Monday, November 29, 2021

Thanksgiving 2021

We got to start our Thanksgiving day with a COVID test! Isaac woke up at 3am with some trouble breathing. It was the same hacking cough that I recognized from when he had croup in August. Aaron took a shower with him, and it calmed things down to a mellow wheeze. We went back to sleep, and when we woke up at a more sane hour, he was coughing but otherwise fine. Then, we had to agonize over whether we should cancel our Thanksgiving plans and quarentine ourselves or not. Luckily we had an at home test leftover that we gave to Isaac and it was negative. We deliberated with everyone and decided we would put Isaac down to nap hidden away while we ate and then keep him outside after he woke up. 

I am so glad we got to go to the feast! We made sweet and savory stuffing, cookie salad, and surprise rolls. The Allens, Fosters, and the other Bloods all brought food too, and it was ever so delicous. We took home enough leftovers to eat for two days.

We had to whip out Tetris skills to get everything to fit on the counter 

The kids table

The Thanksgiving unicorn consents to pause her play long enough to consume at least a little bit of pretzel salad (for the record, there was one actual salad to balance the cookie and pretzel salads)

After dinner we cleaned up and then played most of a game of Acquire. We posted that anyone who wanted to could meet us at the park at 4 to share pie and play soccer. We ended up being half an hour late to our own party, but that was ok because the only other family to show up was even later than us. We ate pie, chatted, and then played some soccer. The soccer game ended when Aaron kicked the ball directly into Eowyn's face, completely knocking her on her back. Whoops. 

Thanksgiving sunset

A year or so ago, Aaron and I had a conversation about how we worried that our life was on autopilot. The big decisions of life had mostly been made, and Aaron especially felt like he wasn't being challenged very much. We had watched friend after friend move away, and in the back of our minds we thought that we would end up moving on to something else eventually. We thought maybe the time for that was getting close. The picture changed when Stephen moved here- no way were we going to leave our beloved Sahuarita now that we had family right around the corner! Aaron's job change was the perfect solution to our autopilot angst. Our life might not look that different from the outside, but it feels like we took charge of things. Aaron really put himself out there and worked his butt off to get a job that is a much better fit than what he had before. We had the opportunity to move but deliberately decided we wanted to stay here. We aren't here by default anymore - we are here by choice and digging in our roots. Add a bishopric calling in there, and we are definitely not on autopilot anymore!

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