Happy Thanksgiving - Florida Style

***Warning Photo Overload***

We've spent Thanksgiving in Florida the past 4 years, but this year was different because Luke's entire family didn't come down.  It was just us and his Mom but we still had a blast and enjoyed getting some sun for a few days.  

We started our morning with a family tradition, the Turkey Trot.  I usually have a handful of runners with me but this year I would have been alone so I convinced Dylan to run his first 5k.  I didn't really tell him how far a 5k was, but told him he'd get a cool medal if he did it! :)  He nervously agreed and we were off, I wasn't letting him back out.  He did amazing, ran the first mile without stopping, walked/ran the rest but finished in an impressive 48 minutes.  I was impressed for a 5 year old, his legs are little.  I'm pretty sure he never wants to run a marathon though, he kept saying, "3 miles is a long way"! 

I was SUPER proud!  We made it back in time for the 100 meter dash, which he apparently wasn't too tired to run.  So Will, Lauren and Dylan ran the 100 meter dash, a great start to our Thanksgiving day! 

Kim and Luke were in charge of our Thanksgiving meal, so I decided to get the kids out of their hair and take them down to the beach.  It was a "cool" 70 degrees but that didn't stop these kids. 

 I'm not sure what this means, but this is their new pose when I ask them to get together for a photo?

 My babies! 

 beach games

 a little chilly when you come out of the water

 they love making sand castles and built an entire city

 more poses on the beach

And naturally after the beach, you have to swim to wash that sand off your body.  So they headed into the "pool" at Grandma's house. 

 The boys were little fish this trip, seriously their swimming has improved drastically over the past year.  

 Lauren on the other hand, is 100% dependent on her floaties but "thinks" she can swim.  She decided to jump in one morning (without her floaties) because "she can swim", as she kept telling Mommy and Daddy.  Fortunately, Daddy was standing right there and fished her off the bottom of the pool.  

We'll definitely need to work on really swimming this summer....

 she does LOVE the water though

 and this was a common occurrence, swimming in underwear??

races

After swimming and naps, it was dinner time!  Since we're in Florida, we might as well eat outside.

Turkey drumsticks for the kids!

Dinner was fabulous!  The kids all told us the #1 thing they are thankful for:

Dylan - "money"

Will - "toys"

Lauren - "money and toys" (she just copied her brothers)

Then I asked them to tell me the #1 person they are thankful for:

Dylan - "Isabel" (his "girl" friend at school)

Will - "Mommy"

Lauren - "Will, Mommy, Dylan, Grandma and Daddy...that's it" (apparently it's out of sight, out of mind for this girl!) 

We have so many blessings to be thankful for this year!