Thankful.

We had the pleasure of hosting Thanksgiving this year, 13 of the Kriege/Jeffers clan came together in our duplex!  We tried out some new recipes this year....some were better then others ;) but oddly enough we had sooo much food that in the middle of the meal we noticed that we didn't have Julie's 3 salads she brought!?!  Here's our sign--so much food you don't know when you are missing some!?!  WOW!

Every Thanksgiving in the afternoon, we bust out National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation--this year marked the 11th year of this ongoing tradition!  I love the laughs and the reciting of everyone's favorite parts :) 


This year Josh drew a  family tree and each of us put our thumb print on it, a neat visual of our family tree--we gave it to Mom as a keepsake of this day!

We then went around the table at lunch time and all said what we were thankful for--it's neat to hear the little ones say what they give thanks for :)

Black Friday is also one of our yearly traditions---we have so many fun memories of this day!  From the time in Grand Forks we thought we were going to get beat up as the crowd behind us was pushing us into the crowd waiting up front....to getting matching socks for our shopping extravaganza!  The hustle and bustle and waiting in suuuuupppper long lines is a fun tradition for us girls!!  It's always fun to get home and see all of the neat steal of deals you got for your family that morning...or night ;)

When we were done shopping Thursday night/Friday morning--Zachary got to go in for some allergy testing!  He has had allergy testing done before back in 2009 and it came up that he was allergic to quite a few foods including peanuts, cashews, eggs, and some fish, we were just curious to see if his allergies had gotten any worse or if any have gone away!

So they poked him 38 times with various allergens--they did cats, trees, molds, trees, grass, and foods.

You can see the ones starting to swell, I think the big ones on this side were the grass and trees mix.

And this was the aftermath--eggs, peanuts, cashews, mold, trees, cat, and grass mix.....the doc laughed and said, well winter is going to be about his best season!  He was such a trooper though and we are just thankful we have an understanding and have it under control!

This year we have so much to be thankful for...family, friends, and our health!  We are so looking forward to this Christmas season as well...this year will be the first year that all of our kids will wake up in their own beds to their own Christmas tree on Christmas morning!!  I've pinned about 20 things on pinterest that I can't wait to do with our little family, more to come on that in a later blog :)  Happy Holidays from our house to yours!!

Time to play a little catch up.....

So again it has been almost 2 months since my last post...lame sauce!  Where oh where does the time go!?! 



 Anna Marie had a big day that I missed blogging about, so without further or do....Happy 11th Birthday Miss Anna Banana....here is your story :)

Josh and I were youngins(19) when we found out we were expecting our peanut!  She was born on a freezing cold October 8th day in Grand Forks....we found out she was a girl at our 20 week ultra sound and she had a dresser full of pink dresses, pink blankets, and pink outfits the very next week!  Good thing you didn't surprise us by being a boy Anna, cause you would have been a very oddly dressed one ;)  My blood pressure was high with this pregnancy as well--but our delivery was perfect!  We had company the night before--Kristy and Tyson had been up to our (tiny GF) place to watch the NDSU and UND football game, so we were up later then normal....and by normal I mean I was up past 9pm :) Josh and I climbed into bed and I was just about asleep at midnight when my water broke!!  So up and off to the hospital we went!  Josh called everyone in his phone and ran around our tiny appartment in classic nervous Dad form....we got to the hospital and our friend Danny from Fargo nearly beat us there :)  It was so neat to have our two very close friends there for this special event---especially since our family lived so very far away!  Some pain and pushes later and Anna Marie made her big debute at 5:27am.  She was 7lbs 8oz and 20 in long--perfect :)
We love watching the video of Anna coming home as by this time most of our family was there and we looked like quite the caravan of people leaving hospital, for those of you who know how tiny our first appartment was on campus---it was a cozy homecoming!

Anna was a great baby--she did have a lot of ear infections and was the only kiddo of ours that ended up getting tubes at 18 months.  She was walking by her first birthday and her first word was Hello!  I was lucky enough to be able to spend Anna's first full year at home with her before I gave UND a go and when we did finally send her to daycare, we found the most wonderful home daycare in the world, a Mom and Daughter team up in GF who I still keep in contact with to this day! 

Anna LOVED and still to this day LOVES animals!  We ask her what she would like to be when she grows up and it's a Vet...or a singer...she does have a beautiful voice :)

Anna is our classic first born, she is smart and sensitive---she is a people pleaser and tends to wear her giant heart on her sleave!  She is thoughtful and loves school.  Her smile is contagious and the world is a better place because she is in it!  We love you so much Anna Banana!  Happy Happy 11th year of life!!