trypto-fan

heather cleaned out my car. she vacuumed it and it hasn't been vacuumed in over a year. sopped up the stinky water in my tire well. she dusted the dashboard. what a nice thing to do. i actually didn't notice until this morning when i was leaving for work. i got in the car and something looked different. it was the floors. i could see the carpet and the carpet was clean.

thanksgiving day started early for us. we had to be at the church by 10am so we could have some family togetherness before the dinner. when me and bethany and mom arrived, katie and brent were the only other ones there. i quickly assertained that mom's real reason for having us there so early was to have helpers handy.

bethany and i were given the job of setting up the tables. if we had to set up the tables, we may as well do a good job we decided seperately and at the same time. so we had the four tables in an open ended square. a 'U" if you will and then the accent table in the mouth of the 'U'. and the plastic table cloths mom got for the family reunion? well they just so happened to be fall themed. the two leaf patterned ones, we put on the end tables. the middle tables had the mustard yellow and the accent table was burnt red. we decided to gather fall leaves for centre pieces. we each brought a paper plate and gathered the perfect maple leaves. every leaf was perfect to me. "look at this one!" was most of our conversation. eventually we had to make ourselves stop. we took them back in and blotted them with paper towel. natalie and madelaine joined us at this point. we placed them artistically in shallow bowls, two per table.

we ate around twelve thirty. lotsa good foods. i enjoyed bren'ts stuffing. he puts cranberries in it. he did that once a long time ago. way back years and years ago on fatima's last clarke family event when mom and dad weren't there for thanksgiving. ever since then i've looked forward to brent's stuffing. but we both don't remember anything but the cranberries. still, the cranberries make a big difference. sarah made the shweetpataytuhs. we had a hanging up war centering on the shweetpahtaytuhs on the way the church. i won. mom said i was a bully because i always had to win. andrea made a bunch of ultra homemade, ultra yummy pies. i had the pumpkin. it was delishus.

after dinner people lazed about and did different things. me and sarah and katie joined bethany who was laying on the couch in the foyer. some of the boys played soccer, during which game kyle sneekily pushed adrial out the doors with a basket ball. hurt the boy's feelin's too. eventually we fought off the tryptophan and went outside and played bocci. me and katie and sarah against mom and dad. the grass was super thick and very wet which irked dad a lot, especially because they were losing. mom's style of throwing was also irking dad and dad's irkedness was irking mom. there was a rough spot when dad almost left the game but we got through it. he and mom won the next game which helped things out considerably. bethany joined us then. it was the daughters against the parents. bethany was apt to do things like roll a wide ball, then run out to it and roll it towards the palino again looking hopefully at us. completely trusting that the youngest child act would get her through this cheating stint. then looking mutely downcast as we all yell out chastisment at her, and reluctantly put the palino back to where it was before she bopped it with her ball. slump dejectedly against the trunk of the maple tree and say "i can't do anything right" oh and her ball! she had to have the same ball every time. she would snatch it away from anyone else who happened to pick it up. katie liked to wham bam the ball. sarah dead armed it and i often used the snake in the grass technique.

when bocci was over it was basically time to go. dad went to visit martha in the hospital (i took her there on saturday night and we spent almost 5 hours there until they got her a bed. we were just so thankful they let her stay. she really wanted to.) mom and bethany and i drove home and i finished packing, bethany talked to ben (we decided that when they get married they don't need two b's. like b&b. just one b will suffice. i mean for all you know it could be two b's on top of each other. who knows how many layers of b is in one 'b'. anyways did you know b will be the third couple like that there's d and e also. the thing is, i lost my conference notes. they were no where to be seen and no where near where i left them. i think amy's to blame. amy and andreas left early which made us sad. i was hoping we could work on the family story we started in the summer. their leaving had something vaguely to do about dogs. questionable.

sunday night we had a steak dinner for ben, but ben was out on a walk with bethany during most of the dinner. brother shoults (i don't know how you spell it. it's weird) paid for it and dad made it. dad sure knows how to make a good steak. then everyone came over for birthday cake for eryn. blueberry coffee cake made by bethany. yum to the tum. then we played games. we played signs and even rhiannon played. her sign was touching her watch. one time we had two signs going at once. that was confusing but typical. dave shoults' sign was sticking his finger in his nose which totally grossed out his wife. she couldn't look at him. my sign was the blow fish cheeks. we started playing cranium but it didn't last for very long. then a marathon game of mafia. i quit during the mafia game and talked to david. mafia was never my favourite game. but they had lots of fun.

sarah cut my hair! it's good except for the two floof logs on each side. that may have to do with me not using gel however. so we'll see. we'll see.

and now i'm done.