Happy Turkey Day!!

Yesterday I ran around all morning... and part of the afternoon. When I got home, I crashed.

Naps feel so good!!

After an easy dinner of grilled lamb and asparagus, I fixed the sweet potatoes for my trip to Jennifer's for dinner today (she's the Pickle rescuing me from a frozen turkey dinner), then cleaned the kitchen. While watching the evening shows, I worked on organizing my stash drawers and basted another charity quilt I found.

I may quilt it up this morning.. it should take about an hour. Then throw it on the "needs binding" pile.

This morning: clean the living room carpet (someone with muddy feet walked on it. I am not saying whether those footprints appear canine or human....), walk the dogs, then get ready for turkey-day.

Steve is visiting his mother and heading to our traditional Turkey-day dinner. All the cousins rent the one-room school house in Bishop Hill, Ill.; it has plenty of tables and a great large industrial kitchen. The food is cooked elsewhere and brought in:

Two turkeys.
One ham.
2 roasting pans full of stuffing (white bread, unfortunately, instead of cornbread).
1 small bowl of oyster stuffing.
Scalloped corn.
That green bean casserole (usually times 2 or 3),
Rolls.
A roasting pan full of mashed potatoes.
Another full of gravy.
Assorted other veggies dishes.
Several salads (one taco salad that has iceberg lettuce and a bunch of jello salads).

This it true "midwest farm country fare" (think a 1962 cookbook). Almost every dish will contain atleast 2 of the following: CoolWhip, Velvetta Cheese, Sour Cream, Mayonaisse, Cream of Campbell soup. Iceberg lettuce will be the only fresh veggie.. all the others will come from a can.

Anyway 2 large cafeteria style tables will hold the "dinner" foods and a third table will hold the desserts.

On the highest year, we had about 67 people show up for dinner... the number has been steadily declining over the years, though, and now averages somewhere in the 30s. (though the amount of food brought to the shindig hasn't decreased).

While the women organize the dinner (service about 12:30), Dan will bring the "thanksgiving tv" (it's a small black and white with rabbit ears that is only used on this day), and set it up for the football games. The cards will be shuffled, the board games examined.

After the first round of gluttony, the women clean up (do you sense a trend here??), and the guys start on the card games. Kids run outside to play (weather pending) and challenge us to HP version of trivial pursuit. This all continues throughout the afternoon

Then about 4 pm, the food comes out again for a second round of chow. Most people settle for a sandwish, some small scoop of veggie and a slice of pie. (we just ate a couple hours earlier, right??). After which... yep, the women clean up the kitchen, divvie up the leftovers and pack the stuff to go home; they guys take down the tables and clean the front room. We have to be out of their by 5:30 pm so that locals can get ready for St. Lucia festivities that occur that weekend.

So what's your traditional turkey day like? And those of you outside the US... what is your country's/regions/ family's "harvest celebration" like? And when?