Getting (it) Together

I'm sorry to those of you closely monitoring the countdown of our unborn child, but that thing was starting to creep me out! It just looked like a curled up worm or something, and when no real growth is happening, what's the point?

So we've been totally slacking on our blogging lately. I would blame it on our super busy, super important lives, but let's be honest, blogging just doesn't take that long and we're just not that important (Don't tell Kent). Anyway, after much suspense, here is the Hansen Fall Holiday Recap...

As much as I absolutely LOVE our new apartment, it doesn't offer a very trick-or-treat friendly environment. Trick-or-treating is one of the best parts about Halloween, whether you're the one in costume trolling for candy or answering the door to over-excited and over-sugared children. However, one of our neighbors promised me that she would bring her daughters to our back door to trick-or-treat. She kept her promise and brought the other small children in our building with her. I wish I had been quick enough with the camera, but it was a group of girls, under 5 and it looked something like this:


Okay, so maybe Andrei Kirilenko from the Utah Jazz wasn't with them, but there were plenty of fairies and princesses to go around. Besides, putting in a picture of an NBA player is the only way to get guys to read this blog.





I did try to get Kent into the holiday spirit by carving the pumpkins we picked up at the Apple Orchard a few weeks before. Kent refused to use the fantabulous pumpkin carving kit I bought because he was too good for that commercial ridiculousness. Although he was jealous of the pumpkin scraper it came with and I had to keep waiting for him to "finish his turn..." Another win for commercialism...Here is what we ended up with. And I will admit that Kent's freehand jack-o-lantern is much more entertaining than my pattern.



My impression of Kent's pumpkin...yes, I do know how brave I am for posting that on the world wide web.










If you're unsure, mine is the awesome skeleton face on the right. Kent's is the crossed-eyed, buck tooth crazy lookin' one on the left.









Following the barrage of fairy princesses, we spent the rest of All Hallow's Eve playing a basketball game for Kent's city league. Oh, it was scary all right.

Then this past Monday my parents arrived from England to spend Thanksgiving with us. They are in the process of moving to Thailand, so their first stop was here in Boston as they make the trip to the other side of the world. I tried to keep them entertained and I think we did an okay job. I haven't seen my sister Amber that often since I lived with her, but it was nice to have everyone together, no matter what Kent thinks. Actually, I'll give Kent credit, the McKinnons can be quite a clan to handle (think battle scene in Braveheart), but he handled it with grace and charm.












This was my first time being responsible for the main part of the feast, but I felt pretty confident having my parents there to help. Early on Thursday morning I put my mother to work...











All-in-all it worked out pretty well. The turkey took an extra hour to cook, but it was delicious and well worth the wait. Although I must say, a 20lb turkey is a tough bird to handle. Around the table we had my dad, one set of elders from our ward (Payne & Soeun), Kent, myself, Amber and my mom. Sadly, we were again slacking on camera duty and this is the only picture we have from Thanksgiving. Everyone looks regal in their paper crowns from the Holiday Crackers my parents sent Amber and I for Christmas last year.



If you don't know what Holiday Crackers are, they are a mostly-English tradition. You hold one end and have the person next to you grab the other and on 3, pull to pop them. Inside you'll find an awesome and stylish paper crown, an equally awesome and corny joke, and a sweet toy. We have had them at almost every holiday feast since we first moved to England when I was 3 years old and if I could buy them in the US I would make sure they were always part of the family dinners.