Thanksgiving In Nauvoo

For Thanksgiving this year we we met up with two of our dearest graduate school family friends from Indiana in Nauvoo.  Miraculously none of us had plans to travel for the holiday, so we decided to rent a big house and spend the weekend together.  And it was fabulous!  We did a ton of planning and preparing ahead of time, so Thanksgiving Day was actually quite restful, food-wise.  And there was always plenty of food to choose from.  We had two turkeys, 8 or 9 dozen rolls, 7 pies, and as many variations on fruit, veggie and green salads you could think of, and the leftovers were awesome.

We shared our chocolate Thanksgiving turkey tradition with everyone, which kicked the day of feasting off right.  

Later in the morning the Davis's shared one of their Thanksgiving Day traditions with everyone- making turkey cookies!  The dads enjoyed that just as much as the kids.

There were plenty of games and crafts and friends to go around for the whole weekend, and I honestly don't think I heard a complaint from any one of my kids while we were there.

Rachael summed up our Friday (and the whole trip!) perfectly on her blog.  This is what she said-

On Friday we were pretty low-key. The girls went to the temple together in the morning and the guys went to the temple together in the evening. This was one of my very favorite parts--we sat together in the Celestial Room for about an hour after our session and just had this wonderful heart-to-heart together. It was a really precious time for me and I am so grateful for the opportunity to have had it!

Later that evening we took the kiddos on a walk/snow adventure; they all came back in totally soaked and we made dinner and then thought hmm, we need to occupy them for another hour or so until the daddies are back to help get these 14 kids into pajamas! So when the guys came back we were all in the middle of this very exciting obstacle course that we'd made up on the spot (after a rousing game of animal charades; I think I was a frog at one point) that had elaborate things like, "run across the basement with a pumpkin between your knees." Totally cheesy but the kids LOVED it; we finished up the night with a rhyming-clue scavenger hunt for popcorn and Rolos (thanks to Melanie's quick thinking on writing clues!)

Noah got his own mini-suite in our closet and slept like a pro the entire weekend.  He ate more than his fair share of chocolate and only sobbed the first time a stranger picked him up.  He had a fun time crawling around and eating all of the crumbs the bigger kids left behind.  He didn't mind the chocolate, either.

Emma was her usual charming self and found a happy friend in Kate, a mature but not too cool to play with a three-year-old sweetie that loved being the big sister instead of the usual third.  They are both middle kids and loved having each other to giggle and play with when they couldn't quite keep up with the bigger girls. 

They didn't realize it, but Adam and Isaac picked up right where they left off 18 months ago when we moved from Indiana.  Those boys are two peas in the cutest pod there ever was.  They spent the weekend playing K'nex, Sorry and flying paper airplanes down from the second story landing.  

Leah was really nervous about spending the holiday with virtual strangers (it's so sad that kids forget good friends and memories so quickly!) and she spent most of the trip there worrying about whether the house might be too big or too loud.  She even scouted out an "alone place" that she could retreat to when she wanted to get away from everyone.  That apprehension disappeared early on Thanksgiving morning, and she spent the rest of the weekend having a wonderful time with her two "new" best friends Eva and Juliet.  As soon as we got home she sat down and penned a letter to each of them (which I didn't get the chance to read before she sealed the envelopes) in hopes of maintaining a "long distance" friendship.

The husbands spent most of their time looking like this- 

holding a child and waiting for the wives to wrap up our latest conversation.  Oh, the conversations were so fun.  The men were such sports- all fantastic fun with the kids and so willing to help with the endless supply of dirty dishes and abandoned crafting projects strewn all over the house.  Jason commented to me at one point that he was amazed at just how much cooking and cleaning and cooking and cleaning we were doing.  It just felt like everyday life to me, only far, far better because it was timed shared with other adults.  No text or email or even phone call can replace the joy that comes from face-to-face conversations with dear friends.

We put all 14 of the kids to bed promptly by 8:00 each night, then spent the rest of the evening and into the early hours of the morning talking and laughing, playing games, sipping on mulled cider and eating so much delicious food.  The entire weekend was like a slumber party for the kids and the adults.

After we cleaned up (again!) and packed up on Saturday, we headed down to Old Nauvoo.  It was the first time our family has been there, and it was great to be there with knowledgeable experts.  They led us right to the highlights of the city- the Family Living Center, the bakery, the blacksmith, and the schoolhouse (which we unknowingly broke into, much to the surprise of the sweet elderly volunteers).

And got to take a wagon ride!  

After that we headed back to the temple for some pictures and good-byes.  It was nice to say "see you soon" and know that we really meant it.  Good-byes aren't forever with friends like these!

Our family wanted to go down to the shore of the Mississippi River before we left, and we got there at just the right time.  It was a perfect end to our visit, and very sobering to think of the many hardships that our ancestors faced as pioneers being driven from the beautiful city of Nauvoo into the wild frontier.

But the Lord had very amazing things in store for them, just like He does for all of us.  Moving to Indiana was a very hard thing for our little family to do, and I never would have guessed how blessed our lives would be as a result of it.  One great blessing of it was the friendships we gained while we were there.  Jason and Tyler used to be early-morning racquetball buddies, and he and Neil have a history of pelting small woodland creatures with rocks.  Andrea and I worked together in the Relief Society presidency, and she was my first jogging partner, then later my walking partner when we were both too pregnant to run anymore.  Andrea  and Rachael taught me to not be afraid of yeast.  I still use Andrea's whole wheat bread recipe to this day.  And Rachael has been my go-to inspiration for finding ways to create meaningful relationships with other women.  She and Andrea have blessed my life in so many ways, and we couldn't have asked for a better way to celebrate the holiday of giving thanks than with such great families.