Thanksgiving Day Part Deux

A little business before I finish my Thanksgiving story:

Bonnie: I adore my Mom, too! And I did get to be with her Saturday-Tuesday following Thanksgiving, and that was really great. I was also able to spend time with my brothers and sis-in-law; Abbie and I decorated Mom's tree; we did a little shopping together; we talked a lot. It was a fun time.

Jennifer: What do you think I should do? Doyathink I better asked to be released because of my imbibing Pepsi? I don't do it that much...

But seriously, thank you for all your love. I miss you. When will you be in town??

Janelle: You are my new rock star! I've been popping over to your blog to catch up on your adventures. You need to finish telling the story about your trip to Egypt. You are so awesome! And the Land of Many Stores, yeah, you totally understand that one.

Okay, then. Thanksgiving night...

After we ate and cleaned up, we went into our turkey stupor for awhile. Then our energy came back and it was time for Family Game Night. The little problem with this was that not all The Family was sure that this was what they wanted to do. But after much convincing (aka bribery: gas money to Fred, and once Fred was on board it was easy to convince Sam), Fred went and changed into clothes for the occasion, and the occasion was

Settlers of Catan Knights and Cities the 5-6 player version.

(We are such dorks!)

Fred donned his work-out clothes complete with head band. And we settled in to teaching Fred and Sam how to play this game.

It wasn't easy.

Some of "us" were easily confused, shall we say?

In the meantime, Nick kept himself entertained practicing ampersands and Copperplate print.

(He already knew how to play.)

But once we got going (around 8:00 PM)

we really kept going.

And going.

And going.

We even had a Maverik Break. That's when your adult children make a run to Maverik to buy Mt. Dew at oh, I don't know, maybe 12:30 or 1:00 AM. There was a little bit of a slump, you see. The guys needed help to keep going. Hummm...are you noticing a caffeine problem in this family? The confusing thing is that we used to never drink caffeine drinks. Really. Never.

But I'm getting off track.

This game went on.

And on.

And on.

At one point something set Jake off in laughter, which set the rest of us off. And it was senseless chortling and gasping for air for a few minutes. I smile just remembering.

Abbie eventually fell asleep (she and I had been a team), but we plowed on to the finish. The goal: Knock Doug off his Throne of Winning. We accomplished that, but I suspect he might have let it happen, which takes away a little of the satisfaction.

I cringe a little to report that we finished this game around 4:00 or 4:30 A.M.

I KNOW. Cra-A-zy.

But we had fun. Lots of fun.

It was a good Thanksgiving. We have much to be Thankful for. Yes. We do

(Be honest--You didn't think I'd really post Part 2 today, did you?!)