Tuesday, December 2, 2008

Ft. Lauderdale & Turkey Day

with my family -- so I decided to go to visit MY FAMILY this Thanksgiving alone. I flew down on Wednesday and just got back on Monday. What a GREAT decision that was!!! I haven't been down to see my family in way too long to count. It was great. I stayed at my parents. I left my house at 3:15 AM to drive to BWI. My flight was at 7 AM. I got to the airport around 4 am. Checked in my luggage, went thru security and was sitting at the gate by 4:49 am. Read my book "Eat, Pray, Love" until boarding. Flight took off on time (yep imagine that!). It was a two hour and one minute flight. Pilot made sure he emphasized that "one minute". Ha, ha. My brother (Kev) picked me up at the airport. I got the royal tour of the beach highway A1A to see all the new hotels, condos, leftovers from Wilma, etc. It was a beautiful day -- chilly by some standards but 75 is not chilly to me. Sunny, blue skies with billowing white clouds in the sky. So glad I decided it was time to visit.

After my tour, Kev took me to Mom & Dad's who of course were waiting anxiously for their eldest to finally arrive. We visited and Kev stayed awhile too. Then he left to go help his wife cooking because she was the chef for our feast to happen the next day. He kept bringing dishes over to put in the fridge, appetizers, side dishes, salads, etc. We were gboing to be eating all day long.
Mom, Dad and I were off to Carrabas for dinner Wednesday nite. It was good too. But we were all waiting and anticipating our very special Thanksgiving Get-Together the next day. There was much to catch up on and we did it too.

Thursday all we did was eat appetizers, dips, and the meal. OMG the meal. What can I say. My SIL & brother did themselves proud. It was WONDERFUL!!!! Beer, wine, mighty fine too as you can see from the pics below!!

Dad & Mom enjoying the appetizers.













Karen, Beth (SIL), & Lynn (my sis) having some liquid refreshments!!!!















Us again but my niece, Kris, told her mom, Beth, to stop looking silly. While drinking wine, how do you not look silly??? And what's the purpose?

The food, the company, the weather, nothing could have been any better than it was! We truly had a magical time with one another. So much so that I can't wait to go back for Christmas. Three weeks and I'll be back down there to spend yet another holiday in Florida. It was 75-80 most days (cool by my Mom's standards) but absolutely perfect to me. Shorts, T-shirt & Sandals - P-E-R-F-E-C-T!!!!



Me & My Sis!!!!











As you can see, Dad took advantage of all the good food. He wasn't the only one enjoying our holiday. Lots of smiles, hugging and catching up. Long overdue. Can't let it be that long in the future.






Kris, her boyfriend Issac, Mike and CJ playing before eating.

Greg, Kev, Beth, & Lynn on the patio. I just barely got part of Mom in the pic too.

So then on Friday it was clean out the garage, pull down tree and decorate the inside and outside of the house day. You can see that the outside looks great thanks to my sis, Lynn, her hubby, Greg, and my niece, Courtney or CJ as I call her. They did a GREAT job.













More pics to come after Christmas visit. Can't wait. I will actually have pics to scrap in my albums. Hmmm such a concept.






2 comments:

Rosemary said...

You posted - hurray! Love the photos, yes, it did look as though everyone had a wonderful time!

There is something unusual about having Thanksgiving in a warm climate, just not used to it.

Glad you enjoyed yourself and it is wonderful having you back home!

Jana said...

Your Thanksgiving sounds idealic. Can't figure out how to drink and not look silly either. Sorry I can't help there. We'll just have to work on it next time we see each other.