A quiet Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving, dear readers!

Since I work on Thursdays, we had our feast yesterday (Wednesday). We started by writing down a menu so we'd know what to make in advance vs. what to make the day of the feast. (We later dropped mashed potatoes and just had Older Daughter's fabulous scalloped potatoes.)

Preparations started on Tuesday, notably the dinner rolls, the stuffings, and desert (strawberry trifle).

Bread stuffing ingredients:

I'm not crazy about bread stuffing, but Don and Older Daughter like it. However Older Daughter doesn't like onions, so what I do is divide the pan into the "onion" side and the "no onion" side. Works beautifully.

My weakness is wild rice stuffing. Since no one else cares for it, I can add all the onions I want. Bliss.

I concentrated on pulling together all the component ingredients for strawberry trifle (defrosting the strawberries, making the cream filling, crushing the graham crackers) while Older Daughter made dinner rolls (here the dough is rising).

I also pulled a bunch of potatoes out of storage.

Yesterday, the day of our feast, started with prepping the bird that's been living in our freezer for three years, and our refrigerator for the past week.

I don't do much by way of fancy prep work on the turkey. After rinsing and patting dry, I merely rub the skin with shortening and put it in the oven (basting it periodically while cooking, of course.

Because we did so much prep work the day before, our Thanksgiving Day was actually rather leisurely. Here's the trifle assembly station...

...and the finished product.

Older Daughter made green beans in oyster sauce and scalloped potatoes, then started setting the table. She likes to fold the napkins in elegant shapes on Thanksgiving. While she was working on this, she suddenly stopped and realized she was making four place settings, not three. Even after all these years, it's hard not to miss Younger Daughter at such times.

While the turkey was baking, Don sharpened knives. It's become something of a family tradition to sharpen the knives for Thanksgiving. The reason for this stems from a time we had our beloved pastor (David "Spike" Shine) join us for Thanksgiving. He offered to carve the turkey, since he was quite good at it. To our everlasting embarrassment, every knife he tried was dull. Don hastily sharpened a knife, and Spike was finally able to carve the bird. Since then, every year without fail, Don gives a bunch of knives a good sharpening on Thanksgiving. (Rest in peace, Spike. We still miss you.)

The bird came out looking very nice.

While Don carved (with sharp knives!), I made gravy.

At last we all sat down to eat, a feast worth waiting for.

Besides the gratitude for our family, our health, and our food, we're also grateful we were able to stay home. Consider this video of holiday traffic, and you'll understand why.

A blessed, abundant, and safe Thanksgiving, dear readers!