The forgotten holiday...

Here's to Thanks-giving, our often maligned and forgotten holiday. Today I finally got around to replacing the Halloween decorations with Thanksgiving ones. There aren't a lot to choose from. For Halloween we get spooky ghosts and spiders and orange and purple lights for the house. Don't get me started on all the Christmas decorations! (I fear I may need to add yet another plastic tub to my collection!) But what do we get for Thanksgiving? Turkeys. I've even seen some that sing and dance, but that's just annoying, not festive! My Thanksgiving decor consists of some window clings depicting pilgrims, American Indians, the "horn of plenty", and pretty maple leaves. I also have a couple leafy garlands left over from our wedding decor, (We got married in November. In fact, our anniversary is on Thanksgiving this year. 9 years!) some fake gourds and the Fisher Price Little People First Thanksgiving playset artfully displayed in the space we usually save for old magazines, junk mail and scented candles we can never light because they might start the junk mail on fire. But that's all. (And I have much more than most people!) I just bought a leafy pinecone wreath and some scarecrows for the outside of the house. Why, you may ask? (It's what the husband was asking!) Because Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays!

I, like many of my generation, did not study the "art" of cooking at my mother's arm. Not that she didn't try, of course, but I was simply not interested. Having grown up far from extended family, we created our own extended "family" of my parent's friends and their children, to whom I am still close, just as much as my own cousins. Our childhood Thanksgivings were hosted by one of these "aunties", so I never really saw all the work that was put into the meal. My family always brought the pumpkin pies and cranberry dish. (Except the year of the "bloody cranberries". For more details see my sister's blog!) As children grow and procreate, these events became too big, and have been subsequently discontinued. Time goes on.

But not to worry, I still have my husband's family, and they have a gathering every year. And a gathering it is, too! I know I have previously mentioned the size and scope of my husband's family, so suffice it to say that they do not have a sit-down dinner! It actually feels a little like eating at a soup kitchen, with the paper plate dripping gravy as you precariously balance it on one knee to avoid the children who insist on running through the house. (There are so many kids now, I'm not sure I even know all of their names!) Not really what I had in mind.

One year I decided we weren't going anywhere for dinner, but where going to stay home and cook it ourselves! (I think every young bride goes through a phase like that.) I got some great recipes off the internet and out of the BetterHomes cookbook. (The red and white checked one...my cooking bible!) I planned it out meticulously, every ingredient and exactly how much time everything needed. (For me, cooking is more like math than art, something to be carefully calculated!) And you know what? It was amazing! Seriously, I wasn't over stressed (mostly because we were eating mid-afternoon so I didn't have to rise at the butt-crack of dawn to get the turkey in the oven!), everything came out the way it was supposed to, or mostly anyway. We watched football and drank wine and ate on real china (my great-grandmother's) with real linens and candles and everything. We all loved it, and so I've been doing it ever since! I usually invite my parents and my brother (I would have my sister too, but she lives far, far away!), and every other year we have the stepsons around the table as well. This is a holiday devoted to family and food and being thankful for what you have. What a great idea! And I can't think of a better way to spend it than eating with my family in an environment where I can actually converse with them! (And not have the "thing that I'm thankful for" be that it's all over!)

I guess it's okay that I can't buy Thanksgiving lights to put up, or that the only movies for this holiday are the Peanuts' Thanksgiving ones. If it was more commercialized it might ruin some of the...romance, for lack of a better word. Besides, when the bird carcass is the trash and dishes are done, (and believe me, that could take a couple days!) it's time to put up the Christmas tree anyway! But until then...Happy Thanksgiving!