Our Thanksgiving

This Thanksgiving, my fiance’s extended family (the local extended family) met my family for the first time.  Months ago, my mother recognized the upcoming holiday (and an impending engagement that was a secret until about 48 hours ago) as an opportunity to cook a ton of food, and she did exactly that.  This should come as no surprise to any readers of this blog, but even for my mother, this was quite the undertaking.

My mother made these wonderful place markers for each guest.  They each held a dozen pieces of Harbor Sweets chocolates that we bought in Salem, Mass.. She placed rosemary and pine cones from our gardens on the front of each of them.

            Our family was brought together for the first time, and we sat and bonded with the help of three turkeys, several pounds of stuffing, an equal amount of mashed potatoes, a ton of corn, plentiful green beans, rolls for days, 20(!) pumpkin and pecan pies, Crab Hoelzel, Peanut Soup, sweet potatoes, and if I’m forgetting anything you’ll have to forgive me because come on, that’s a lot of food. 

            We held the dinner at my parents’ guest house, or, as it’s more commonly known, The Stone House.  It features a jukebox that spins vintage 45s, and a very wide-open space in the main room that could comfortably accommodate the thirteen people who attended.  Cooking that kind of meal for such a large group created certain logistical issues that necessitated the use of chafing dishes and sternos, a first for us.  And I’d like to say I did a wonderful job popping the caps off of the sternos and lighting them!  

            Other ways in which I contributed: 

                        -Moving the food into the chafing dishes.

                        -Bringing up soda and apple cider from the downstairs refrigerator.

                        -Lending my calming presence. 

                        -Plugging the impromptu playlist into the jukebox. 

                        -Helping my sister find La Bamba in said jukebox, which proved                                    difficult due to a mislabeling.

                        -I wanted to set up a fog machine, but was overruled. 

                        -Getting engaged, thereby necessitating the event in the first place!

            It was a fantastic evening.  The peanut soup and the Crab Hoelzel are two of my absolute favorite foodstuffs ever, and over the past months that I’ve been dating Thais it’s been my pleasure to meet her wonderful family.  I loved being able to finally introduce them to my own. 

And by the end of the meal, we all felt kind of like this: