The Boy and the Bulldog: Thanksgiving 2008

Monday, December 1, 2008

Thanksgiving 2008

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving weekend! If you're like me, you have a lot to give thanks for. This year, we were thankful for our health, our family, and especially thankful for an amazing first year home for Ian.

I'm not sure he understood the holiday or even knew it had happened. We did a very scaled down version of Turkey day for just the three of us, and then did a traditional meal with Grandma Trish & Grandpa Tom Sunday. One thing's for sure. Ian isn't much of a Thanksgiving food fan. He likes cranberries, potatoes, and yams, but not so thrilled about turkey. Over the course of the 4 day weekend, he had way too much junk food and watched way too many Little Einsteins episodes. He stayed up late every night, slept in, hung out in his jammies all day, played in the table-fort, and just about everything else you can think of that spells "lazy parents". Good for us, huh?

Backing up a bit, Wednesday was Ian's Thanksgiving lunch at school. Parents were invited so took a long lunch from work and arrived for a turkey lunch with 15 two year olds. What could be more fun? Ummm, well... Almost anything else in the world would have been more fun. It wasn't all that bad, but I can confirm that there is nothing more disgusting than watching 15 two year olds serve themselves and eat a large, messy meal. The little boy across the table from me ate somewhere in the ballpark of 20 mini corn muffins. Most of them all at once. Ian ate almost nothing but corn and cranberries, while the tiny little girl next to me ate 3 very large pieces of turkey. Unfortunately, I couldn't take pictures for privacy reasons, but Ian held hands with the girl next to him, Reese, almost the entire time. It was so adorable.

Unfortunately, most of the parents who came took their kids with them when they left. I hadn't planned for that and had to get back to work. It went over horribly. Ian assumed he was coming with me (like he always does when I come to school) and even brought me his coat. When I told him he needed to lay down for nap and I would be back later, he had a huge meltdown. Huge. Huge. Huge. I laid with him on his mat and scratched his back, but eventually had to go. He kept screaming, "please mommy, crib!". I felt horrible. I will never, ever show my face in the middle of his day again!

Today was kind of a big deal. I took an extra day off and spent it all alone. Polli was pouting after we kicked her out of bed last night for snoring, so I didn't even have her by my side. I vacuumed, cleaned, put the Christmas tree up, and cooked a turkey on the BBQ. Yes, you read right. I wanted more turkey for leftovers and decided to try it on the BBQ with wood chips. It turned out great. It wasn't nearly as smoky as the turkey Grandpa Tom does in his smoker, but it still turned out much more tender than in the oven.

The tree is another story. Anyone with a prelit tree understands my pain when I put it together and half the lights didn't light. On a prelit tree, it's not quite so easy to determine which light is causing the outage. It made for a long morning, but I got it figured out. Getting Ian and Polli to leave the ornaments alone is another story!

Below are a handful of pics from the weekend. I didn't take a ton. See the part about Lazy Parents. I'm really mad that I didn't get another of Ian with Grandma & Grandpa for a comparison, so these will have to do. Sorry!