A Cajun Fried Turkey With A Side Of Friends!

Thanksgiving 2011 was a first for Nathan and I. It was our first Thanksgiving without our families. While we missed everyone back in Kentucky terribly we had a wonderful Thanksgiving here in Houston! Our dinner guest list slowly grew over the past few weeks and we ended up getting to spend the day with 13 of our friends! All of our friends brought a dish to share for our Friendsgiving feast. There was plenty of food, laughs, drinks, games and football to make for a very fun, perfect Thanksgiving! 

Nathan and I decided to come up with some superlatives for our guests as a thank you for sharing Thanksgiving with us! 

The Sixth Man aka 3rd Host has to be Pete for helping us get the apartment ready to have everyone over! He was also thrilled to see his Cowboys win! 

MVTC (Most Valuable Turkey Carver) goes to Seto and his amazing turkey carving skills! Don't know what we would have done without him! 

Most Dedicated Baker goes to Dan for making the most delicious homemade rolls I've ever eaten! He went above and beyond his roll duty! 

Most Creative Sweet Potatoes has to go to Scott for his twice baked sweet potatoes complete with peanut butter and marshmallows! I would even go as far to say his may have had the best presentation, I wish I had gotten a picture to share! 

Sweetest Bride to Be goes to Jessi girl! Her new shiny ring is beautiful and I am so glad we got to spend time with her this weekend before she went back to Papua New Guinea. We miss you already Jessi! Can't wait to see you in January. Congrats again to Jessi and Scott on their recent engagement! 

Apples To Apples Queen goes to Miss Beth Feger. Being witty and hilarious is her thing so don't mess with her green cards people! Her apple pie was also delish! 

1st Thanksgiving as Mr. & Mrs. goes to Alison and Luke! So happy we were able to be with them on their first Thanksgiving as Mr. & Mrs. Stephens! Also very proud and excited for Alison and her new job as a nurse practitioner! 

Most Popular Guest goes to Mary and Shamar for bringing sweet baby Kaden! We were so lucky to get to spend his first Thanksgiving with them! 

Favorite Eggrolls this is a big one. Eggrolls have always been a part of my Thanksgiving tradition, just ask my Mom's side of the family. They were one of our must haves every year, but this year Miss Jillian brought us homemade eggrolls from her family! They were absolutely wonderful and reminded me of so many great memories with my cousins at Nana's! 

  

Most Boisterous goes to one of our favorite New Yorkers, Joe! We were so happy to have his booming voice and fun personality to keep our game of Apples to Apples lively! 

We have so much to be thankful for and this Thanksgiving we were particularly thankful for our friends who have made Houston feel like home. Having a house full of friends was a great start to the holidays! Here are a few pictures from our Friendsgiving!

This could be the first time Nathan wore shorts to Thanksgiving! Thankful everyday for my husband! 

Kaden and I, he was the best baby, didn't even cry once!

Our Turkey Carver, Mr. James Seto. Nathan is getting tips for next year!

Alison and Luke, the newlyweds! 

Jill and Beth, two girls I am very thankful for!

Jessi and Scott, we were so happy to spend time with you both!

Mary, Shamar and Kaden celebrating Kaden's first Thanksgiving!

The big kids table!

Guess that makes our table the little kids table!

A Visit from the Whites & Our Family Photos

It has been a busy 2 weeks in our house. Last week we were so happy and excited to have Kevin and Julie visit! We had such a wonderful visit with them. Having visitors is the best, it allows us to play host and hostess and gives us quality time with our visiting family and friends.

Our visit kicked off with a trip to the Houston Zoo where got up close and personal with some Giraffes and got to see some baby elephants playing in their pool! We also go to take Kevin and Julie to some of our favorite restaurants in town. Charlie and Winston loved all of the walks that we went on while showing Kevin and Julie our area and one of our favorite parks!

Nathan and I realize how incredibly blessed we are with family and we value every chance we get to spend time with them. We loved having Kevin and Julie visit and were so sad to see them leave. We cannot wait to see our ENTIRE family in one month!!

To kick off the holiday cheer we have included some of the pictures our friend Julia took for our Christmas card.

Happy Thanksgiving to all of our friends and family! We are so thankful for all of you!!

It's Been a While...

It's been a while since we last posted but we are going to try our best to post more often! It has been a very exciting time in our lives these past few months. Summer came with new friends, many fun trips, lots of pool time, many and our 1 year anniversary! We are very blessed to have found a great group of friends in Houston and Texas is feeling more and more like home.

One major development in our life - we have a new White to introduce to you all! Charlie was adopted July 16th and has been such a fun addition to the family. We had forgotten how tough it is to have a puppy but we love him dearly! Winston loves having a little brother and Charlie follows Winston everywhere.

We have been lucky to see our friends and family recently. Amber came down for a visit in September, my parents came down for a long weekend, we traveled to New Orleans for Halloween and got to see Gary, Jon and some of my old SOS friends. The Whites are coming down this week and we will be home in 7 weeks for Christmas! We will be staying in Houston for Thanksgiving this year but are planning on having a "Friendsgiving" with our friends who aren't going home. We are very excited about that and will be sure to post about it :) We will be cooking our first Turkey- should be an experience!

On a side note, we found out that our family friend Mark Barsotti was diagnosed with cancer a few weeks ago. It came as a shock to everyone and our thoughts and prayers are with him and the Barsotti family everyday. If you have a chance, please say a little prayer for them and if you would like to follow Mark & Mary Ellen's blog here is a link to his CaringBridge site.http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/markbarsotti

We are posting some pictures of our summer and fall adventures for you all, we can't wait to be back home for the Holidays.

All of our love,

Kelly & Nate

Halloween 2011 on Bourbon Street. We were Goose and Maverick for the night!

Our first night in New Orleans with Jon, Gary & Kristin.

When we first got Charlie, he was so little! Now he is taller than Winston!

1st Year Anniversary Dinner at our favorite restaurant III Forks!

The Whites at the lake on our summer trip home!

The Jameson family at Dawn's wedding! So glad we were able to go and spend time with our Danville friends and be there for Dawn's big day! The wedding was beautiful!

Kaitlin came to visit in July and we went on the "Texas Tour" trip. We went to Austin, tubed the river in New Braunfels and wrapped up the weekend in San Antonio. It was a great weekend with friends and we were excited to spend time with Kait!

Showing Amber the Houston skyline- What a great weekend with one of my best friends!

Charlie at Beach weekend! He loved playing in the water and being able to run around the beach!