Gobble Gobble Gobble

Thanksgiving was satisfying this year. You know—turkey trot, family time, turkey feasting—the usual. I love a quiet family holiday.

We did our annual homegrown Turkey Trot 5K in the cold morning of Thanksgiving Day with a few friends (I think this year our run population was around 15). We had everyone start the run saying “gobble gobble gobble!” Jeff cruised into first place with an 18:43, and I chugged in 3rd at 24:03. Jeff’s brother Sam was in town and he got second place a minute ahead of me, so it was a White SWEEP! I was pleased with my time because I’ve only been running for a month now…and then I woke up the next morning. One word: SORE! The stiffness is finally subsiding 3 days later.

Since we were not hosting The Dinner, I made green bean casserole from scratch for fun this year. Those fresh crunchy fried onions were SO YUM. It was such a comfort to learn how easy it is to make homemade cream of mushroom soup. 100% better than the canned goop. Needless to say, the casserole turned out tasty-roo. It was a lot of work, though!

I also made juicy peach-cranberry pie, creamy pumpkin cheesecake, and an experimental peanut pie (not that great). Oh, and 57 fluffy white rolls. The Whites did the rest, and we convened at their house to eat at 5:30pm (it was late because Steph and Jasen had the Gibbons’ family feast to attend first).

Remember this picture? Well, 2 years later Jay’s opinion of turkey legs has improved:

Jay ate one leg 'o turkey and called it quits. He didn’t know which part was edible and which was cartilage-gristle, so he made some awesome faces. Rose liked her dinner just fine, but she was more interested in playing with Grama’s and Grampa’s toys.

After a nice, pleasant family turkey gobbling, we went home and watched the classic 1987 Claymation Christmas Celebration on YouTube to kick off the Christmas season. It’s one of Jeff’s favorites, and the rest of us like it too.

After the niños were in bed on Thursday night, I made the grave error of venturing forth to the Sunnyside Walmart to see if I could snag a backyard trampoline on sale. HA. Shudder. Fail. Walmart is never ever EVER worth it. I could paint a whole lengthy, dark post about what it was like being squeezed amidst swarms of people,  waiting an hour in line to buy the wrong [not-on-sale item], but I think I’ll opt out of reliving that horror. Suffice it to say that it took me almost all day at home on Friday to recover and regain my motivation for anything.

By Friday night, however, Jay persuaded me to get out our Christmas decorations and we spent a pleasant evening decorating our skinny fake tree and putting up our new garland. Christmas music healed my Black wounds faster than anything.

 

Jay built a “house” by spreading blankets out on the floor, and he and Rose laid in it admiring our Christmas tree. They LOVE that thing so much! It is un-decorated and re-decorated at least 10 times a day.

Happy Thanksgiving and hello, Christmastime!