Water, water, everywhere...

Hello everyone!!
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I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving. I trust you all consumed the proper amounts of turkey, ham, dressing, cranberry sauce and ALL the other fixins. Well, I sure did. But fortunately, I didn't get miserably full...this year :-).
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Thankfully, our drive to Mobile, Alabama was an uneventful one and our visit with family was great fun...at a minimum.
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This year, due to "generational growth spurts", we had Thanksgiving dinner at a local church hall. We had the use of a HUGE kitchen in which to stage the yummy food and plenty of eating space for the fam.
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There was quite a bit of time to kill prior to dinner. So Mister M. and I took our girls for a walk down to the bay. How bout a few pix?

Mister M. & the girls on their way to the bay.

One of many shells Jayla found.

Driftwood is so pretty. Just thought I'd share :-).

Our girls (and baby Anna).

Mister M. & the girls.

Me & the girls.

Big Sis showing Lil Sis a shrimp boat out in the bay.

Me & Mister M. checking out what's left of the bay after years of hurricane damage.

Briyanna SAYS she wasn't posing, lol.

"LOOK Mommy, more shells!"

Mister M, doing his part...making sure all the shells are placed back in the sea :-).

Again, Bri SAYS she wasn't posing. But what a cool picture, huh?

Baby Anna wants to take in some sites too. That, and Jayla was tired of holding her :-).

One more shot before going back for dinner.
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By the time we made it back to the hall, several family members had arrived. And by the time everyone got there, I'd say there were about 40+ people. We have so many good cooks in our family. And oh my goodness, there was SO much food! All of it was yummy too :-).

Here's my mom taking a break from hosting, to spend some time with Baby Anna. You wouldn't believe what a conversation starter this doll was. Several people thought she was real :-).
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Well, like I said, a great time was had by all. Other than getting to see some family I haven't seen in a while, I'd have to say my favorite part of this trip was how slow paced it was. Usually, we spend so much time running around visiting folks, shopping, etc. That we really don't have time to just BE. We got to do a lot of that this time. Gotta love it.
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SO...we get back home on Saturday evening and all was well on the homefront. Or so we THOUGHT. After we get home, we get settled and head to bed early, as we planned on going to church on Sunday. I think, over the past 4 days, we'd gotten use to sleeping in. So needless to say, we kinda slept right through church, OOPS!!!
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Later on Sunday afternoon, I try to get on my computer and there seems to be a problem with the network. So Mister M. goes to the basement to reset some stuff....ONLY to be greeted by...(drumroll please)...SQUISHY CARPET!
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YEP...you guessed it...our hot water heater decided it would, ahem...relieve itself all over our basement! Although my mother in law has been home the entire time we'd been gone, she had no idea what had happened. Therefore, we have no idea how long we've had this constant leak of water. But it's been a couple days at the least. ARGH!!! I've always wanted a pool...just not in my newly finished basement.
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Oh well, it is what it is. So as of TODAY, and about 900 unexpected $$'s later, we are the proud new owners of a brand new hot water heater!
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Well, that's all I've got for now. I need to get to bed so that I can TRY and get up on time tomorrow. I mean SO WHAT I was supposed to be at the school to help sell Chick Fil A biscuits at 7am! SO WHAT Jayla has to be at school by 7:50am! And SO WHAT we overslept this morning until 7:27am!
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But that's another story.....