Thanksgiving Adventure

Every Thanksgiving since the dawn of time, our family has had our turkey dinner, cleaned up and then gone for a long drive out into the countryside. As kids we would stop along the creek and stretch our legs and play on the rocks. Year after year we would try to leave something different, pile up a bunch of rocks in the creek, carve our names in a tree, to leave a reminder we were there, and then next year we would look for it, but never find it. 11 years ago I had the bright idea of hiding a bottle somewhere. We put a note inside talking about our tradition and what had happend that year in our lives. Year after year Mom & Dad have returned, with as many of us as were able, to find the bottle and add that years update.
Here Kaitlyn, Grampy and Great Grampy stop for a rest before we head out on our adventure to find out bottle and see if it has survived another year.

I love this picture of Dad & Kaitlyn. It is so nice.

As part of the tradition, we all gather before we go down to the river and read the years updates. Because every year we wonder whether the bottle will survive another Mom comes prepared with another copy of all that we have, and another bottle to replace it if it is broken. Here we are reading the old, and creating the new before we go to our secret spot. It is Nanny & Grampy's first year joining us and we were all thrilled to have them. The rule is you have to be born or married into the family to join this tradition-- exclusivly Carson, no boyfriends, friends etc. They can join us for dinner but they have to stay up at the house while we go on the Thanksgiving Adventure. But since Nanny & Grampy started us out by giving birth to Mom ;) we thought it appropriate they come along. They were excited as well!

Got to love this picture of Angela and Kaitlyn. They are such a cute couple the two of them. Pees in a pod!

I insisted we get our family picture taken down by the river. The day was so beautiful and the colours gorgeous. Unfortunatly for this picture, the sun was also very bright, casting shadows and shining into our squinting eyes. Oh well, it's still a nice picture.