thanksgiving pictures

My mom is home from the hospital. She seems to be doing alright - much better than last week, anyway. I'm still staying on edge, though, just in case I need to take an emergency trip to Utah. This week I have been scrambling around, trying to get on top of everything. I've been prepping like mad for my upcoming class (which starts a month!), completing university orientation/training sessions, reading through my stack of library books, doing Christmas shopping, etc.

Posting some Thanksgiving pictures is also on my to-do list. We didn't take a lot of pictures during this trip (we kept busy doing other stuff), but enjoy what paucity I have:

Sam got to see all of his surviving great-grandparents on this trip. We didn't get pictures with all of them, but we did get some. These are my grandparents on Thanksgiving Day; the photo was taken in my other grandparents' home.

Visiting the Grandpaxes with N (who took this picture), SJ, and Little N

Sam loved to brush L's hair

This week has been a little like Christmas at our house. My friend gave me a huge bin full of toys that she doesn't need anymore - and these aren't just any toys, but really nice, expensive toys. Ironically, four of the toys were ones that we were going to give Sam as Christmas presents. Anyhow, Sam is in heaven. I've actually taken some of the toys and hidden them for Christmas (he won't care that they're used, right?), but he's been playing with a lot of them. He especially loves the little John Deere tractor, which is infinitely cooler than his bike because it has a steering wheel. It took him less than a day to learn the word "tractor."

Pleased as punch