We have established the tradition (three times in a row can count as tradition, right?) of spending our Thanksgiving week in Arizona and Mexico. Each of the past three years we have flown down the weekend before Turkey Day to Phoenix, spent time with our dear friends the Rickey’s, enjoyed some down time relaxing, and ended up at John’s sister’s home for some much-anticipated family time. Allow me to walk you through our pre-Thanksgiving day holiday time…
Stop 1: The Rickey’s
It’s been especially cool the last two years because we have gotten to see Debbie (who we are now referencing as “Grandma Debbie” for Sage) in addition to the rest of the Rickey clan (minus Jeff, sadly). It is such a treat to spend a day with these guys and this year they spoiled us with a Thanksgiving meal complete with the best sweet potato pie ever, homemade stuffing and gravy, and mmmmm….all the deliciousness of the Thanksgiving meal.
They are Oregon fans, if you couldn’t tell… =)
Yes, we did allow Jon to throw a very soft ball at our daughter while she was in the swing. She thought it was hilarious!
John and Sage had a few impromptu jam sessions. Who do you think might be getting a guitar for Christmas?!? shhhh…. 😉
Stop 2: Sedona
Our down time last year involved a full day at the Grand Canyon and a wayside stop at Sedona on our return trip to Phoenix. We LOVE, LOVE, LOVED Sedona last year and after the way too short stop last year, we made the agreement to return in 2012. We found a super place through airbnb with an awesome view of Cathedral Rocks. Our first day in Sedona we spent hiking Soliders Pass, napping, and then taking a very leisurely hike to the base of Cathedral Rocks (which we could access just across that creek in the photo, below). Sage was awesome and hiked about 1.5 miles all on her own that first day, with the assistance of her newly discovered trekking pole.
Day two in Sedona was spent hiking around Courthouse Butte on the Llama Trail–a very gentle, rolling trail that allowed Sage some more hiking time.
We hustled back to Phoenix in time to see the majority of nephew Bailey’s basketball game. He’s pretty much an all-star, if you couldn’t tell from these pics.
A highlight of the trip is meeting up with everyone at John’s sister’s home. John’s folks, cousin Krista, Dusty’s parents, and the Andersons all in one house preparing to head out together in the morning. It’s always a good time together! After a delicious meal at Pei-Wei (click here to petition we get a Pei-Wei in Portland! ;-)) we came back and loaded up a U-Haul trailer full of diapers, formula, clothing, and miscellaneous items bound for Juarez.
You better believe we slept good after that meal and some heavy lifting!
Thanksgiving – Part Dos – Juarez is coming soon!
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