::thanksgiving report::

We had a peaceful low key Thanksgiving, just staying home together. It was really nice. We ate and relaxed and watched football and played games and sort of slept in.
We decided to just eat a few of our favorite dishes and try to make it simple.
Except cooking a turkey never is really simple. I don't think we needed to get a whole turkey, but we did. It turned out yummy which is a good thing because we're going to be eating it for a while.

I cooked a whole bunch the day before so that Thanksgiving itself could be a little more restful. The fridge was all full of yummy stuff waiting to be cooked.

Everything turned out really good except the rolls which I spent way too long making. They burned. Well the tops looked great, but the parts in the muffin tin all burned. That was a pretty big bummer.
But oh well. At least I had Kris get some frozen ones for a backup so we were ok.

We had turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, sweet potato casserole and rolls. I had corn too but I forgot to bring it out. Which was really ok considering how it was way too much food for us as it was.

I struggled with the gravy as usual, but it turned out pretty good. Not exactly how I wanted it but good enough. And seriously, any sort of gravy looks good in my favorite gravy boat ever (thanks Target!)


Max was pretty interested in how Kris was carving the turkey, and had some good questions.

He really wanted the wishbone, but we couldn't find it this year. He was pretty bummed about that. But that's how it goes sometimes. Besides, we make our own luck around here.

This is Max warming up for dinner by munching on a yucky plastic drumstick. Ick.


Happy Thanksgiving to all!
(and to Sultan)

::happy thanksgiving::

Happy Thanksgiving to everybody, we hope you have a wonderful day!

(gotta love kindergarten)

(and kindergarteners)

::thanks::

For Family Home Evening the other night I stole an idea from a friend (which had already been stolen by her from another friend).
I cut out a bunch of shapes so we could put together little turkeys and write something that we're grateful for on each feather.
I thought it was such a cute idea, and I also thought it would be fun to see what Max is grateful for.

So we did it.

They turned out cute, right?
Max's is hilarious looking. He was pretty disappointed in me that I didn't remember to cut out wattles for the turkeys. I think they must've been working on turkeys at school because I for sure did not teach him that word!

He's grateful for friends, family, eating, his body (I think he had a little help with that one), Dad, Mama Fish, Sultan, and lastly me. We had to remind him that he probably should put me on there. We said, "Didn't you forget somebody Max?" He thought hard and said, "Oh yeah, SULTAN!" Ah well, I know he loves me.

I'm grateful for a lot of things, but one of those things is the internet. It's so nice to feel connected to so many friends and family even though we're so far apart. What a blessing.

::thanksgiving report::

We had a good thanksgiving day yesterday. We had been invited to have dinner with a doctor and her family from Kris's work. Unfortunately they had some sickness in the family and so that didn't work out. Hopefully they're doing better now!
Our friends Chad, Melissa and Grant were also going to go over there also. So we talked and decided we'd get together and just have our own little celebration.

I've cooked a turkey one time before, so I figured I could do it again. With some good advice from moms and dads and a yummy not frozen turkey from Trader Joe's we pulled it off.
The turkey turned out really good. My mom told me to use a turkey bag and it sure worked well. By the time Kris went to carve it the meat was basically falling off the bones. And despite a little scare about cooking the giblets in the turkey, all turned out ok. (we couldn't find the giblets, and then my dad told me they're up in the neck cavity.  By that point it had already been cooking for several hours.  I was just hoping they weren't in a plastic bag, or else the whole turkey would be ruined. Luckily they were in paper. Phew.)

We did about half the food and Chad and Melissa brought half the food. It works out well that way I think.

Poor Grant didn't get to eat anything for his first thanksgiving. It's hard to be little sometimes.
Speaking of first thanksgivings, remember this boy?

Luckily for him he was big enough to eat some of the goodies--he had a couple of months on Grant.

Anyway, back to today.
Here's Kris handing out some denture ice to everybody.

Have you heard of denture ice?

It's ice in the shape of dentures. Kind of gross huh? Pretty funny really. Kelly and Lechelle gave us the ice tray and Max loves it. It's pretty weird to see transparent dentures floating in your drink though.

We had a good meal. I didn't get very good pictures of everybody, but I did get pictures. It's so dark around here these days.

Kris got a whole bunch of Stewarts sodas for us to drink. Mmmm they're good.





Max was wearing Kris's scrub top before dinner. He was pretending to be Dr. Max. This was inspired by Kris getting called into the hospital an hour before dinner. It's nice to be on call...
Anyway, Max wore the scrub top all through dinner, and it made for a wonderful bib. We may start using scrub tops for every meal.

Max, of course, was way too hyped up to actually eat his meal. He was busy talking and giggling and fooling around. So as usual he ended up at the table trying to eat long after everybody else had left. It was so funny--I went in there and there he was very carefully cutting slices off his piece of cranberry sauce with his knife and fork. It was surprisingly civilized of him. And cute of course.

He didn't get all his food finished, but he did end up eating at least some of it. It was quite the effort to get that much done.

After dinner we cleaned up, then we watched some football of course. Then as per Max's request we watched Wall E. This was thanks to Grandma Kathy who had sent it to Max as a thanksgiving gift the day before. It was fun. Then we ate some delicious pumpkin and pecan pie. I was really full after all that.

Then Max held Grant on his lap for a while, which was hilarous.

Grant loves Max, and Max loves Grant. They're good buddies.


And then we called it a day. A good day.

We're thankful for good friends, food, family and our religion. We feel so lucky and blessed this thanksgiving.  Here's hoping everybody else had a great day too.