Baking under way

Christmas cookie baking is under way. I tried a new cookie the other day - Ina Garten's frosted shortbread cookie - and it was horrible. Well, it tasted OK but the dough was all crumbly and miserable to shape. I cut the dough into toy soldiers and the heads fell off some and the feet fell off of some. I stashed a few in the freezer but I'm not sure they'll ever make it to my cookie tray. I can guarantee that I won't use that recipe ever again. What a waste of two sticks of butter! Anyway, today I baked the chocolate chip cookies with red and green M&Ms and they look good! Hard to mess those up.

Fancy

New ornaments

One of my new ornaments is this blingy Mickey Mouse Cindy bought for me on our Disney trip.

This one I bought myself at a craft show Julie took me to in October. I'll admit it. I have a snowman collection problem.

I found this cardinal for just $3 when L and I went shopping for Mayu's Christmas stocking last weekend.

And this is one of my new decorations this year - a mercury glass kaleidoscope tree. When it's not lit, it looks silver.

Christmas decorations

Our decorated tree!

L found these red Luminara candles for me when she was shopping in Chicago. I think she was waiting for Cindy to come in on the train for our Disney trip last summer.

We put up the pinecone wreath I got from Mom years ago but not sure it's going to stay. It's really heavy, some of the pinecones are falling off and it's really dusty. L says I need to get a can of air to spray on it, like what they use to clean computers. We'll see.

Andy's idea to put lights on the piano.

Our dining room windows ...

and the back porch. Again, Andy's idea to put up lights there.

Till Christmas

E and B left this morning to go back to school. They won't be home again until winter break.

Muffles crawled in B's laundry basket. Can't blame him for wanting to go to college.

This squirrel was making quite a mess in our back yard while enjoying a late Thanksgiving meal. We're assuming the white pumpkin is delicious.

Muffles has already made himself comfy under the tree. At least he's not hiding in it ... yet.

Decorating

The fall decorations came down today and the Christmas decorations went up. We wanted to do it before E and B head back to school tomorrow so they could help bring boxes in from the garage ... I mean so they could help decorate.

Andy might have gotten a little carried away with the lights this year. They're everywhere.

And all day he had his tortellini soup simmering so I didn't have to make dinner. Aww.

And in the midst of all our decorating, B's friend D, who had been staying with us since Tuesday, left for the airport this afternoon to go back to school in Boston.

Black Friday

This morning, B and Mayu got up and left the house before 5 a.m. to pick up friends and head out Black Friday shopping. Meanwhile, I finished cleaning up from Thanksgiving and August decided he needed to roll around on the clean tablecloth. He was on the table in no less than five minutes from when I put the clean tablecloth on.

Andy and I took L and her friend, A, Black Friday shopping at Yorktown Mall. They walked around while Andy and I did a little shopping. The weather was in the 60s and the mall wasn't horribly crowded.

We came home around 3 p.m. to find this:

B, his friend, D, who is staying with us, and Mayu all crashed on the sofa. But were they done for the day? No way! They got up and went downtown to Chinatown for dinner and karaoke.

Thanksgiving

The table is set and we're ready to show Mayu her first American Thanksgiving!

Andy made the turkey. We let it rest while we baked the stuffing and macaroni and cheese (made by L). It ended up being very juicy, or as juicy as we think turkey can be.

Allison carved a turkey in a pumpkin!

Finishing up the side dishes ...

... while Cousin C enjoys Andy's pumpkin pie martini. It was strong!

L tried to cut the cranberry sauce slices into pumpkins. It didn't work as well as we had hoped.

Let's eat!

My plate had a little bit of everything.

It's kind of a Thanksgiving (and sometimes Christmas) tradition that B falls asleep by Aunt Allison after (and sometimes before) the meal.

Enjoying family conversation. This picture cracks me up:

Prepping for Thanksgiving

Andy went with B to O'Hare Airport yesterday morning to pick up B's friend, D. He's staying with us over Thanksgiving because his parents moved to the West Coast after he graduated and he wants to see his high school friends. He's going to Northeastern University in Boston and brought us all college gifts. I got coasters, Andy has a snazzy new tie and L got a keychain - perfect since she'll be driving soon.

Allison fueled me up by bringing me coffee this morning and then I started cleaning and cooking a couple dishes for Thanksgiving. I noticed when I took some trash out that the milkweed pods are dry.

I couldn't find a pecan pie in the store (really?) so I had to make one.

Permitted driver

Look who got her driver's permit today ... and it took less than an hour. L was handling everything herself until I heard one of the employees ask another employee if she had to take a road test. Nooooo!

Andy and I took E and L out for dinner (B and Mayu were out with friends) and afterward we let L drive around in the Ascension Church parking lot. She was surprised the car would move when it was in drive even though she wasn't hitting the accelerator. This is going to be an interesting learning period.

Squirrel!

The girls never did carve their Halloween pumpkins so I set them outside at the bottom of the back stairs so the squirrels could eat them. I didn't think a squirrel would get so close to the back door! I heard him from inside and had to investigate. He was right outside the door, eating something - probably a pumpkin seed.

Not a typical day

This morning I took the girls to Oak Brook so E could get her hair cut at Mario Tricoci. Above is the "before" picture and below is the "after" photo:

And we came home to this:

Andy said the faucet was leaking (apparently he noticed it a few days ago) and while he was moving the faucet it broke off. So now we have to go to a home improvement store. The kids had been wanting to go to Mitsuwa so we shopped there for a while before leaving B, L and Mayu to get some lunch while we went to Lowe's to look for a new faucet.

They both ordered curry. The wait was about 45 minutes! They both agreed, though, that it was delicious and tasted like it does in Japan.

It was fun to watch Mayu go up and down the store aisles and see things she recognized from home. She and L each got a cake that they're bringing to different classes for a Thanksgiving dinner Tuesday at school. L's is for Japanese class; Mayu's is for her English class which has a lot of international students in it. They're supposed to bring something to share from their home country so that should be quite an interesting meal.

When we got home Andy started replacing the faucet. Took him about an hour. And now ...

... we have a new faucet.