Day Three-Hundred and Twenty-Night: Give Thanks

Happy Thanksgiving!

Here are some scenes of our stay with Joel's parents during Thanksgiving.  I did not take too many pictures this time.The day was low key.  Joel's mom always does a great job with the food, and had actually made most of it before we got there.  So there wasn't too much to do on the actual Thanksgiving day.

The girls lounged around all morning, watching TV and holding squirmy kittens.

Kaitlin and Natalie with Ben and Callie

We got together around 4PM for Thanksgiving dinner and the rest of the evening was spent watching TV.  Not the most exciting thing but relaxing enough.

Natalie and her uncle Brett

Tomorrow, Joel and Natalie are planning on attending the Nebraska vs. Colorado game.  She is really looking forward to it.  Kaitlin went when she was four years old and the noise and excitement was so overwhelming for her she promptly fell asleep for most of the game.  I have a feeling things are going to be different with Natalie.

Hope you had a great Thanksgiving day with your loved ones!

Thanksgiving Scenes

I should probably post some of our Thanksgiving celebration pictures before Christmas gets here.  We had a nice time together as a family.  As most families on this day we ate too much and moved very little.  The plan had been to play some football before dinner, however, the weather did not cooperate.  It was just too cold to be outside playing. 

So we sat and ate and ate and sat.  It was festive in a low key kind of way.  So very thankful we can all share these special moments together!

Thanksgiving is Here... Again

Here is Thanksgiving again bringing the “holiday season”. The year has gone by so fast! I think I had such a rough start this year that the months have just gone by in a blur.

However, Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays. It feels festive without the whole commotion that Christmas normally brings with it. This year my side of the family is getting together at our home {insert half-joking half-serious cringe}. In all seriousness, it should be fun.

I decided to bake the pies tonight. Things looked promising at the beginning. We were moving right along, Kaitlin was helping and we started baking the pumpkin pie. I made more crust for the apple pie, and started cleaning around the kitchen and setting up the table for tomorrow. I checked on the pie after 45 minutes and it looked firm enough but when I inserted the knife, it was still coming out dirty. I left it in for 10 more minutes and just took it out before the crust would start getting burned. I kept looking at it from time to time, because it just had an odd texture. All of the sudden it dawned on me what the problem was. I decided to give it a taste, and sure enough, I had used flour instead of sugar!! Panicked because I had only bought one can of pumpkin this year, I sent my husband to the store to get some more pumpkin. He came back with two cans and said those were the last two cans on the shelves! I remember reading in the news that this year they are having a pumpkin shortage.

So here I am at 1:30AM waiting for the second pumpkin pie to be done baking so I can go to bed.

{Update:  The pies were a success, although I'm not sure worth the going to bed past 2AM}
While I wait, I figured I would share with you our menu this year.

I found this recipe for Apple Pie that I tried a couple of weeks ago and it turned out very good. The part I enjoy the least is making the pie crust. I’m not very good at rolling it and it being one whole piece. Mine looks more like patchwork. However, it tastes very good.

Since the above pie turned out so good, I decided to try the Pumpkin Pie recipe at the same website.

Tomorrow I am going to try to make this Unturkey. This one should be interesting. I have never dealt with gluten or nutritional yeast flakes and the likes, but I am going at it with low expectations and hopefully I will be pleasantly surprised.

{Update:  This Unturkey was a total failure.  I'm glad I had a backup plan!}

We are also making some Green Beans with almonds. I am going to be following this recipe.

Finally, a favorite dish for everyone is Candied Sweet Potatoes. I use my Mother-in-Law’s recipe and it always comes out delicious.

Here is the recipe:

3 cups of Mashed Sweet Potatoes (drained)
1 Cup of Sugar
2 Eggs Beaten
¾ Stick of Butter or Margarine (melted)
¾ Cup of Milk
½ tsp Cinnamon
½ tsp Nutmeg

Topping:

Mix
¾ Cup crushed corn flakes
½ Cup Chopped Nuts
½ cup brown sugar
2/3 stick of butter (melted)

Bake sweet potatoes on greased baking dish for 20 minutes at 400. Add topping and bake an additional 10 minutes.

And that's just me! The other two families are also bringing some dishes.

I hope you and your family have a wonderful Thanksgiving.