HAPPY KIDS = HAPPY MOM

Austin arrives with laundry -- no time to go to the laundromat before they leave on their big adventure!

What a wonderful Thanksgiving we had this year! Our kiddos each brought their Hunnies this time, and were all atwitter thanks to three of them having newish jobs in their fields of choice, which they are very excited about, and because dear Areej should be heading off to grad school before long, after teaching High School chemistry for three years. She would love to do research into drug-resistant bacteria and cool stuff like that! As if that weren't enough, the two couples are each moving into new digs that they are very, very excited about. Bestest of all? All four would be heading off to Orlando together the very next day, for a long-anticipated visit to Universal Studios and Harry Potter World!

Nothing makes a mom's heart overflow like seeing her kiddos so happy! Well, except maybe for getting to keep her favorite grandpuppy Guinness, while her parents are off on their big adventure...

and knowing that both of her kiddos' partners come from a warm, loving family, have a lot of respect for their parents (one set of which were able to join us), and are quite fond of their siblings -- a bit of a rarity these days!

The icing on the cake was that our BFF's Paula and Tim, who are the most generous, flexible parents-in-law I've ever seen -- always willing to postpone their own small-family celebrations so that they don't interfere with their daughter-in-law's much larger ones that involve a huge extended family -- were free to join us as well! Plus, all my guests brought so much food, the only thing I had to cook was my easy-peasy but oh-so-delicious chili-rubbed pork tenderloins with garlic-cranberry sauce (using a couple of yummy tenderloins from locally raised, happy-happy pigs) -- my easiest Thanksgiving in years!

P.S. The kids only arrived in Orlando late last night, but they must have been up and at 'em at the crack of dawn, for we've already received the first round of photos! I'm guessing Night Owl Nate never bothered to go to bed at all. Unfortunately, I tried to snatch a few of the Harry Potter World photos to share with you here, and they came up as "unallowable". Sorry!