thanksgiving by the numbers

11: people living in my house all last week. We truly loved every minute of it. The house felt so quiet and empty when they left. We're trying to figure out when and how we can get them all to come back here!

8: pounds of butter we consumed over the week. 
0: times I regretted that. (Well...maybe just once, when I had to be weighed at my midwives appointment on Monday...)

6: chefs in the kitchen on Thanksgiving. SO glad I had such talented help with the dinner!

3: people who got the privilege of "helping" taste test the barbecued turkey (My grandpa's recipe--it's tradition!)

21: pounds of turkey cooked and nearly almost all of it consumed by the end of the week. 

72: hours of playtime spent with Nicholas, Ellie, and the uncles. My little brothers are super cool, and I'm pretty sure they actually really enjoyed playing with my children. 

And a whole week of having people other than just me and Kent to read stories/comb hair/wash little hands/put on shoes/read more stories/refill cups? It was really, really awesome.

300: times we laughed about "phteven" memes and jokes.... Okay, really, it's funnier the more times you say it. And the later it is. And the more turkey and pie you've eaten.

421: times we reached for more candied walnuts. I used this recipe. And we couldn't stop eating them.

about 1,000,000: Christmas lights we saw at the Riverwoods on Wednesday night

 And Nicholas wanted to take a picture in front of every.single.tree. 
15: times Kent wondered if Nick is really his son every time Nicholas asked me to take another picture.

Yes, but he's my child, too, after all.

2: person team it took to make the picture-perfect lattice-topped apple pie

2: times we laugh-cried (aka giggle fit--those times when you get laughing so hard you can't stop, it's contagious, and soon everyone is wiping tears and can't breathe.) "These candles are making me so hot!" and "I think I'm gonna sell this on Etsy." 
Gosh I love my family. 
2: times I realized that laugh-crying is not the most comfortable thing for a woman pregnant with her third child....

6: sugar-cones-turned-tipis crafted by my kiddos. Easy, messy, and chocolate-covered.  The tipis were followed by a Nicholas-directed tutorial on making marshmallow caterpillars ("calapitters") which were eaten too fast for me to even photograph them. 

Ellie's pretzel tipi "poles" caved in on her final tipi. Her response? "I don't care." Okay then.

56: names from our family history we took to the temple on Saturday morning to do sealings for. For more information on the work we did and why, go here or click here. What a sweet experience it was to go and do that with Kent, my parents, and Josh and Alicia. Also? I'm going to need a bigger temple dress very very soon.

35: pieces of my Grandma Murray's beautiful china carefully brought down for us to use.

The table just wouldn't have been the same without that gorgeous china, don't you think?

46: leaves on our Thankful tree. My favorites were mostly from Nicholas--all on his own he wrote "Church," "Jesus and the Prophets," "Temples," "the Sacrament," "Living with my family," and "How to Train Your Dragon." Oh how I adore that little boy!

3: pies. Pumpkin, banana cream made by Josh, and apple a la Josh and Sarah. 

6: near corpses sprawled after the big meal, along with

2: bouncing children, who did their best to jump on as many full stomachs as they could.

Thanks for coming, everyone!