Sixteen (Plus Two) Busy Hands

How Do You Keep Eight Busy Children

(aka Sixteen Hands)

Occupied The Day Before Thanksgiving?

Let Them Make Pie (and Turkey Cookies...or as they say eeewwww...

Not Turkey Cookies...Just Cookies that look like Turkeys)

Today was Neighborhood Baking Day, and Bake we did.

We Made Blessing Mix

and

These adorable and super-simple Cookies that look like Turkeys

Then it was time to put on the serious aprons....

Time to make Pumpkin Pies.

It was like a regular Cooking School-Home-Ec Class.

We made FOUR Pies.

Two children (Four hands) per pie.

At the end of our Baking adventure, there was a pie for each Family to take home and enjoy.

Considering I am NOT cooking for Thanksgiving (whenever possible, I MAKE RESERVATIONS for Thanksgiving Dinner at a restaurant....tomorrow is not exception) I baked my little heart out today and last night (I made homemade stuffing for dinner last night...a first in my lifetime)

Four Bowls, Four Whisks, Four Groups, Four...Four...Four
Four Tasty Pumpkin Pies are in the works....

We were blessed with new neighbors this past week. They moved here from out west and do not know a soul in the area. Their children are delightful and play well with my girls and the other neighbor children.

Everyone followed directions amazingly well and stayed focused from beginning to end.

I told them to make sure they got every last drop of Pumpkin out of the can...they scraped and scraped until there was nothing left. (See my Christmas Tree in the Background?)

Working to get every last bit of Pumpkin...

This was the perfect way to spend the day before Thanksgiving. As we completed each project, the children would go as a group to different neighbors and present them with Thanksgiving Goodies. It was a great way to have our new neighbor children meet additional neighbors.

Blessing Mix, Turkey Cookies, and Homemade Pumpkin Pies...Oh My...the perfect combination to keep 16 (plus my two=18) Hands happy and busy.

Tomorrow, we open our Blessing Box to read the entries of what each person in our family is thankful for. This year, as we have had house guests, we have asked them to write down a blessing they are thankful for. It will be fun to see what is in the box!

Happy Thanksgiving! We will spend Thanksgiving in Gainesville....go Gators....they play the Seminoles on Saturdy at Tallahassee.