The day before we left, Lelu took the doggies on a walk as it was so warm outside. 

November 22

We all headed down to sunny AZ this year for Thanksgiving.  TT was somewhat disappointed because he thought he’d be missing out on skiing opening day when I told him about it, but I must have had a 6th sense about the lack of snow, because there wasn’t even a flurry.  It was almost as warm and sunny in UT as it was in AZ.  I think it was close to 70.  Yet, down in the desert it was a balmy 85 degrees.  A bit too warm for my taste while hiking Camelback. The rocks were warm to the touch and it is a rock scramble at the top of the mountain.  Me, B, Master D, TT and Lelu made the trek.  Of course, the kids all made it back down to the car much quicker than we did – I’m generally a speed demon going downhill and not the least bit afraid that one wrong move will send me launching off a cliff to my death, so instead my excuse reason for going so slow: I was taking in the moments of gratitude at a Thankful-I’m-alive pace – and they drove up and picked us up at the trail start with big gulp coke slurpees.  We were also lucky enough to share my favorite holiday with Dave, Shel and the boys.  Once I got my brain working I snapped a few photos of pie eating.. This one might be my favorite since Ryan is so UN-impressed by the treats in front of him – plus the magical Harry Potter glasses!
As a noteworthy mention, TT has another talent that we discovered as he whipped the meringue by HAND while watching TV as the one beater hand mixer was smoking over the effort.  It makes me very grateful for modern conveniences because I would not make lemon meringue pie if I had to whip it by hand.  Thank you TT!There were a couple of turkey comas.  Look at those angelic faces!

There were also a few little shenanigans (does that word make me sound old?) going on too.  Master D convinced TT to try and escape from this coffee table.  Umm He couldn’t do it..

Ryan discovered he could lead Master D around by the head and was calling him his “video game”.  We did a little biking too while we were here.  The girls were treated to e-bikes and Ari’s was especially easy to ride (more like a Vespa than a bike) and she was having a great time on that thing.  It was quite the feat, but we fit seven bikes onto the top of our rental car.   We did a little shopping too and were wondering who these jackets were representing and who would actually wear these and why in AZ? Tempting as they were for us to use for hunting season (oh duh, we don’t hunt!)…we didn’t buy them.