Thanksgiving recap

Hey yinz!!

I hope everyone had a phenomenal Thanksgiving. 

This post just shows you how behind the times I am that my Thanksgiving post is at least two weeks late… Lol! But I guess it is massive progress that I’m posting at least monthly now. Ha!

I just finished ALL my finals for this semester of nursing school! I finished this semester with 2 A’s and a B.  One more year left and then I am a nurse!!

Here is the picture of my clinical group on our last day of Hospital Clinical. Our instructor is on the end on the right and I am three from the right! I scribbled our badges and school identifiers so apologies for that. I got so lucky - it was such an amazing group of women and we all jumped in and helped each other soo much!!

Thanksgiving was spent the traditional way for my family… Good food, laughter and a wonderful time spent together. We did our usual cookie baking fiasco and as usual it was great! Here are a bunch of photos from the long weekend.

Below is my my brother in laws mom and step-father, my parents, my brother in law and sister and their children and grandchild (minus her older daughter who was working this day). The little tot in the picture is my first great-niece, Leighton! We all love her soo much!!

This is my sister and brother in law with their first grandchild. Soo adorable, right??


This is an impromptu pic of the beginning of cookie baking. Those are both of my sisters and my dad.


This is our side of the family. We do two dinners and this was the second one. This is my sister and brother-in-law their children, grandchild, and one of the kids girlfriend. Also, my other sister and brother in law and their kids. The kids are all so grown up! If you have followed my blog for a while you will probably be amazed… Three of the children in this picture are those three little tiny kids that I played in the lake with for so many years. They’re all grown up now.

Many evenings we have game time. It’s a great time for everyone to just laugh and decompress. I can’t even tell you the numbers of different games we played this year.


More candid baking photos…


The kids and I fought over who got to hang out with this little cutie. She was definitely the hit of the weekend. She’s so much fun to be around and all the kids took turns watching her while we baked.


Sugar cookies…


Candy cane rolling…the worst cookie job that excreting hates-ha!!


A little relaxation - football and screen time!!


Snuggles between batches!!!


My adorable niece entertained us all with her guitar playing throughout the weekend!! Love listening to her play!


My sister started selling Beauty Counter products so of course we all had to mask up and rejuvenate Our skin in the evenings.  If you need a product hookup, let me know. I’ll get you her information!

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving and I hope everyone is happy, safe and well!!!

Thank you all of you for all your words of support!

Love you guys - so many hugs to everyone!! 

Wolfe's 2018 Annual Cookie Baking

After our two Thanksgivings, you can read about them here, my family has a tradition of spending the rest of that weekend baking cookies! And by cookies - I mean COOKIES!!!! We even have matching aprons we made for everyone! Be prepared for a VERY photo heavy post!!!!

Here is a play by play of Friday night, Saturday and Sunday...

It started out with my niece and I unwrapping the candies that will be used on the cookies. Usually all my nieces and nephews do this but a few of them went to the Penn State game and one niece did not feel well so it defaulted to me and Maddy!

This is my little sister and niece mixing some dough! The kids love to help so much! I think they like this as much as we all do!

My tw0 adorable nephews pushing the peanut butter cups into the baked dough.

My sister-in-law and myself for a selfie!

Mom counting the completed batches.

My oldest niece keeping the little ones occupied during their break by playing Polly pockets. The little kids love the baking but they have a short attention span and need frequent breaks - LOL!!

Here is the break room - HA!!! The boys watching football no doubt!!!

See them all - lots of testosterone in that room!

Two nieces working on the cutout cookies. We bake these and then let the kids decorate them every year.

Another break - I think this one is the Game of Life break.

Here is my darling niece Jess.  She recently graduated and has just started teaching at a school near my sisters house so she moved back home.  To her right is her new baby Max...she is a super cute cat mom and is great to her baby!

This is a close up of her baby Max...

Another round of the Game of Life anyone?!?!

My niece Jordan was hilarious this year! Not only did she participate this year with baking, playing with her younger cousins, etc. but everyday she came up with a new outfit for the day! This one was great! She is a cat mom too to a cute little fur ball names Penelope. This sweater actually lit up!!!!!! Awesome!!

This is a cute out that my sister-in-law found on Facebook! Sadly, it is a deer that has been shot. My brother-in-law hunts so it was perfect for him to take up to his deer camp. LOL! I was not in the spirit of love so we only made three - HA!

This is about halfway thorough the baking...

Cute picture of cousins working together to mic batter...

And my littler sister and nephew twisting candy canes...this is a horrible job and we give it to my sister every year - HA!

My niece was counting cookies in this photo-see her way back there with her paper. We add up the numbers we do every year...

My sister makes homemade applesauce and she wanted to defrost some for dinner Saturday night to eat with pizza. She put it outside to defrost. Then it started pouring down raining outside and my Mom put on all her raingear to go out and retrieve it...LOL! I just love this picture...my mother will kill me if she ever sees it on here! LOL!

This is my brother and sister making Santa's out of Nutter Butter's. He is an engineer and she thinks like one so these are the most precise and perfect cookies you will ever see...seriously! They turned out super cute!

Everyone chilling and taking breaks on electronics.

Same here....

This is the finished table!!!! What a productive weekend! We finished on Saturday night around dinner time. We did not set a family record this year as we dropped a few kinds that we have made before but we finished all of our holiday baking. Total cookie count was 2,133 cookies; 173 dozen; 16 varieties!!!

On Sunday the family separates the cookies and everyone heads home. We split them up in zip-locks and everyone takes home a ton of cookies they can then use for cookie trays at parties and gifts! Holiday baking is completed for everyone! Note: everyone in their Steelers gear for the game!!!!

 

If you live nearby and we are friends; be prepared for your tray of cookies!!!!

 

I love my family and I love all the time we spend together! Do not be deceived; we get on each others nerves but there is nothing better then family! I think we only about 20 minor spats throughout the weekend which is pretty good for all those people under one roof!!! There is no one that can push my buttons more then my siblings! LOL!!!!

 

I hope you all had an amazing holiday!!!!

 

Do you bake for the holidays? Do you have any family traditions you follow every year? Do you enjoy spending the holidays alone or in chaos?

 

 

Love the Holidays!!

Spent the holiday weekend with the family in Harrisburg eating (thanks to Kerry and her AMAZING Thanksgiving meal and everyone elses contributions) and cookie baking. It was great!!! As always, we had sooo much fun and THEY got sooo much baking done!!! As for me, I am officially hooked on the Guitar Hero video game and the Wii Fit....at first I sucked really bad at Guitar Hero and then started getting good. I think I missed my calling - too bad I do not own one so I can practice at home!!! It's probably for the better that I do not purchase one also or I think I may never leave home - LOL.
Matt and Dan went hunting for deer - I have not gotten a report yet but as soon as I hear if they got one I will post it...ickky ickky but they enjoy it and from what I hear it needs to happen.
Wally was sick all weekend - I felt bad. Of course, I initially thought he was faking it (stage fright with having to spend the entire weekend with people he had not met yet) but I have come to decide that the poor man really was soooooo sick....I think he ate for the first time in four days last night. I am soooooooo glad he is feeling better!
Oh, and I officially joined my new gym and I am more motivated than before to get hotter if that is even possible (meaning if it is possible that I could be more motivated not that I could be more hot-that is not possible, ha ha). I will let you know, but sooo far I am loving my new gym Complete Fitness after one days workout!
Have a great Tuesday!!!!!!!!