My friend R. told me about a food drive that a local church was having for Thanksgiving.  I quickly volunteered.  The kids and I woke up at six in the morning, got ready, and headed there.  As a thank you for coming with me, we headed to Chick-Fil-A to have their chicken minis (NOM!).

Around eight, we arrived at the church.  There was a huge line of people waiting for the food drive to begin.  The kids and I went to a side door to begin volunteering.  W each got our own name tag, and the coordinator told us to go to one of the tables filled with food.  I have never done a food drive, and I was shocked at the amount of food there was.  It seemed like grocery stores donated food to the church, which I thought was wonderful.  I even noticed an IT consulting company was volunteering as well.

The kids and I were in charge of the Instant Meal/International table (don’t know how the two are similar) and were told our job.  We were suppose to restock the table as soon as a person made a decision of the item he/she was going to put in the grocery bags.  Luckily we got the table that had stairs behind us, so the kids could sit.  A few moments later, the food drive began.

I was impressed on how organized it was.  The head coordinator was very efficient in any issues that arose.  A volunteer would help an individual/family go to each table, which were theme based, and help them pick the amounts of items they could get.  If a person had a question, the person assisting them or one of the people in charge of the tables would help them with any questions.

At first, the kids didn’t understand the point of all of it, until they started seeing the smiles on people’s faces.  The quickly began helping me restock.  There were times that I didn’t do anything but stand there awaiting the next person to come because they kids quickly helped replace any items.

They also helped me send messages back and forth.  I was really proud of them. At the end, they didn’t want to leave.  I had to push them out of the door.  Cebastian later said, “Mommy, that was fun!”

Cebastian had these extra thoughts:

After that, we headed to my parents’ house.  My 11-year old cousin was there, so the kids played with her until their father came to pick them up.  I said a few minutes later, “I miss them.”

My cousin said, “Already?!”

My mother is doing some consulting work for the Library of Congress, so she asked if I could run some Thanksgiving errands for her. My cousin and I got in the car and headed to Sam’s Club to get the apple pie and pumpkin pie that the kids love.  I also picked up some sparkling wine for them as well.  We took some time to go to Border’s and roam around.  I was a little disappointed in their sales section this time around, so we went home empty-handed.

After talking to my mom for awhile, I noticed the time.  I had to start getting ready for dinner with Chaesco and Choodomir. By that time, I had only slept four hours, and I hadn’t taken a nap, so I was dead tired.  However, I got up, went home, and got ready to go to dinner and then out with my friends.

It was nice meeting Chaesco.  He is wicked smart, so I loved hearing him speak about the things he was doing at AnimeUSA.  We went to Jaleo and ate Spanish tapas.  I could have eaten more, but everyone else had stopped eating, so I decided not to.  Choodomir and I left Chaesco and headed to the Science Club to meet my friends.

They arrived and we had fun.  Well, that is until I started crashing.  I could barely keep awake, so I decided that it was time to head home.

Overall, it was a wonderful weekend doing wonderful things and being with wonderful people.