Happy Thanksgiving, 2010

Thanksgiving this year was full of many wonderful moments and we made lots of fun memories! The girls and I especially enjoyed studying a bit of history about the first Thanksgiving in the week or so prior to our celebration of the holiday. And, Focus on the Family produced a Radio Theatre show about Squanto which we were able to listen to. All very fun and educational!

Here's the family at Thanksgiving...we took the family picture first before things got too crazy. John and Rachel, Clara Anne (almost 6), Chloe (4.5), and Christin (2.5). Here's all the ladies gathered, the magic behind the meal! We were so glad to be able to spend Thanksgiving with our overseas "family."

My role this year was again to be in charge of the turkey. I roasted it, took the meat off the bone, simmered the bones to make stock, used the stock to make stuffing and gravy, and then made a pecan pie to go with our meal. I love to do the turkey! It's not as hard as it seems and I get to sneak bites of the crispy skin.

My kids, however, hardly ate any turkey. They were more interested in the homemade crescent rolls, veggies and dip, mashed potatoes, and cranberry applesauce.

I love this picture, doesn't it just show one of the many differences between boys and girls? Don't miss the fun table centerpiece made by the lovely Savannah!

A certain two year old was also excited about the food!

Here's the spread . . . mmm. . . I think the surprise this year was the stuffing. Though I have made the same recipe for the last four or so years, several people commented that it was particularly good, even people who don't usually like stuffing! I'm not sure what made it different, other than it had no sage this year. I only use sage once a year, in Thanksgiving stuffing, and discovered on Thanksgiving morning that I had none. And there isn't a Super Target down the street! So I substituted some thyme and called it good enough. And it was! Another big hit: we had an appetizer table that included a tray of pickles, olives, and pepperoncini. It was totally and completely empty by the end of the day!

I'm thankful for my dear husband! We're coming up on our 14th wedding anniversary, though that doesn't seem possible. And what a great husband he is--godly, thoughtful, encouraging, fun to be around, a great leader, dedicated father and servant of the Lord! I am so blessed.

Don't these little pilgrim girls just look darling? In the absence of my friend Rachel, who excels at all things creative and crafty, I took it upon myself to make a few pilgrim and Indian hats since we put on a play for our Thanksgiving celebration called "Squanto and the story of the first Thanksgiving." I was the narrarator, John played Squanto, and several of the other men had to play a couple of different parts. The audience consisted of exactly four women and a few kids when they weren't in the scene. It was pretty low key but we had fun! Here's some action shots:

I thought this was a darling picture! The boys are so intent and serious and wanted to do their very best. You can see at this point, one was a pilgrim and one an Indian.

Here's Squanto agreeing to help William Bradford, feeling it his life mission since his own people are gone.

The pilgrim children helped Squanto plant some corn. (Props were very minimal as you can see!)

And here they are all enjoying the first Thanksgiving meal. I doubt it was as delicious as ours was!

Bravo, Bravo! An encore was requested by some of the children, but by then the adults were ready to sit down and have some dessert. Pecan pie, apple crisp, chocolate mousse pie, and an amazing chocolate caramel cheesecake made by my friend Amy was still in the offering. We all relaxed over dessert and coffee and ended up staying and chatting into the evening, finishing out the day with a showing of Toy Story 3 projected on the wall! It was the kind of Thanksgiving where you end up staying so long that you eat again, everyone at their own whim and thanks to the miracle of Crock Pots, things were still hot! We were all so thankful for a wonderful day together. Truly the Lord gives such good gifts to His children. I never could have imagined, seven years ago, that such an American holiday would even be possible here in this country. And yet, here we were, finding a way to eat all of the American traditional foods, enjoying fellowship and worship together, and even getting a brief history lesson on the first Thanksgiving. What a blessing! Thank you, Lord!