Thanksgiving Recap 2014

 For most the of the same reasons as everyone else, I do love Thanksgiving.  It's a wonderful chance to focus intentionally on teaching thankfulness (to God) to my children.  It also provides many opportunities to learn American history as well as service to others.  There's not the gimme-gimme battle that comes with Christmas, and in general it's just a simple holiday enjoyed with family.  (That being said I also love Christmas).

The past three years we have hosted Thanksgiving.  Since we've been married, I have been dreaming and waiting for the day when our house would be filled with people on holidays.  It evokes many warm feelings to have my home associated with loving memories for not just my children but for my nieces, nephews, and extended family also.  I want to be a blessing to my family and show them my gratitude for them in my lives.

However, it's also work and I'm learning as I go.  I'm a terrible planner.  Things always end up coming together in the last minute, but I'm hoping this post will help me prepare in years ahead  so I am able to enjoy the process a little more!

I try to be intentional about having my kids express thanks all the time, but it's nice to do something "hands on" for Thanksgiving week.  This year we kept it simple and just had a grateful banner in the dining room.  We do our best to just let the kids write what they want, as long as it's appropriate.  We got a lot of good things, mixed with some random things.  Nathan made a point to add all branches of the military, and Ella added Barak Obama (we obviously don't talk politics in our home).

The day before Thanksgiving has been traditionally set aside for last minute errands and making "turkeys and pilgrim hats".   The kids look forward to doing this, and it's so easy that even the under five crowd can do it.  It involves a fudge-striped cookie, a marshmallow, and chocolate almond bark.  The turkeys also need a piece of candy corn for the head.  I'm glad that my sister Amy and her kids were with us again this year.

First you take your mallow and you cover it in the chocolate.

 

Then you take your mallow and you stick it on your cookie.  Stripes down for a pilgrim hat, stripes up (running vertically) for a turkey.

 Snacking on cookies is definitely not allowed.

Snacking on marshmallows, also not allowed.

If making a turkey, add your candy corn and you are finished!  As you can see here, the stripes on this turkey are not going up and down...I tried.  I also supervised this very little and the kids were pleased with their creations.

Wednesday is also when the cleaning happens.  It's not too bad, and Matt helps out a lot since most of it is done after the kids go to bed.  I think that the problem is potatoes.

The past two years, we've done potatoes Thursday morning because that is the way my mom always did it.  However, we make a lot of potatoes!  There are usually about 30 people (some kids), and so I make around 15 pounds of potatoes.  So, Thursday morning gets overrun with trying to peel and boil potatoes (thankfully I had sisters that helped with this).  We also learned the hard way that you do NOT put peelings from 15 pounds of potatoes down your garbage disposal.  This results with Matt with his head under the kitchen sink Thanksgiving morning.  Thankfully that was a lesson was last year, like I said I'm learning as I go.

SO, this year I boiled and peeled the potatoes the night before.  I mashed them up and had them ready to be warmed up in the crock pots on Thursday.  This definitely made things a ton easier.  There's still room for improvement though as I was still up until 1:00 AM making potatoes!  

Thanksgiving morning went as planned.  I woke up at 7:30 AM and had the turkey in the oven by 8:30 AM.  I don't have room for two turkeys, so my older sister also cooked a turkey at her place.  My other duties were to make dressing and corn, and set the table.  The girls helped with table setting and my sisters prepared green bean casserole and relish trays.  All the other side items and desserts were being brought by family.  Another must is to let other people bring food!  I also had my sister bring a third crock pot (my two were both filled with mashed potatoes) so we could slice the turkey and keep it warm without overcooking it or having to eat it cold.  I'm sure I wouldn't have to do it this way if I had the timing perfected...but it worked great this time.

Finally, around 1:00 PM it was time to gather around!  The headcount has always lingered around 30.  This year we had 29, including ourselves.

(I love beautiful centerpieces, but don't understand how you have the space...our table was not decorated, but filled with food!)

Our dining room is a converted living room.  Our table only takes up half of the room, so 364 days of the year it looks pretty bare.  However on Thanksgiving we get to fill it to capacity! 

(the tables were filled, though not quite yet in this photo)

 

 I was up and down retrieving things for people most of the meal, but I did sit and enjoy dessert (pretty much by myself because everyone else was finished :).  Afterwards, of course the men watched football and the ladies did dishes.  Normally the kids would play outside, but it was freezing cold!  My cousin timed us, and it took an hour and a half to clean-up.  I was in the kitchen from about 7:30 AM until 3:30 PM.  It was work, but it was enjoyable.  It's great to have lots of family working by your side!

