Food, Glorious Food!

Dad prepares to carve the turkey.

I come from a family who LOVES to eat so many of our celebrations and memories have centered around food over the years.

Thanksgiving with toddlers.

Apparently my hubby came from a similar family because when I married him, he brought a whole new set of family recipes to the marriage AND his own recipe box.

Will Grandma do her usual sampling?

One of the family tricks that has provided amusement at our gatherings has been my mother's tendency to "sample" the pies when no one is looking.  We'd usually discover that she'd done some tasting when we'd go to bring the pie to the table and see that a little hole had been cut out smack dab in the middle of the pie.

"On your mark, get set....."

When all the family gathers together, we enjoy the same dishes over and over again.  If it is Thanksgiving, you get Green Bean Casserole, Hash Brown Supreme Casserole, Sweet Potato Souffle, Dressing, Mashed Potatoes, Jellied Cranberry Sauce, Turkey, a dessert salad (affectionately called "fruit compote" by the kids), and at least two kinds of pie.

We also like to photograph food.  I never realized that we did this so much until this year when my sister-in-law came around the corner and saw me setting up a shot with one of the dishes.

"Wow, " she said, "You and your brother are just the same.  He's always taking pictures of food."

I'd never realized this was unusual.  I thought everyone did this at special meals or when they make something that they want to remember.

After all, how else are you going to have bragging rights, if you don't snap a picture of that culinary concoction and then post it on your blog or up on Facebook?

I was going to ask my mom if she used to do this but then I figured out it would be pointless to do so.  After all, she was ALWAYS taking pictures so I'm sure that there was a roast or a pie in there somewhere.

I DID have to chuckle though on Thanksgiving Day when we Skyped with our son and his family in Texas.  We asked him if he had had a nice holiday with his in-laws.

"Mom," he said.  "It was a curious experience spending the holiday with a different family and seeing what  traditions they had.  And this has to be the FIRST time that I've sat down at a holiday meal where everything  didn't taste like dessert."

Yikes!  Guilty as charged.  We do have a powerful sweet tooth in our family.

Outings and Shenanigans

Continuing our discussion of Thanksgiving traditions, one of our favorite traditions has centered around the cousins getting together.  They've been enjoying each other's company since they were babies and when they get together, mischief and fun isn't far behind.

Over the years, we've had impromptu fashion shows put on by the kids.

We've had sing-a-longs interrupted by the occasional OUTSTANDING dance moves.

We've gone on outings over the holiday weekend.  This particular outing has a little story attached to it.  My brother had been raving about the hamburgers at a place called the Black Diamond Bar and Grille.  He kept going on and on about how they were HUGE and the best he'd ever had. So we all piled in the van and headed out one cold morning for a long drive up into the mountains to have those hamburgers for lunch.  After all that driving, we got there only to find out that they were closed that day.  Oh, man....we sure didn't let my brother forget about that!  However, we continued on and came to this wonderful pancake restaurant that had real maple syrup with their flapjacks and after the meal, you could sit outside on their swings or walk little nature trails through the woods.  It turned into a lovely outing after all.

We've enjoyed "talent shows" put on by the cousins.  They've really been a hoot.

Have you heard of a group called the "Tijuana Brass?"  Well, sometimes we adults have joined in the fun, hence the "Michigander Brass."

And the kids have kept us entertained while we've waited for the turkey to finish cooking.

Sadly, the cousins are scattered around the country now with job and family commitments that make it difficult to get them all together at one time.   These days we are lucky to have one or two of  them joining us for Thanksgiving.  But regardless, we still have fun together as a family.  Wherever YOU are, we hope you have some fun planned, too, this holiday weekend with family or friends.

Smile for the Birdie!

Ah, Thanksgiving!  That time of year when families travel from near and far to get together to eat too much, shop too much, act like fools, and make wonderful memories.

 In our family, my brother's family and our family have taken turns for years getting together to spend the long weekend together.  We've had certain "traditions" that we've followed over the Thanksgiving holiday which I'll share with you in the next few posts but one of the most sacrosanct has been posing for family pictures.

At some point in the weekend, we all get into our festive outfits and gather in one central location, set up the cameras on the tripods, and then the fun begins.

We take many different combinations of pictures.....photos of each family, photos of just the kids, photos of the adult siblings, and photos of the siblings with our mom.

These photo sessions can drag on  and on, sometimes erupting into gales of laughter and other times deteriorating into testiness.

The one thing that they all have in common, though, is that they are snapshots of times in our lives that will never come again.  Despite the dorkiness of them or their perfection, they will always remind us of the special joy we have shared as family.

They are treasures that I enjoy looking at every year.

Perhaps my all-time favorite is this picture that was taken the Thanksgiving immediately after I had finished my 6 months of chemotherapy after a diagnosis of breast cancer.  The joy reflected on our faces is so evident.  We were a family united together, alive,  and life was good.  It still is!  May you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving this week (or have HAD one - for my Canadian friends).