Give Thanks

Well I have become a blogging machine this weekend. What up with that? Some how I've managed to carve out a little extra free time for me. So Dave and Mel have gone home, taking Dave's beard with them. I will report that Abby did touch the beard on a couple of occaisions before they left.

We had dinner with my Mom and Eddie last night and true to form she made way too much food. This is a chronic holiday problem for my Mom. Her motto is go big or go home. My Mom is one of 5 kids and growing up all major holidays were either spent with my Mom's parents or my Dad's parents. We never had a holiday dinner at home, that I can remember anyway. So dinners with my Dad's family was a pretty low key affair. There was my grandparents and my Aunt's family (husband and 2 kids). Now with my Mom's family there was 5 kids with 4 of them having spouses and kids of their own. Plus my grandparents, my great grandma and whatever "lost souls" somebody had managed to collect that year. All of us crammed into a house that was way too small to hold us all comfortably, but you never felt uncomfortable there. Now can you imagine the food that was at that table? Did I mention the fact that my Mom is Polish? There would be turkey, ham, kielbasa, pierogies, cabbage rolls, potatoes and assorted side dishes. Now it should be mentioned that my Grandma had neither indoor plumbing of any kind or an electric stove. Water had to be brought in from the pump outside and all of her cooking was done on an old wood fired cook stove. Can you even imagine trying to bake a pie or hot cross buns in a wood stove? How in the world could you ever regulate the heat? I guess 40 years of cooking like that will make you an expert. So even though now my Grandparents have passed and most of our holiday dinners are spent just with my Mom, Eddie, Dave, Mel and us my Mom is still programmed to cook for 20 plus. But hey..... no compliants here. You should see the leftovers we came home with. I do have to say that the 30 pound turkey was done to absolute perfection! Perfectly moist!

So we had dinner. Abby ate her weight in sausage. Dave ate his weight in everything else. Desserts were multiple. Pumpkin pie, apple pie, peach pie, pumpkin cake, pumpkin cheesecake. More yummy leftovers for us!! After dinner and a brief period of rest we had coffee, dessert and played some 90's Trivial Pursuit. Dave and Mike had beaten Mel and I two games in a row last night so we were desparate for a win. I have to say it ended in a draw since Dave and Mel needed to get on the road for home. Have I mentioned how much I hate how far away they live? I love to play board games. It's a cheap night of entertainment and nobody in our circle of local friends like to play games. Dave and Mel are it. Abby was right in with us trying to play Trivial Pursuit so I was already getting excited seeing family game night in our future. I've actually already picked her up the Memory game for Christmas. I loved Memory as a kid. Seeing how much she wanted to play last night I think I might get her Candyland too.

Since it is Thanksgiving... what are you thankful for?

I am thankful for......

Mike and the family we've made together.

Abby, she's everything I could have wished for and so worth the wait.

The Baby even when he/she is kicking away at my bladder.

being pregnant. Ultimately I wanted to be a mom which doesn't necessarily mean ever being pregnant, and that would have been fine, but I'm thankful for the experience.

our family... the ones I brought, the ones Mike brought and the ones we've adopted together along the way. What an amazing group of people. We're so lucky to have them all.

Not a very long list, but a very important one. That's all I really need. Everything else is just stuff.