Thanksgiving Recap - Part 1

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!  We just returned from a great week with the Wes and Tami family.   (You know the guy who has a job much cooler than your job?  That's Wes.  See the above link.)

You may recall that they are the friends who stayed with us after the earthquake.  They used some Timeshare points to get condos in Lake Tahoe and asked us --while we were still in Japan-- if we wanted to join them for Thanksgiving.

We considered the fall-out if we chose to spend our first major holiday in the states with friends instead of family...

Then we realized that they ARE our family:  Uber Family.  Earthquake Family.  Japan Family.  Just family.  And hey, they asked us first.  So we said YES!

(Plus, we're also FUTURE family since we're planning for our kids to inter-marry--just to make things more official.)

We are SO glad we went.  We had a blast.  Here's a quick(longish) re-cap:

Thanksgiving Tahoe Vacation

Day 1/Tuesday:  Leave at 6:30 a.m.  Drive a new way up the 395.  Drive drive, drive drive drive, 

Breakfast at Denny’s, drive on windy road, stop for Sam to puke, drive drive drive.

Really pretty scenery, stop for ice ball fight,

drive drive drive, 12 different pee breaks, drive, drive, drive, stop at an antique store, drive drive drive.

Arrive in Tahoe.  Papa Murphy’s for dinner.  Meet up with Tami and Wes, check in to our BEAUTIFUL condo.  {This is the second time Doug and I have stayed in a time share condo in Tahoe and, again, it was awesome.} We had a two room suite, Tami and Wes had a two room suite, and Wes’ brother Sam, wife Adrienne, and their eight kids had a three room suite.  If we ever buy a time share, it will be in Tahoe.  It was awesome.

(We met Sam and Adrienne when we went to Monterey for Camille’s baptism a few months ago and our kids were excited to see each other again.)

Day 2/Wednesday:  We visited the lake (right across the street from our condo)

It was a little chilly, but super-duper beautiful!

And only one kid (Sammy) fell in the frozen lake.

 relaxed, hung out, made pies, watched HGTV and YouTube videos,

Doug and Wes are such a cute couple!

went in the hot tub,

and went shopping for groceries and supplies.  (I made two America’s Test Kitchen Chocolate Cream Pies.  No Peanut Butter pie this year…I thought it would be too hard in a condo kitchen.  I’ll make it for Christmas!)

Day 3/Thursday:  Tami made stuffing and we got it in the Turkey and in the oven early.  (I was in charge of the turkey, which is the easiest thing ever) and Adrienne did potatoes.  Tami made apple pies the day before and the rolls were from Costco this year.  Oh, and Doug made Raspberry Jello which is always a crowd pleaser...

Wes, Doug and Sam (Sam is Wes' older brother)

Lunch/dinner was at 2 and a huge success.  Everything tasted fabulous and there were plenty of left-overs.

Lots of kids having lots of fun!

Tami, Me, Adrienne

Mini Wes and Mini Doug (Sam Jr. and Max)

To top off a perfect day, Guillotine and Rummikub were both played multiple times.

With one major exception, it was a fabulous day!

And that exception is...a story for tomorrow!

To Be Continued...