Holiday Spirit...

Our first Thanksgiving was a complete success with many thanks to our Mom's for helping us compile some last minute recipes we were able to form two family traditions into our own traditions! Derek and I were pretty excited to host our first Thanksgiving but began to feel nervous Wednesday night when we were at church and many of the congregation members were giving us tips on how to cook the turkey! We then went home and decided to watch Martha Stewart's your first Thanksgiving to help us out! After many debates on if we should grill or use the oven to cook the turkey we decided to use the oven for the turkey and the grill for the ham! (Yes we had Turkey and Ham because the Salzwedel's always have both... and I like Ham better than turkey!) After coordinating the oven dishes we had everything ready to go! And EVERYTHING turned out! Here are some pictures of our feast!

(I must say Derek did the Turkey, ham, mashed potatoes & homemade gravy! Thanks to Grandma Dar who took a last minute phone call on how to make the gravy!)

Let's just say we had more than enough food! Eric and Megan joined us for Thanksgiving which was a wonderful treat! Our neighbor Jamie and her friend Courtney also stopped by at the end of the evening! It was a fantastic day with wonderful people!

The day after Thanksgiving Derek and I ventured out to get some Christmas decorations! Paul, Amy, Katie and Brian will be here for Christmas and we wanted our home to be decorated for the holidays! We found some great bargains....

We hope you are staying warm! We are looking forward to hearing how the holidays are treating all of you! I started working at another Caffe Ladro to get more hours in. I now work at the Edmonds Ladro as well as the Lynnwood Ladro.

Derek is busy preparing for Christmas. He continues to love being in this congregation but we are missing all of you very much...especially during the holidays!

Love you!