Thanksgiving, continuing tradition

I like to put photos in my posts, but this post is about Thanksgiving and, well, I ATE all the food before I thought to take a photo!!! So here is an oldie - my purple Shakespear in the Park - I've made this pattern 3X now and want to make it again! That is all the quilty content of this post - onward to my thoughts about this past Thanksgiving and traditions!

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Being from the US, I KNOW Thursday was Thanksgiving down there - but here I am in Canada. And guess what? Canada celebrates mid-October in a more low-key way than the US. So - been there, done that this year, sort-ov. For Canadian Thanksgiving I asked SB what he wanted for a special meal and he wanted weinerschnitzel - and seeing that it was just the 3 of us, that was fine with me. I thought I had skipped the entire Thanksgiving turkey meal!

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Enter my 5 1/2 year old son - who is now old enough to figure out that THIS week was the US Thanksgiving day (thanks to some internet e-cards!). Oh, the drama!!! I explain to him that we already celebrated, but to no avail. Nope, no sir-ee, he ordered up a US Thanksgiving dinner, staring a turkey. Because it is ALL about the turkey, right? Never mind the fact that I already know he will only take 2 bites out of a 20 lb bird and then happily eat just the mashed potatoes and carrots. Of course, I could always cook a smaller bird, but we already had a 20 pounder in the freezer.

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Anyway, we had already invited a family over for dinner on Saturday - a good playmate of School Boy's - who has 3 younger brothers & sisters, so you do the math. Lots of little kids, and oh so cute! Plus a middle-school aged daughter. We WERE going to have pork roast, but since SB's heart was set on turkey, the turkey was defrosted. All 20 lbs of it for 3 adults and 5 young children - 1 of whom doesn't eat solids yet (the father stayed home with 1 baby who was still napping). Oh yes, we have left-overs! We did have 1 couple come into the restaurant and they each had a plate too and of course, we sent some home with SB's friend. But still, there are lots of left-overs, yum!
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I made some favorites... sweet potato casserole with pecan topping, fresh green bean/mushroom casserole, stuffing with sausage and dried cranberries, LOTS of gravy (need that gravy for hot turkey sandwiches later this week!), buttered peas and carrots and mashed potatoes. For dessert there was store-bought pumpkin pie and vanilla icecream. As predicted, SB ate 2 servings of mashed potato and a few bits of his peas/carrots, but nothing else. Oh, and icecream. That boy makes me laugh - he was soooo excited to have this big feast, had his heart set on turkey and then didn't even take one bite. It was just the excitement of having a traditional turkey meal with friends that he liked.

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As he raced around the house with his friends in full glee, I realized that as adults sometimes we need to let our own ideas of holidays go by the wayside and continue traditions for the younger generation. Being from a big family I am used to a Thanksgiving celebrated with many, many people so I thought, why bother - just for us? But my young son has taught me, because "just for us" is important! When I tucked him in to bed he hugged and kissed me and told me it was the best Thanksgiving ever!

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Yes, is was alot of cooking for mostly very young children, but in the process I am perpetuating a holiday tradition. And we all enjoyed it. All said and done, I am glad that we didn't skip the turkey dinner this year!

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