A Tennessee Thanksgiving/Christmas

We travel to Tennessee every Thanksgiving to visit Nathan's parents and brother.  We take this opportunity to exchange gifts and celebrate Christmas.

This year was extra special because not only were we able to make it, but all the Sweeney kids.

  Originally this photo was on the steps, but Aaron (the one in the hat between Jane and Elliot) refused to stand up, so we came over to him.

We  participated in the American tradition of breaking the wishbone.
Elliot pulled too soon, so grandpa got some of it on the top. he determined it was a tie. 

Jane told the history of the cornucopia
Elliot -not pictured, but I think he is on video, gave a speech about how Native Americans made tents.

We picked up the British tradition of the Christmas Cracker while we were in Hong Kong.
I rounded up my Marks-n-Spencer clearance kid crackers from last year and found some at World Market for the adults. 
Everyone seemed to think it was fun.

The wonderful food.
My mother-n-law makes the best yam yam sweet potatoes ever! no marshmallows, just a pecan topping that is delicious.

Jane helped grandma bake three pecan pies and two pumpkin. I'm convinced that I alone at a whole pecan pie over the course of a week.

Played some kickball, even grandma joined in on a game.

We played a game of 500 

Actually we played several games.

The rules: one person throws and yells out a number and if you catch it you get those points. When a person gets to 500 they win and they take a turn throwing.

The Grandparents hid the kids gifts, requiring a little effort on their part before opening. I like this idea as it makes the gift giving time go a little longer and keeps the anticipation up for the kids.

Benjamin loved his spider webs.

Decorating for Christmas

Many many blessings, and a lot to be thankful for. 

intn from outypants on Vimeo.

Rodeo and The Reds

The Sweeney brothers had a reunion in Tennessee.
Left to Right: Greg and Linda, (with Aaron in the middle) Garrett and Lavona, Grant and Gloria, Glen and Elaine, and Graham came with his son Loren. 

The kids had fun with a pool around. Uncle Aaron is having a good time splashing his niece. 

We went to a rodeo in Rutherford. It is a fundraiser for the  fire department.
Gloria showing Jane some dance moves.

Elliot and Loren thumb wrestling.
Elliot loved the attention of his older cousin.
It was nice getting to know Loren and we invited him to visit us in Grand Rapids.

The calf scramble ( I think they call it that) All kids 12 and under compete to pull the tags off three of them. Once you pulled a tag you were to return to the middle and give it to the rodeo clown.
Elliot had pulled a tag, but dropped it a bigger kid grabbed it off the ground and ran up to claim the prize. The clown had noticed what happened and told Elliot to come up and get a prize too. The prize was a five dollar bill.

Congratulations.

This was the kids first rodeo. They immediately began asking for boots and cowboy hats.
We left the kids with their grandparents for four days and met up in Cincinnati over the next weekend.

The highlight was the baseball game.

Hoping to catch a practice ball.

The infamous Charlie Sheen was there. They had him play a game during one of the innings. 

We purchased Reds shirts at Old Navy and came ready to root root for the home team.

Johnny Cueto bobble-heads for the first 20,000 people.
Jane sold hers after the game for $5.00 to a couple of guys who were buying them.

The T.V announcer was drowned out by the cheering fans.
The Reds were number one in their division and were on quite the winning streak. Watching the last inning was very exciting. The Reds closer had 100 MPH fast balls, the Pirates didn't score any runs and another victory was added to Cincinnati. 

  My favorite part of this video is hearing grandma, start clapping and cheering while Elliot is awarded his $5