Happy Thanksgiving!

One thing I am always very thankful for is very good friends who are like family!  Once again we headed over to the Ls house for our Thanksgiving dinner, along with 5 other families including the L's son Zachary and his wife Karynn, and also 2 college students.  Quite a crowd!  There were a zillion children!  We had tons and tons of delicious food, and I ate way too much (I can't stop nibbling on my butter toffee crunch--it's my big weakness, LOL).  As you can see from the picture, Drew got to be a really big boy and sit at an actual table to eat!  I was a bit concerned that he wouldn't stay in the chair, or that he would fall off or something, but he did great, until he decided he didn't want anymore to eat, and he started trying to take stuff from Theodore.  Then Caleb brought him to me!

 

This day was quite a change from last year, when I was heavily pregnant and had gestational diabetes!  Then I ate very small servings, with very few carbs (no butter toffee crunch!), and Bob and I went on a walk after the meal with Zachary and Karynn--in our short sleeves, because it was so warm!  This year, Bob and I did not walk (Zachary and Karynn did, though, setting a good example that we ignored, LOL), and if we had, it certainly would not have been in short sleeves, because it is freezing today!  So I enjoyed the day much more, being able to eat whatever I wanted to, but now I am tired and full-feeling.  Blah.  I always regret eating too many carbs!  But hey--it's always a good Thanksgiving when I'm not pregnant, because, let's face it, those are fairly rare, LOL. 

 

We had such a  fun time though.  There was much discussion of music, especially bluegrass, of all genres, and Ed even pulled up some samples for us, along with a brief "history of bluegrass" to help us be more well-rounded.  The teens played an enthusiastic game of Pit, as well as Skip-Bo, before they went outside to play volleyball.  The younger kids played downstairs and watched the movie "Planes". 

 

Eventually Drew got really crabby, so Bob drove him and me home.  He napped for a little while I cleaned up the kitchen and prepared our turkey.  The only problem with going to the L's house is that we don't have too many left-overs, so basically I am making Thanksgiving dinner tomorrow too!  I have a little bit of sweet potato casserole left over from today, and yesterday I made lots of extra cran-apple-pear sauce so that I would have enough of that tomorrow too.  I will have to make some more sweet potato casserole, but I already have the sweet potatoes cooked and mashed.  I also will make mashed potatoes, dressing, and gravy.  For the turkey, I am dry-rubbing it with a rub I got several years ago in a cookbook called Dining on a Dime.  It's really good--putting it on a chicken make it taste like a rotisserie chicken.  I used to wet-brine, but this is kind of like dry-brining, which I had never even really heard of until I was reading a thread on the Well Trained Mind board a few days ago.  There I discovered a link to this article about wet-vs.-dry-brining, which was really interesting!  It's a lot easier to do a rub than the wet-brining, especially for the really big birds, like we need.  It's hard to fit them and all the liquid you need somewhere and keep it all cold!  Now I rub this salt/spice mixture all over the turkey, put it in my giant roasting pan, cover it in foil, and stick it in the outside fridge.  Easy peasy!

 

So I hope all of you had as wonderful a day as we did!  Right now I am thoroughly enjoying the quiet of just Drew and me in the house, before the hordes descend again, and it's time to give baths and get people to bed.  What a wonderful life we have.  I have been so truly blessed!  Happy Thanksgiving!