Thanksgiving Weekend

Wednesday afternoon Paul's parents came in town and we all had dinner at Gram's house. My family just adores Mom and Dad Hicks and it is so nice when we can all be together. Thursday we headed to Boone to spend a couple of nights with Paul's grandfather, aunts, uncles and cousins. I truly love his family and couldn't be more blessed by all of my in-laws. Just between two of Paul's cousins there are 11 kids under the age of 5! They are kind of like the Duggars, if you know what I mean. But let me tell you, they are the most well behaved and non spoiled children I have ever been around. Paul and I take notes on their parenting skills every time we visit.

On our way home Saturday we went to a Christmas tree farm right by Paul's aunt and uncle's house and picked out our own tree.


It was my first time and I sure hope we'll make it a yearly tradition from now on. It was so much fun! I never had much room for a tree in my townhouse but since we are living in Paul's now, we have a little bit more space for a good size tree.

Behold, the first annual hand picked Hicks family Christmas tree.



We definitely felt like the Griswolds trying to get this big guy in the house.
Little full, lot of sap.




Paul had to do quite a bit of trimming and it still touches the ceiling. No tree is too big in my opinion though. And there are few smells as good to me as a fresh Christmas tree. I am so excited to be able to enjoy it for the next month. The majority of our Christmas decorations are packed too far away in storage at my mom's to bother getting out. It's times like these that I remember we aren't living in our permanent home and I can't wait to have a house with all of our things in one place. It will feel like we just got married again by the time we unpack all of the things we left behind when we moved into Paul's house almost a year ago. We did manage to dig a few Christmas things out. Sophie's Christmas sweater included of course.




My mom knitted this tree skirt a couple of years ago and it is such a treasure to me. It took her over 6 months.



My wonderful family is always very understanding of having to "share" us for the holidays so we waited until Sunday and had our second round of turkey day at Gram's house. Paul cooked the turkey.



It was his first time and he was sooo excited about it! It was a huge success and we've enjoyed three days of leftovers for lunch.

In less than 3 weeks we'll be out of school for Christmas break!

Where do I begin?

It's been so long I honestly don't even know where to start in catching up. My lack of blogging is due to me continuing to be extremely busy and exhausted from work. I'm sure all seven of the people that ready my blog have been on pins and needles waiting for the next post. I'll try to remember a few highlights of what's been going on with the Hicksters.

Soccer season got over about two weeks ago. It was the worst season Paul has ever had as a coach so we were both glad to see it end. We are also glad to have a somewhat normal life again...like walking in the door for the first time before 9:30, eating dinner together, walking the dog, watching a little tv.

Sweet Thomas in Kenya had his throat surgery last week. It was successful and the American doctor confirmed that he does not have cancer. It was some of the best news I've ever heard. He spent a few days in the hospital but is home now recovering and studying for his final exams, which is what you have to take before secondary school (high school to us). How he does on the exams will determine where he will be able to go for secondary school, none of which will be free.

We decided on a realtor after meeting with four different ones. She is going to wait until January to put our house back on the market. We have quite a few projects to tackle before then. One is having the inside of our house painted, which will start tomorrow. We found a super cheap painter, which we are so thankful for because it would have been a struggle to find the time to paint our entire house within the next few weeks. I will not miss these boring, white walls.

Work continues to be extremely difficult. I feel like I am limited on the amount of details I can share, but let's just say each and every day feels like the worst day at work that I've ever had. I am more than convinced at this point that teaching, at least in public schools, is what I will be doing for the next 20 plus years. The Bible tells us to count our trials and hardships as joy, so although I fail more days that not at doing that, I am trying. Thankfully He promises to see me through and not to give me more than I can handle, which hopefully means it can't get much worse than it already is. Paul continues to amaze me with what a wonderful husband he is. He has been so supportive and helpful to me during this hard time at work. Since soccer season has gotten over, he has been cooking dinner and doing a lot around the house to help me feel less stressed. I couldn't imagine doing life without him!

The new Twilight movie comes out this coming Friday. Paul and I used to make fun of Twilight fanatics until we gave in and rented all of them one weekend about a year ago. We've been hooked ever since and have been anxiously waiting for the new one to come out. We already have our tickets for this Friday and can't wait to go with our friends and fellow Twilight addicts, Abbie and Chris.

We are looking so forward to Thanksgiving and Christmas. We haven't seen Paul's parents since this summer and miss them so much. With Paul and his dad both being coaches, neither us or them have been able to travel on the weekends. We can't wait to see them in a week and a half!

Hoping it won't be another month before the next post.