I'm Getting Old and a Thanksgiving Weekend Recap (2 weeks late)

It's happening....I 'm getting old.  I've been trying to deny it, but my 27 (nearly 28--yikes!) year old body does not bounce back as quickly as my 26 year old one did. Case in point, I ran a 4 on 4 drill with our basketball team last night because we only had 7 girls who could practice (which is a story in itself).  This morning I could hardly drag myself out of bed, and I am SORE.   Just 12 hours later!  It used to take a a good 24-36 hours before soreness kicked in.  Ugh.

The reason I was running 4 on 4 drills with the team was because we have 2 of our 9 girls out with injuries.  We've had 2 rolled ankles in the past week and the school does not provide us with an athletic trainer on a regular basis (and never for practice). Last year we made it through the season only needing to tape thumbs, which I got really good at.  I knew the time was coming that I would have to learn how to tape an ankle.  I've had my ankles taped countless times before but have never actually taped one myself.  Enter my athletically trained husband who actually took that class in college (I really wish I had).  He gave me a crash course last night. and I must say I am pretty proud of my taping abilities. I just hope I can recreate this at practice without him guiding me.  That will be the test.

I realize that Thanksgiving was nearly 2 weeks ago (yikes!), but I did not want to leave this post out. I guess it's better late than never.  =)  Our Thanksgiving was a bit discombobulated this year, but we managed to have a wonderful one.  Dad stayed down south since he and Mom moved into the new house the weekend before, and Matt spent Thanksgiving with his girlfriend's family in Wisconsin.

Since the football team lost the week before we decided that weekend that we would drive up to my grandparents' house in Indiana.  I absolutely LOVE going up there because it's where I was born and spent the first 9 years of my life.  Going there brings back so many wonderful memories...it is its own little slice of paradise.

We drove up on Weds, and pulled into town literally the same time Mom got there. Thanksgiving day mom, my grandma and I did some cooking while Eric and my grandpa worked their butts off.  They were busy all day long.  Since my cousins, aunt, and uncle were not coming until Friday, we decided to have our actual Thanksgiving dinner until Friday, but don't worry we stuffed ourselves silly with beef tenderloin instead of Thanksgiving Turkey that night.

Mom and I went out Black Friday shopping early Friday morning. We've done this the past 5 or 6 years.  We don't get out too early with all of the crazies.  We usually leave around 6AM so that we can get to Chik-fil-a right when they open at 6:30AM.  We would not be able to make it without eating first. We made it through out list of places we planned on going (most of which were in one location luckily) by lunchtime and were back home in time to help with our Thanksgiving feast!

Our beautiful (and delicious) Thanksgiving Table. 

Saturday Eric and I headed into town with my aunt and uncle for the Battle for the Old Oaken Bucket AKA the Purdue/IU football game.  It's a far cry from the Iron Bowl that folks in our neck of the woods have as a rivalry game, but it's the rivalry game that I grew up going to and it was so much fun!  

We got to campus early to have the whole Purdue football experience.  This included a trip to Harry's Chocolate Shop.  I had never been so Eric and I got to have our 1st Harry's experience together.  It's a bar was built in 1928 (during prohibition).  The upstairs was a chocolate shop but the downstairs was an underground bar.  Now the entire thing is a bar but it still has the name.  It has a TON of character and it was packed....at 10AM.  

Sporting our Purdue duds that I picked up during Black Friday shopping round 2 Friday night.

After an hour or so we bundled up and headed over to Rossade Stadium for the game.  It was a balmy 29 outside for the ENTIRE GAME.  Amazingly we did not get cold until about halftime, my hands and feet went numb quickly, so I guess it was not that bad. =)  We are used to sweating to death in 100 heat at football games, so 29 dregrees at noon was quite a departure for us.  We had amazing seats, which we bought from someone at Harry's 30 minutes before kickoff. I was so thankful for the padded seatbacks that kept my hiney off the cold metal bleachers.

20 yard line about 20 rows up.....perfection

The worlds largest drum!  One of my favorite parts of the Purdue Band!  We used to go watch them perform before the games when I was a little girl. 

Since it was the last game of the year, it was Senior Day and all of the senior band members got to hit the drum.  It was pretty cool. 

Purdue won, which was awesome!  We then went to another bar in town to watch the 1st half of the Iron Bowl , which was not much of a game.  We left at halfttime to head back to my grandparents' house knowing that there was not question who was going to win.  When we got back my mom, grandparents and cousins had Arni's Juniors and Arni's Pizzas waiting on us.  Arni's is only my favorite restaurant in the entire world.  Sadly they only exist in Indiana =(   It's the greatest pizza/salad place ever! [in my humble opinion]

We headed out early Sunday morning to beat some of the traffic back to Alabama, which we surprisingly did.  I'm somewhat embarrassed about my lack of picture taking during out trip.  I guess I got caught up in all of the fun and left the camera put away, which is not so much of a bad thing.  It's trips like this that remind me of how awesome my family is and how blessed I am to have them!