Thanksgiving and beginning of Christmas season

Thanksgiving was a blast. We ended up having 12 adults and the Phipps' kids as well. The girls sat at the table and chatted while the guys sat in front of the TV and watched American football-LIVE!! Here we are at the table. We had Great Britain, Belgium, Netherlands, Germany and the US represented. The food was all delicious and since we didn't eat until 7PM we had to make sure to fill up quickly before bed! It was my first year being in charge of making most of the main dishes so I was pretty psyched that everything turned out so great. Liesl's apple pie was definitely the prettiest thing we served!

This past weekend was also the first weekend of Advent so the Christmas markets are now open all over Europe. We have a really nice one right here in Brussels so on the way to church Sunday Liesl and i walked through it. Here we are in the Grand Place where they have a large Christmas tree and a manger scene set up.

After church some of us decided to go ice skating- they set up a rink on one of the place's. Last year I watched people several times but never got out there myself so one of the things I wanted to do this year was actually go! It was so much fun- until is started to rain! Here are me and Reka trying not to fall!

the whole gang! We asked one guy to take our pic but he kept falling down so I didn't trust him with my camera:) then one of the workers came over and took the pic for us!

Fiona, Liesl and I!!

Can't wait to explore some of the other Christmas markets around - I will keep you posted!