Thanksgiving 2011

This year we were able to spend Thanksgiving with Michael's family. We all went to Salt Lake City to enjoy the luxury of Christopher and Laura's very nicely sized home... Oh one day I'll have a house like that... For the record, I really really like their house, even if it is in the city. It was a bit difficult to get the time off of work to make the trip though. At the clinic I work at there is one receptionist, 3 vet techs, a groomer, and the veterinarian. On our busy days, Monday and Friday, we have to have 3 people there and the vet (4 total). The receptionist works Monday - Friday but has Wednesday off. I work Monday and Friday mornings and all day Wednesday. Another girl works Monday, Wed, Fri afternoons and all day Tuesday & Thursday. A different girl works all day Monday and Friday and mornings Wednesday. Confusing, right? Pretty much nobody works full time (so none of us get benefits) and there are only just enough of us to work exactly the amount of shifts that need to be covered. This means getting time off sucks. The clinic was closed Thursday and the vet had to get his knee scoped to see if his meniscus was torn (it was and he got the torn ligaments removed and is fine now). So all of us got Thanksgiving off, but just one day for the holiday kinda sucks. One girl has Wednesdays off as part of her schedule already, so she was covered. Since the vet had his knee scoped, Friday was going to be a light day and we only needed 2 people to work. We really only needed one person to work, and the vet of course, but somebody wasn't ok with cleaning all the kennels by themselves... So that gave another person 2 days off. Now there's just me and someone else. I agreed to work all day Friday so that gave the girl that works afternoons that day 2 days off. Now there's just me. Originally I wanted Friday off, but since I had to work 8-12 Saturday it didn't make much sense. Instead I opted to have someone cover my shift Wednesday. That worked out nicely. Michael rearranged his schedule to get off in the afternoon Tuesday so we could leave right after. Then I'm not sure if someone forgot they were working for me or if they just wanted to have an extra day off, but I got asked if I could work Wednesday... What am I supposed to say? No? Pretty sure that's not really an option. I like my job and would like to stay there as long as we're in Rexburg. So I said if I absolutely have to, then I reminded them of the arrangement we had made prior. So I ended up waiting until Tuesday at noon to see if I needed to work Wednesday. And I didn't, yay! We were the first ones to arrive at Chris and Laura's for the holiday celebration, but I can't say we were all too entertaining. The drive was long and sleeping hasn't been very rewarding lately. But it was nice to hang out a bit before everyone else got there. We did make sure to stop at In-N-Out on the way down. :] Wednesday (how dumb of a spelling is that?) Michael sold the PS3 and brought back Carl's Jr. strawberry biscuits. Love it! We hung out for a while and finally convinced Chris to get off work early, thanks Chris! It just wouldn't be the same hanging out with Laura if she couldn't enjoy the company of her husband! Then we went to Chick-fil-a, cuz it's awesome! Man, it's a good thing we don't live in Salt Lake, we'd be broke and super fat from all the restaurants we don't have here. We had the worst timing ever with going there though. Seems like everyone in town wanted Chick-fil-a at the same time and there were tons of people there. We actually had to hover around someone's table as they were leaving so we could sit there. Then as we were leaving an hour later, there was like no one there. Dumb. But the food was amazing as usual.

Ivan was more than happy to sneak us in a drink. And he slept the whole time. Don't be fooled by his eyes being open, he's good at that, fooling people that is.

Ben was more than content to just hang out on the bench for a little bit while Jane and Megan played.

After that we took a trip to Provo and visited Michael's Wampler grandparents. They are awesome. Chris and Laura came too. Before we got to their house though, we stopped off at Michael's aunt's house. It's only about 5 minutes away from our original destination anyway. It was good to visit them and let everyone meet Ivan. Plus Ivan got to meet a dog up close and personal for the first time. I can tell he loves animals already! Well, maybe he's just too flaccid to be able to react too much to anything we put in his face.... We'll see. Then we enjoyed the Golden Corral with Chris, Laura, Jane, Megan, Ben, Ivan, me, Michael, and Michael's grandparents. I'm pretty darn excited that Ivan gets to know his great grandparents so well at such a young age and having them there is so fun!

Here's the Wampler Great-Grandparents, and Chris and Jane in the background :]

After this we were planning on going to Cabela's, cuz there isn't one here. We enjoy seeing all the taxidermy and just drooling over all the things we would like to have someday. Like a good tent, good boots, and guns. Someday. We had forgotten one thing. We were an hour away from Chris and Laura's and the rest of Michael's family was arriving that day. Brenda is living in Salt Lake, with Laura, and is currently doing a clinical/ internship type thing. She's all smart and stuff and is practically a physical therapist already. It was the evening already, hence eating dinner, and Brenda wanted to spend time with us. So Chris and Michael went to Cabela's and Laura and I went home with the kids. By the time we got back Brenda had left, which is understandable, why wait around for us when you could be doing other fun things. It was good though, I got to spend some quality time with Jane and Megan. They are so funny! I would share a story, but it's really not appropriate, that's how funny it is! We stayed up late talking and having fun, then we went to our hotel. We stayed at a Marriott downtown for 20 bucks! It was nice to watch some tv. I have to say since we don't have cable at home, anytime I get closed to a tv with cable I'm sucked in. And Michael enjoyed the hot tub Thursday morning. On Turkey day, we ate, watched the Curious George movies, had lots of desserts, played games, and had loads of fun! The babies were good for us most of the time. Ivan wanted to be held while we were eating lunch, so he slept in my lap while we ate. After dessert, Jane and Megan wanted to play a game. Jane (who is almost 4) told Megan (who is 2) that she couldn't play because she had a silly face. Megan had eaten a slice of chocolate pudding pie and left some on her face for later. Jane told Megan to lick it off her face and showed her how. Megan couldn't quite get it, so Jane tried to lick it of off Megan's face for her! It's much funnier if I tell you in person. I'm always interested in what kind of personality Ben will have since Jane and Megan are just so colorful. Gotta love 'em.

The cause of Michael's wrist pain?

I love playing games! Especially the Bean Game, my favorite. 

My favorite people, I am such a lucky girl.

Since I had to work on Friday, we needed to leave that night and head back home. Before we could do that, we needed to go black Friday shopping. Toys-R-Us opened at 9. We got there at about 8:40, waited in line half a mile from the door, and were in the store by 9:20. Not too shabby. Then we realized the baby stuff didn't go on half off sale til 5 am. Lame. So we left, all we wanted from there was a jumparoo for Ivan. We immediately went to WalMart. Conveniently enough we got there right at 10, which is when most of the things went on sale. They put the movies at the front of the store, and we really like movies. I just so happen to be small enough to slip through people and weasel my way in to small places. I was able to get to the front and get some pretty sweet movies. We got 8 movies for 25 bucks brand new. We picked up a present for Jane, a safe, and 26 piece tupperware set. We left there at about 11:30. Not bad! We knew exactly what we wanted and spent the majority of our time at the store waiting in the check out line. We are definitely grateful that people were fairly nice and that we didn't have to bring Ivan with us. And that was it. I went back to work Friday and got to decorate the lobby for Christmas and we set up our tree on Sunday. Yesterday was my brother's birthday, shout out to him and his awesome beard.

Ivan's preferred sleeping spot.

Yep, his pants are on his head. This way you don't lose them or get them dirty. Everyone's doing it. 

Aw, our cute little family.

In other news, we recently discovered that Ivan is destined to work on computers... the I.T. man. He is also cousin IT to Jane, Megan, Ben, Paul Jr, Ryan, and Emma. (cuz his name is Ivan Tyler)