Thanksgiving Stress

I posted already about not really wanting to travel for Thanksgiving this year. At that point I will be 36 weeks pregnant and I didn't then, and still don't think it's going to be all that comfortable and it's a 4 or 5 hour drive to my in laws.

Since that post my husband and I have had a couple conversations but haven't made any final decisions. At the last one I said that I didn't want to be stressed about Thanksgiving. I can't be. I can't do it.

Argghh. Apparently that's a WHOLE lot easier said than done.

Here are my stresses:

1- My poor father in law got the shaft this year and has to work Thanksgiving evening and I think the day after. (Not at K-mart!) So, my in laws can't travel this year, they're staying in Nashville.

In of itself that's not a huge deal.

2- My sister in law with her boyfriend have already talked about going to Nashville and spending Christmas with the boyfriend's family.

Again, not a huge deal.

3 - This year is also the year for my brother in law with his family to spend Thanksgiving with the parents. Last year they hosted at their house for his wife's family.

This starts to be come a deal.

When we get together with my husbands family, we typically go to their 'cabin' in North Tennessee. They have a small house on the side of a mountain and built a second one on the property also. The houses are not on top of each other, far enough away that they feel separate, but you can yell back and forth between them. At the 'cabin' we have four bedrooms, four and a half baths, two kitchens, two separate living rooms with two separate tv's and screened in porches. If we need to escape from each other, there are places to go. We can all cook easily and have lots of space between the two kitchens to not be completely on top of each other.

In Nashville, there are three bedrooms, the master and two very small guest rooms. Very small meaning, no pack n play will fit in there, no room for kids. It's a room with a bed and that's it. There is one small kitchen, and two bathrooms, one master, decently sized, and one very small guest.

Should all of us descend on my in laws. That means there are eight adults and two children. And, should our dogs go to, which they normally do, three dogs and two cats.

And nowhere to hide. And nowhere to sleep actually.

There is going to have to be a hotel situation, but who gets that short stick? Us with the dogs makes is really hard. Big M has never been in a hotel and I know he would not settle down in that type of environment. My Old Lady has been in hotels before and she usually stands at the door growling at the noises in the hallway.

To be honest, just my crew will fill the house. We're the truckload that puts the whole circus over the top. Without us, there would theoretically be enough room for my husbands brother and sister with their respective 'others'. There would only be one dog, the one who lives there, and my niece can be set up in the den.

So, there's that.

And, then, adding to my pot of stress.

My parents are not staying in GA for Thanksgiving. They're driving to New Hampshire to spend the holiday with my grandmother and a couple of my aunts.

So now if we stay in GA, we're having Thanksgiving with just the three of us. And if we go to TN, we're the catalyst for making it an overcrowded, over stressed house.

Part of me would like to put the responsibility on my husband for this because I am very worried that if we stayed home, and didn't see any family on Thanksgiving, that he would be sad and disappointed. But really, that's how I'm afraid I'll feel. I know how hormonal and emotional I am these days. I'm afraid I'm going to be upset about it. But then I flip it around and actually consider going to TN and that just stresses me out again.

I don't know what we're going to do. I just have to believe that it will work out and it will be fine.