Thanksgiving Plans

Now that we’re well into the first week of November I think it’s socially acceptable to start talking about Thanksgiving plans.  I love Thanksgiving.  It is, by far, my absolute favorite holiday.  I love cooking for people, so I think a holiday that’s all about being thankful you have food to cook and people you love to cook it for is perfect.

Thanksgiving this year wasn’t looking good, though.  Nick works in a branch of the emergency services, and has to work on Thanksgiving. That’s not unusual.  I  think he’s had one Thanksgiving off in the nine years we’ve been together, so we’ve become pretty good at working around him having to work.  In years past, he has gotten a two hour lunch break, so we’ve had Thanksgiving then.  It worked.  I had everything ready, and people always showed up on time.  Other years we’ve had dinner a little later, when he gets off of work.  This year, though, he’s on-call starting the day after Thanksgiving.  The likelihood of him being called in to work early Friday morning is high.  A late celebration at our house just didn’t seem like a wise plan.  I was pretty upset by the idea of not being able to have some kind of Thanksgiving celebration at least close to Thanksgiving.

This has been a really, really bad year, and I’ve been kind of floundering lately.  Part of me wants to cry myself to sleep and hibernate until 2017 because it has to be a better year than this one has been.  Please.  Part of me also wants to try to do something to somehow try to improve the rest of 2016; maybe the last little bit of it can be a little better.  I just haven’t really been able to come up with a good plan, one that felt right, or that I could get really excited about.  That’s when we came up with our plans for Thanksgiving.

The hospice house that GrandMommy was in is very close to us.  They have a kitchen so family members can cook meals there, and they have a nice big dining room table so people can eat together.

Hospice is an incredible organization, and they’re very welcoming to people who want to do something to volunteer.  We thought about it, and decided to ask the hospice house here if I could cook them Thanksgiving dinner and bring it for whoever might want it.  Losing a loved one is never easy, but I can’t imagine how painful it must be to face that during the holidays.  From a practical standpoint, restaurant choices are somewhat limited on a holiday.

I called the hospice house the day we came up with the idea to ask if I could do it.  I wasn’t sure if they might want references or some kind of background check or something, so I wanted to allow plenty of time for that.  The lady who answered the phone was incredibly nice.  It took a few minutes to explain that, yes, I wanted to bring an entire Thanksgiving meal.  She told me that would be fine, wonderful in fact, but suggested that I talk to the volunteer coordinator just to make sure, and to make things official.

The volunteer coordinator wasn’t going to be in for a few days, so I left my contact information and waited to hear back from her.  Meanwhile, I panicked a little bit.  Cooking Thanksgiving dinner for the hospice house seemed like the perfect plan.  I was very worried that there would be some issue, and I started making lists of people I could ask for references if I needed to plead my case.  Nick promised me he would find me someone to cook Thanksgiving dinner for if the hospice house said no for any reason.

I finally talked to the volunteer coordinator, Elaine, about a week later.  She and I ended up playing phone tag for a couple of days, but it was worth the wait.  She was incredibly nice!  She confirmed, again, that I did mean the whole meal, and we came up with a good time for me to bring it.  The plan is for me to call a few days ahead of time to get a rough idea of how many people might be there.  Elaine reminded me that some families may have other plans, and that some people don’t eat very much when they’re upset.  She also said that the staff will definitely appreciate it, and that surely some family members will too.

So now I’m cooking Thanksgiving dinner for a crowd, and getting to pay it forward a little bit too.  Honestly, I’m hoping there aren’t very many people in hospice care on Thanksgiving.  I’m more than happy to cook for a crowd, but I hope it’s a happier Thanksgiving than that for most people.

Now, it’s time for the fun part of this post!  The food!  I’m trying to go ahead and plan the menu; partly so I can buy things ahead of time on sale, and partly because that’s just how I am with Thanksgiving.  We close at work at noon the Wednesday before, so my plan is to come home from work that day and start cooking and baking.

Obviously, the turkey is the main part of the meal.  Depending on what they tell me as far as the number of people, I may also cook a turkey breast along with the turkey.  Dressing is a must, as are mashed potatoes, and sweet potato casserole.  I’m a good southerner, so gravy (lots and lots of gravy) goes almost without saying.  And more gravy.  Definitely macaroni and cheese.  Cranberry sauce is another must.  Definitely some green bean casserole.  I can’t stand it, but the rest of the world seems to love it.  I always make rice (with pan drippings in place of some of the water, and a package of vegetable soup mix, it’s delicious!) with our Thanksgiving dinner, so I’ll do that too.  I also usually make some sort of greens with Thanksgiving dinner.  Partly because I really like them, and partly because I can feel better about gorging on Thanksgiving food because, hey, I’m eating leafy green vegetables too.  And of course dinner rolls, because you need something else to mop up the gravy with.

For desserts, pumpkin pie is a must.  Depending on the number of people they tell me, maybe more than one.  I’m also planning to make chocolate cupcakes.  Maybe a pound cake.

Now here’s the part where I ask for your ideas and suggestions:

Is there something else I should make?  I didn’t grow up celebrating Thanksgiving.  I’ve embraced it wholeheartedly, but sometimes I still feel like a novice.  I make the foods that Nick and I like, and that the people we’re celebrating with that particular year like.  Is there some traditional/must have Thanksgiving item that I’m missing?  What makes it special for you?  When it comes to greens, do you prefer collard greens, turnip greens, or mustard greens?  I like them all, but I know some people have strong preferences.  I’m open to menu suggestions and ideas.

