Thanksgiving!

We hosted Thanksgiving for ten people and it went wonderfully well!  I had fun decorating the table with Mama Bear's pretty special occasion tableware, plus some Liezel creative touches.  My sweetheart and I decided to brine our turkey (a 25 lb. bird) using this Food Network recipe: Alton Brown Good Eats Roast Turkey; it was perfect.

We contributed other traditional hot foods (mashed potatoes and gravy, rolls, stuffing), but our guests made the dinner exceptionally good.  Tanya brought a delectable traditional Ukrainian holiday vegetable side dish.  Mara wowed us all with special corn bread muffins, jello salad, Medjool date-bacon-and-ricotta-cheese wraps and two amazing desserts.  There was a lot of umming at our table.

We broke with tradition (slightly) and used green pumpkin seeds as our "kernels" for counting our blessings.  I reviewed my journal a few days before Thanksgiving, and (wow!) it has been an incredible year.  Picking just three kernels to mention at our Thanksgiving table was difficult.  Among a great many things that I am very grateful for this year, I mentioned:

1. Dallin.  My sweetheart, my best friend, my helper, my team-mate (and we make a really good team), and super-dad.  We survived the first year of being parents (together).  We moved again and survived that transition (together).  We made a whole new year of memories and adventuring (together).  I would be a mess without Dallin and all his help and great love.
2. Ezra.  My little sweetie boy is my sunshine during the day and is most excellent company.  Being a mom is not for the faint of heart, and it has not been easy, but I don't know what I would do without my little Ezra.  He is clever and cute and soooo fun.
3. Roslyn and John.  I am so grateful they are having a wonderful time in China.  I am so grateful they are serving a mission and seeing a whole new world.  I am so grateful they have this opportunity.  I am so grateful they are in good health.  I am so grateful for their immense generosity in letting us live in their house.                  

Oh, and another great perk of our Thanksgiving was seeing the cousins together (after an almost 3-month gap).  Happy, busy boys!