In Which We Give Thanks.....

Sophie helps set the table. 

 For a few years now, my daughter has been mentioning how nice it would be to have Thanksgiving at home. We used to have Thanksgiving at my grandmothers house. Then, when she wasn't able to do it anymore, my aunt took over. It has dwindled down to just us, and a few of my brothers and my dad and grandpa over the years. I like the idea of having the kids come home for Thanksgiving (when they are older of course), and so I agreed, on one condition. Until my grandpa passes on, we continue to go to my aunts. I suggested however that we might pick a random weekend in early November and do our own thing anyhow. Just cuz we've never had a big turkey dinner at home.

The makings of a yummy pumpkin pie.

On Columbus Day, I drove down to Ikea with a really good friend of mine. She mentioned that her mom and sisters were coming to visit the first weekend of November, and we should all get together and have dinner (I've met and enjoy her mom and sisters company very much). An idea was born in my head, and yesterday we celebrated our first "Harvest Dinner". The kids and The Boy™ called it Un-Thanksgiving, but I wasn't too keen on that.

The turkey.. cooking away in the oven.

Having never cooked a big turkey dinner, it was a learning experience. I had to find recipes to try out, figure out the schematics of how to fit 8 people in my dining room, and discover if I had enough serving pieces for a large dinner. I'd like to report that all the recipes I made (for the first time, I might add) were delicious. All but 1 came from Cooking Light, and the cranberry sauce recipe was from Pioneer Woman. I will be putting them all into my cookbook for future cooking endeavors.  I can fit 8 people in my dining room, and I did not have enough service pieces, but fixed that situation before the big day. I entertained everyone by putting notes on each piece about what was going in it, or on it... which also helped me make sure we had room on the tables. What I did fail at, was serving spoons. It never dawned on me to check that situation out ahead of time.

We had much to be thankful for...

Despite a few logistical kinks that were out of our control, the whole thing was a huge success. We laughed, we ate and enjoyed each others company. Even the clean up wasn't that bad. I did take note of some things I will do differently next time, and hope that until the day comes when I start doing it on Thanksgiving, that this becomes a yearly tradition.

**(Ok, so a post a day isn't working out this month. I'll try again next month. This month.. the goal is just to blog MORE than the past few months.)