Now here’s the part where it gets really complicated.  I cannot properly carve a turkey.  Not even close!  Any tips on that?  I’m hoping I can get a friend to stop by and do it for me.  I’m willing to bribe someone with a pie or something.  Any ideas on what a good bribe might be to get someone to come over and carve the turkey for me?

I’ve even considered taking it whole, but I’m afraid that might be inconvenient for the hospice house.  What are your thoughts on that?  Any compelling reasons why you think I should take it whole?

So what about you?  Do you love Thanksgiving?  What are your plans?

Blogging From A to Z Challenge

It’s almost time for the annual A to Z Blogging Challenge. You can read more (and sign up!) here. If you’re not familiar, it involves blogging almost every day during the month of April, following the alphabet. Sundays are the day off. On April 1^st you write a blog post that somehow pertains (starts with, about, etc) the letter A, and move through the alphabet during the month, but skip Sundays.


The A to Z Challenge is a lot of fun. It’s a great way to connect with other bloggers, as well as a great way to get into the habit of regular blogging. If you’ve never done it, I encourage you to give it a try. Yes, it’s time consuming, but it’s enjoyable.

You have the option of sticking with a theme, or going random. I’ve gone random every year I’ve participated, but this year, I’m going with a theme. I thought it might be fun to try something a little different, and I’ve come up with a theme I really like. The theme reveal for everyone doing one is on March 21^st. Some people come up with some really interesting themes.

So what about you? Are you planning to sign up for the A to Z Challenge? Will you be doing a theme?

Sixteen Things to Ring in 2016

Happy New Year! A couple of days late. Blogging took a backseat during the holidays, so here’s my catch-up and holiday posts all in one.

1. Emma is okay for the moment. I almost hate to write that, but it also feels good. It was a wonderful Christmas present. We’re dog-sitting my parents’ dog this weekend. He adores Emma, and she seems to be reveling in the attention and change in routine.

Sweet Emma!

2. It got really cold really fast here. We were running the air conditioner on Christmas Day, which was total bliss. By New Year’s Eve we were running the heat. Winter is my least favorite season, so I’m disappointed that it seems to be here in earnest now.

3. Brie, blue cheese, walnuts, and apricot jam is a truly amazing combination. We had this dish on Christmas, and now I can’t wait to make it again. Nick isn’t a blue cheese fan, so I did half without blue cheese. It’s good without the blue cheese, but with blue cheese it’s amazingly delicious. 

4. I had my yearly MRI to check on the hepatic adenomas on December 14^th. I wasn’t really expecting results until after Christmas, but I got them the next day, and they were great. The largest one is now about a quarter of the size it was when the whole thing started two and a half years ago! We’ll continue with a yearly MRI just to keep an eye on things, but it’s looking good.

5. We started a new Christmas tradition with our next door neighbors. We’ve always exchanged baked goods, but this year we swapped out nights of cooking. It was fun, a little different (especially since there seem to be so many baked goods at Christmas), and getting a night off from cooking can be a nice gift.

6. We still have almost everyone’s Christmas presents. For various reasons we weren’t able to see most of the friends and family we normally see on or close to Christmas. The cats are thrilled by this since it means they still have boxes to sleep on and bows to tear up.

7. The upside to not getting to see everyone is that we were able to have a very relaxing day spent in our pajamas. Nick was off for Christmas, and it was wonderful to actually have a holiday together.

It still looks like Christmas here.

8. The downside (aside from not seeing everyone) is that we’re running out of places to stash people’s presents. The cats have already totally unwrapped one, and there just aren’t that many cat proof places in our house.

9. The other downside is that I really, really like one of the presents we got for my best friend Crystal. It’s a really pretty garnet ring. She and I wear the same size ring, so the temptation is real. Very real. But she’s my best friend, and I think she will really like it.

10. My phone/technology issues aren’t going away this year. I tried to call a friend last night and my phone informed me that it had been deactivated. After lots of frustration and on-line chatting with the company I discovered that because I have a new debit card (same account, the credit union just seems to really enjoy issuing new cards) my payment was declined. I had to text the information to my sister because you can only make payments over the phone. I’m not sure what plan I have now, but the phone is working again and Nick has promised to fix everything back to the way it was once he gets home from work tomorrow. 



Not the best picture, but it's a great ring

11. The no-kill shelter we adopted Cookie from makes a video at the end of every year with highlights from the year and information about the number of animals saved. For 2015 they saved over 6,000, which included the ones they took in after the flooding in South Carolina. It was the most successful year yet. 

12. We’ve started a list of all of the things we want to see/places we want to go that are within a day trip from home. There are so many things fairly close to home that we’ve been talking about doing, but never seem to get around to. We’re hoping a list will help.

13. January is Pantry Challenge Month. It’s a good way to get back on track after the holidays and use up all of those impulse buys from the grocery store.

14. We are finally completely finished with AT&T, a.k.a. The World’s Worst Internet Service. We switched to Charter about three weeks ago, and it has been wonderful. Netflix doesn’t freeze, we can both be online at the same time, and it doesn’t take forever to attach pictures now.

15. Despite having a smart phone, I’m still sticking with my usual day planner for 2016. I just don’t get along well enough with the phone to trust my entire schedule to it.

16. Even if you’re not the type to make resolutions for the new year, there’s just something promising about a new, blank calendar. Maybe it’s just the idea of a fresh start.

So what about you? What’s new in your world for 2016? Or what is staying the same?