Thanksgiving Weekend

It was great to have Thursday and Friday off this week. Since our lease is up mid December, this weekend we spent a great deal of time looking for and at apartments. Today we found one that we would love to move into. We're filling out the applications now and Lord willing we will have a new place to live! It's a cute little unit, on a lot with only 2 other residences. I was happy it has a refrigerator and laundry!!! (Believe it or not, these features are not always the norm is southern CA.) It's actually only a few streets down from where our current place is, and we really like the area.

On Saturday I continued our thanksgiving tradition by making my grandma's Turkey Soup!!! (It's my favorite soup!) In addition to apartment hunting, we went to the movies. We saw "Bolt" in 3D. It was a great movie and we got to wear nifty glasses!

Feeling Thankful

Thanksgiving was very different this year, as James and I celebrated in CA. We celebrated in our own little way by giving thanks to the Lord for all he has blessed us with this past year. We have so much to be thankful for! James invited some friends from work over to celebrate with us. It was a fun night filled with food, drinks, guitar & harmonica jamming, and of course our favorite...games!

It was also a first for me to cook the whole meal from start to finish by myself. In the past I've often had a lot of help from my mom, she really is a good cook! I also had a lot of great family recipes to assist me. I began the preparations the night before by getting the mashed potato bake ready, and baking the sweet potato pie. The next morning I woke up bright and early to begin the cook off. I began the morning with homemade pie dough, and ended the day with gravy. It was a full day of cooking... but well worth it. Everything turned out great and the best part... no smoke alarm this year! :)

(For those who are actually interested) Here was the Kanka Thanksgiving Menu:
- Turkey
- Nicole's Mashed Potatoes w/ a pinch of Garlic
- Carrots
- Green Beans
- Stuffing
- Candied Yams
- Gravy
- Biscuits
- Sweet Potato Pie
- Whipped Cream
- Apple Pie
- Vanilla Ice Cream

We hope all our friends and family who are far away had a great thanksgiving, you were in our hearts and thoughts. Love you all! Here are a few pictures from our Thanksgiving :)

Lake House Visit October 08

Better late than never.... In October James and I went to MI for my cousin's wedding and then headed up north to Gaylord, MI to spend time with my family at my brother and sister-in-laws lake house. It was beautiful as the trees were all in color. I can't wait to go back. Here are just a few of my favorites....

From Oct. 08 Lake House Visit

This Weekend

This weekend James and I spent apartment hunting. To be honest it was not very fun. Most of the rentals in southern CA are small privately owned complexes. So we were driving around looking for signs, calling the numbers, and using our GPS the whole time I felt car sick. It was the same feeling you get when you read too long in the car or if you are riding down really curvy roads. We have a lot more looking to do. I must admit I am getting a little nervous, given our lack of time for looking and the price range we are looking for. I really want to be happy with whatever we decide upon. If anyone has any suggestions of where to check out please let us know.

Also this weekend there were major fires in the surrounding LA area. The sky was hazy and the smell of smoke was evident in many areas. Luckily in Burbank there was no danger or smokey smells. Last night we had plans to visit our friends Joel and Amy to hang out in Fullerton. The fires were in a nearby city. Though logic would say not to drive towards the fires, of course we did the opposite. There was no danger by Joel and Amy's place or in their city but the smell of smoke was everywhere. Looking out their windows you could barely see some of the fire on top of the mountains 8 or so miles away. So we went to see the new James Bond movie and had yogurt at yogurt land. By the end of the night ash white ash was falling like a very light snowy mist. It's sad when you think about the ash being some one's memories or home. I wish we would have brought our camera to capture some pictures. But Amy and Joel have posted some of theirs here from earlier in the day. I am so thankful for all of the firefighters in CA who yearly fight these major fires. It makes you think......

Tuning Out & Turning Off

Have you ever been so incredibly busy that you just want to turn off? When you don't have much time sometimes even the smallest thing can seem like a huge time zapper... and you decide to tune out. Well unfortunately that was me recently. October came and went in a rush. Everything went so quickly. There were things that I didn't have time to do, and things I should have done....maybe, if I had had the time to do them. As you can image updating my blog was very low on the ladder...along with updating my pictures.

Well, since my last post my cousin got married. My family and I spent the rest of the week at my brother's beautiful lake house in Gaylord, MI. It was gorgeous with the trees all turning colors and fun to hang out in each other's company. Then it was back to the mad rush of things to do here in LA. Halloween was of course nothing less than I would expect in Hollywood. The election came and went and the buzz was so neat!

Now that I feel like I'm back in the game I'm debating... do I want to edit my pictures......nah! Too much to finish in one night. Maybe it will be my weekend project? We'll see how it goes. On a side note the other day as I was turning onto our road I passed the Dunder Mifflin, Inc. truck from the office! They must have been driving back from a shoot. Kind of cool!