Following dishes, the ladies like to look through the newspaper...ads, ads, ads.  Everyone likes to make their plan of attack for Friday shopping.  I honestly was not that motivated this year and so just followed my sister like a puppy.  The end result was that I mainly just bought clothes on sale for myself :)

Finally, Saturday morning the kids got to break the wishbone.  Since we had two Nathan and Ella broke one also...but  I missed it.

There it is Thanksgiving 2014!  

These times make me miss my mom like crazy.  She was the eldest in her family, always poised and in control. I wish she was here to help teach and guide me as I try to do what she did so well year after year.  But, I have been blessed beyond measure, and to my savior Jesus Christ, I. am. thankful.

Autumn Beaut(ies)

 One more Fall post before I have to admit that Winter is here!  

Raking is a still a great time at our home.  All the kids enjoy raking and helping out, and if they get tired of it they climb a tree or play in the leaves.  We lost half of our mature trees in a storm two Springs ago, so the load is lighter, which also helps!

I love the Fall; it's crisp and gorgeous.  Once the leaves are down though, it's hard to deny that the weather is changing.  Winter is definitely a beautiful season in its own way, but I'm thankful we could enjoy the Fall weather one last time!

 

 

Apple Orchard.

I can hear the wind whistling outside and see the evidence of the "white stuff" here and there.  Granted it's November and winter must come sometime, but it always catches all of us off guard.  So, today I think back to only a few short weeks ago when we picked apples in our short sleeves!

We were blessed with a haul of apples both from a friend and from my Dad (and don't forget we harvested one ourselves).  However, we eat about six apples a day here, so we go through them pretty quickly.  I snagged up an online deal for a local orchard and we were able to get about 50 lbs more (in two different trips).

Ready to go!

It was a short walk to the trees.  Evelyn rode in the wagon most of the way, until Nathan and Ella took off (literally) running for the trees.  She then was all about pulling the wagon.  She pulled the wagon around most of the time while we were picking. 

It was getting towards the end of the season.  The apples were still good, but there were a lot on the ground.  

Nathan is more about tree climbing than apple picking, although he was able to do both.

Monkey see, monkey do!

Here's Ella doing likewise.  

I like this shot because it shows how short these trees are.  So, when I say tree climbing, it's more like tree stepping into.

Still going with the wagon.  

It pulls a little harder when loaded with apples.  I think this is also about the same time Ella and Addie bailed for the port-a-potty.

This tractor made me think of my dad.  He's always been a simple, humble man with a heart for a good, old tractor.

We have a rule when picking apples.  Everyone must eat one to make sure they're good.  But, just one...don't get greedy!

Always love to look at all the bins of pumpkins and gourds.  Each season is full of its own blessings.  

Once we were finished picking apples, we decided to walk near the other end of the orchard.  They have a barn with ponies, goats and chickens.  My kids have never been much into animals (meaning they are very much afraid), but they have been making great improvements in the last 6 months...or so I thought.

There was one crazy black goat that was out (and you couldn't put it back in because I saw it jump over the fence).  He was mainly just walking around minding his own business and letting some other little girl feed him apples.  Nathan and Ella were cool, but Evelyn and Adeline definitely did not like this goat being so free about them.  It was high anxiety with lots of clinging.  I convinced them however, to sit on some hay to take a photo.  It's safe I assured them, the goat isn't over here.  About the time everyone was seated, the goat got bored with before mentioned little girl and decided to trot (though not aggressively) to see what we had for him.  He then jumped up on the hay stacks about 15 feet away from where they were sitting.  Oh. my. word.  You would have thought someone was chasing my children with a chainsaw. 

Ella, who is actually now quite fond of animals, tried to distract the goat away from Evelyn and Adeline (both of whom I was holding), and the other girl there tried to chase it away also.  It was very heroic!

After all that, I didn't get the original photo on the hay like I wanted.  However, Nathan and Ella were willing to try it again, and Addie even participated with some convincing.  Evelyn, not so much.

You see how Ella has her hand on Addie's knee?  It was a mix of "it's going to be ok, I'm here with you", and "You're not going to run away".  She'll be a good mom someday! :)

And of course, when apple picking you wear your red high heals.

These are her most beloved shoes.  We may have to get her a new pair.  There's no way these fit anymore, but she doesn't want to give them up!