupcakes with a pumpkin cream cheese frosting, which I thought were exceptional, except I had over cooked them a little so to fix that in a pinch I decided to just cut off the bottom of each of the cupcakes...the part that was the most overcooked!  They quickly got nicknamed the bottomless cupcakes!!  I also made an apple butter vanilla cupcake with a vanilla frosting and garnished with a sprinkle of cinnamon!  I love making cupcakes, just as much as I love eating them!!  Jared had set up an archary station for the kids and the girls did check it out but by the time Emry asked to have Jared come out and show them the sun had set!  But I think they all had fun despite the missed opportunity!

I was happy we celebrated Thanksgiving yesterday, we may not have had Jared with us any other day because of all the work he is busy with...Saturday we had a sick calf with bad feet who really was having a hard time standing to get milk from his mom.  So Jared and Emry rounded the calf up and loaded him into the trailer to take him to the vet.  Jared said Emry was such a big help and a real natural when it came to wrangling cattle...the calf was in the water hub but as Jared and Emry backed the trailer in, his mom realized what was happening and came tearing over to her calf and riled him up and together they took off to the farthest corner of the field.  I got a phone call asking if I would come and get them so they could get the quad.  They were going to miss the vet appointment if they couldn't get the little guy in.  Once they got back down there with the quad they were able to separate the mom and her calf from the rest of the herd, and while Jared walked behind the cow and her calf Emry drove her quad to prevent them from straying off course!  Jared was so proud of her and so thankful for her help, he couldn't have done it on his own, and she just naturally knew what to do, he didn't give her any direction!  They got the calf loaded and then off to Nanton they went, where they found out not much at all!  The vet said it could be a couple of things but both resulting in his feet falling off.  One diagnosis was selenium poisoning from gorging himself on the mineral Jared puts out to keep the cows healthy, or the other diagnosis could be ergot, which is generally due to too much grain...which our cows haven't had!  So Jared is treating this calf daily with an antibiotic and hopefully it will help him, and if not, we will at least have some good eating!!  And even after the adventure of getting the calf to the vet and home again, Jared even made it to his Priesthood Meeting, which he thoroughly enjoyed!  A good way to end an already good day!  Today if it isn't too wet, Jared is going to try and haul more bales home.  Never a dull moment here on the farm!

We were also happy to have friends celebrate thanksgiving with us yesterday...Adam and his wife Melodie and their three children joined us for dinner!  Adam has been doing a lot of the finishing work in our house and he getting close to being done before he moves onto Myrna's house, he really does do exceptional work!

The beautiful Thanksgiving sunset!

As everyone was getting ready to leave Buck got a phone call from my mom who had already left saying there was a fire over in the direction of their farms.  A few minutes later he got another phone call from my mom, a lot more frantic, saying it was most definitely at her farm.  From the road she couldn't tell if it was her house or not.  Thankfully JW is apart of the Vulcan fire department and he quickly took action and called it in.  Everyone left in quite a hurry after that, including Jared to see if he could help out in any way.  With the house empty and quiet I was too anxious to just sit and wait to hear, so the kids and I piled into the car and were only going to drive to Alston Road to see just exactly how bad it was.  As we were driving we could see that it was in fact a big fire, and Emry was terrified. Just before we turned onto Alston Road Arren called me and told me the fire was not at the house but in the field just east of the bins, so not far from the shop and the house.  She said the fire was quite close to the lane way so it probably wasn't wise to come up to the house.  We stayed parked at the intersection to let the two fire trucks by before we turned onto Alston Road and parked just past my mom's lane approach to let the other fire trucks know where to turn.  In total there were about seven trucks there from three different stations, Vulcan, Champion and Carmangay.  They were quickly able to get the fire under control and eventually put out.  They did a wonderful job and responded super quick, thank goodness for the exceptional volunteers in our little communities!  The verdict of how the fire actually started is not yet in, but last night Buck was thinking it could have been the fencer that is attached to the post behind the row of bins.  There was very little structural damage done, just a few fence repairs.  So despite the little bit of adrenaline rush last night we truly have much to be thankful for...family, friends, good neighbours and dedicated volunteers!

What a day to celebrate the blessings we have been given.  I have so much thanks in my heart...
first of all, for my truly loving and devoted husband, a man who lets me be my own person and yet guides and directs me on the right path, a man who has a sense of humour and makes me laugh on a daily basis, a man who says I love you even in front of the guys at work when we finish a conversation on the phone, a man who can find the joy in everything we do even when its dealing with our super energetic children!  Second of all I am so thankful for our children, and the innocence they possess, I am thankful for the joy they bring to my life and the smile they bring to my face every time I look at them.  I am also thankful for extended family, my mom and Jared's mom and for all the help they are to us and for the wonderful examples they are.  I am thankful for my dad and for the love and support he gives to me each day, I always look forward to his phone calls, they always come at a time when I seem to need them the most!  I am extremely thankful for the gospel in my life and for the peace and security I feel from it each and everyday.  I am thankful for all the rest of my family too, and for the love I feel from each of them.  There is so much to be thankful for and to list it all I would truly be typing forever!