thanksgiving: take four

I am tired of eating.  Seriously.  In the past, there were years that my only Thanksgiving meal was grilled hamburgers—true American!  But this year I managed to squeeze in four!  I don’t want to take any of it for granted, as I know that there are many people all over the world who are not as fortunate.  Dear Lord, please never let me forget those people.

For the ‘real’ Thanksgiving, Jeff & I traveled north to be with his family.  What should be a 4 hour trip turned into a 6+ hour drive; slowed by the 3 million people vacating the city and stalled by one very dead car battery!  [Had we been in my car we would have had jumper cables.  A Daddy’s girl is always prepared thanks to said Daddy!]  We made it, though, and just in time for a delicious meal at a small local Italian spot.

Chef Jeff

His Aunt and Cousin arrived at the house just in time for lunch on Thanksgiving Day.  And lunch we had!  Everything was delicious but my favorite moment came at the end of the meal when his Mom said, ‘Ellen, I don’t know if you know this, but it is tradition for the guys to clear the table and wash & put everything away while we the women stay right here.’  Thank you, Lord, for traditions!

I have no idea how long we sat there enjoying dessert, drinks, and each other but I do know it was well past dark when I first stood up.  [Keep in mind we had Thanksgiving lunch.]  Later that evening we went and hung out with Jeff’s friend, Greg, and probably watched some football.

The rest of the weekend was spent lounging, eating, & Roll Tiding, sprinkled with some shopping, and showered with a defensive driving course that I was racing to complete.  Christmas decorations were also seen exploding and popping up all over the house.

Crazily enough, Emily’s boyfriend’s family lives practically in the next town over.  They came up the weekend so we got to hang out with them one night!  I also got to see my friend, Brooke, from grad school.  I was so excited to see her and meet her new boyfriend.  I love old friends.  Our friendship has had some rocky patches, though.  A brief timeline of events might look like this:

Brooke gets the flu; sick for two days.

Ellen gets the flu from Brooke; sick for seven days, fever reaches 104.1, visits doctor once and receives shots & meds.

Brooke wants to make Ellen feel better with a tub of ice cream; driving to the store, she is hit in an intersection and totals her car.

Good friends see each other through the worst things!

I think this was the first Thanksgiving/holiday that our family was in four different places.  Mom & Dad were in Alabama fixing up his house the week before and didn’t get home until midnight the night before then turned around the next day and headed up to the TAMU football game.  Andrew probably slept till noon and then went to the football game.  Emily probably slept till 2:00 as she did not have tickets to the football game.

I hope that you had a wonderful Thanksgiving!  And remember, the diet doesn’t start until after New Year’s!!!