Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is really my favorite holiday. Get together with friends and family, eat, drink and give thanks. What's not to like? Perhaps just the thought of too many people in a too-small place is your challenge. Perhaps timing the cooking of 16 different dishes at four different temperatures for 16 different amounts of time in one oven is just too much to contemplate. Or maybe Aunt Sarah's and Great Aunt Mary's annual "Who made the best pie contest" has gotten as old as they have. Then there are the toddlers with picky appetites whose nap times must be worked around. Or there may be that gluten-intolerant, nut or shellfish allergic, vegetarian whose food issues must be dealt with.

And there is always, always happy noise echoing off of every wall and shouts of chaotic bedlam that come with multi-generational family life. You could be trying to cope with family circumstances that are challenging or filled with grief. You might be alone. But for me, this holiday is worth every ounce of it. Every hour in the kitchen, every hour cleaning the house, every hour airing bedrooms long unused, every sound and every smell. (Even the year we carved the turkey on a cutting board that had been sprayed accidentally with bitter orange spray I’d been using to train a puppy not to chew everything in the house.) Because getting together with friends and family to eat, drink and give thanks is my favorite thing to do.

It's my opportunity to make sure that at least once a year I very intentionally say thank you to my friends for choosing to walk this life with me. To say thank you to my family because even though they really didn't get to choose me, they did choose to love me and share their daily lives with me. To celebrate births, engagements, marriages, firsts and lasts. To commiserate with the sad or lonely and to grieve with the grieving. To say thank you to God for the fullness of my life. And to say thank you for His presence here. What are you thankful for this Thanksgiving?

Thanksgiving Menu 2011

Roast Turkey with Gaga's bread stuffing
Tav's Grilled Turkey, chopped with bbq sauce
Honey Baked Ham
Gluten free stuffing
Vegetarian stuffing
Turkey Gravy - gluten free
Mushroom Gravy - vegetarian
Green beans (cut on the bias for Gramps)
Mashed Potatoes
Fresh Sauerkraut (we are of German descent)
Vegetable Stuffed Butternut Squash - Vegetarian Entree
Aunt Ella's Baked Apples and Cranberries with Oatmeal Brown Sugar Topping (no nuts, no gluten)
Cranberry Sauce (jellied, straight out of the can and lots of it)
Sister Shubert's rolls
Gluten free rolls
Chocolate Pie - nut free/gluten free
Pecan Pie
Ice cream & whipped cream ( the real thing is gluten free)

I hope your Thanksgiving is a joy-filled celebration.