The company is gone, the last of them pulled out this morning around 10. Frosty and Noel got busy decorating the house, cleaning up the last of the dressing and turkey, cranberry salad and threw out the desserts. I have one more story about this past week. I had taken Christi, our daughter from Orlando to Sam Moons to buy some gifts. While there, I remembered that a friend had told me that I should invest in a magnetic bracelet to keep the ails and pains of certain arthritis away. So there I see them, $8.50. I quickly grab one and once in the car, proceed to put in on. Now, I will feel no aches and pains during the holidays. Frosty calls us to see if we want to meet him for lunch. Of course we do. So we head off to lunch and I order shrimp creole. We are chatting away and eatting and telling him all our things we have done that day when all of a sudden I realize I have somehow poured food all over myself. I look down and there is shrimp, rice and sauce all over me. Then I see it, while talking, my magnetic bracelet had picked up my fork and it was attached to my arm, via the bracelet. The food that had been on the fork was now in my lap. We started laughing looking at the fork just dangling in mid air. What a sight. So, new rule, do NOT wear the bracelet while eatting or cutting things. I have had a knife attach itself to me just waving my hand over the counter. I’m glad it helps keep pain at bay, since it looks like I’m going to have quite a few cuts and burns, thanks to my new bracelet! Hope you had a blessed Thanksgiving. It was great to see our kids who we don’t get to see very often and to make some precious new memories, some of which were quite hilarious.

Well, it has already begun. Thoughts of how to use up the left over turkey. We did go a little overboard this year on the size of turkey. We had a 22 pounder with a 10 lb ham, so we are on Amazon looking for ” 365 ways to use turkey” cookbook. The only ways we could come up with are as follows:

Turkey Stew, turkey and dumplings, sweet and sour turkey, turkey spaghetti, turkey and rice, southern fried turkey, turkey pot pie, turkey goulash, chicken fried turkey, turkey frito pie, turkey enchiladas, well, you get the idea. Frosty has told me to most assuredly scale down next year on the size of the turkey. But until then, I am open for suggestions oh how to get rid of all this Mr. Tom Turkey. We hope to hear back from some of you as to how to do this. We are off to the mall to look for cookbooks and to walk off some of the pecan pie, pumpking gooey butter cake and the chocolate cream pie that we consummed yesterday. Enjoy your shopping day today. If you spot one of those cookbooks, please let me know.

Wow, we had it all, the turkey, the trimmings, the tall tales and………………throw up! I had everybody finally seated and had just taken a couple of bites when my grandson sitting right across from me made a few “burping” sounds and then, it was all over………..needless to say, my meal was over. His mother, my daughter, sitting at another table, didn’t even know what went on. We got it cleaned up, the plate rinsed out and washed his mouth out, and I look over and she is still just sitting, laughing, enjoying her meal and just having a grand time. Marie, my son-in-law’s mom fell off the curb upon arrival to our house and dropped the deviled eggs. Cameron had to go up to Wallgreens to get a laxitive.  We actually got a video of Frosty snoring in the chair. Everyone is gone and we are cleaning up and putting the food away, when we look in the living room only to discover that everyone had not left. We had one guest who was still here until we hear a knock on the door, and we open it to our “left over guests’  sister who had come back after him. Guess she forgot he was riding with them. We have had “left over food” on Thanksgiving, but this was a first to have a left over guests. Boy, I cannot wait until Christmas! I’m thinking that Luby’s is sounding pretty good and maybe Frosty and I can go up and eat with the “oldies” around 5:30. No left over food, no left over guests, no mess to clean up, but then……………….where would the memories be? I think I will just chance it and begin to write my evite for Christmas dinner. After all, we now have a great blackmail video of Frosty. That should get me quite a few gifts this year! Hope your Thanksgiving day was blessed. We had a great day and enjoyed so much having 5 families ranging in ages from 88 to 4 months all sitting around the table. What a way to celebrate God’s goodness.

Wanted to take a few minutes to thank each of you for reading my blog! It is a joy to write thoughts and recipes which you are hopefully enjoying reading cooking. Wishing you a most wonderful and blessed Thanksgiving. Hope each of you take a moment to just think of all the wonderful things we have to be thankful. We are blessed this year to have so many of our family with us, so it will be crazy, loud, exciting, fun, but oh so awesome as we sit together around the table. We will miss some who could not be with us. You are in our hearts and wish we could all be here. Write and tell us some of your new recipes you are trying. Can’t wait to hear. We have two new ones I will write about on Fri. So take a minute to put your feet up, after the meal and think of at least one new memory you helped create this year! Blessings to all of you, Trudy

My, oh my, it was brought to my attention last night that I am not 30 anymore. Christi, our daughter and her good friend from Houston and I went “exploring” today, all day and did the Sam Moon trip, Hobby Lobby, Mexican food lunch, Weirs, Mardel’s and finally The Market, where upon arriving at home about 6:30, we unloaded the trunk, with our Sonic drinks in hand. Standing in the kitchen getting out the necessary pans to make “puppy chow” which, I have to admit is the best food invented since faitas on flour tortillas, there are now 4 of us in the kitchen, while I am trying to make chicken spaghetti and get it in our stomachs before 9 p.m.(which I have learned ,I cannot eat at 9 without taking a bottle of tums to prevent heartburn). Anyway, the girls are making this chocolate dream of a snack while I am cutting onion and bell pepper and trying to convince Frosty that he would be a much better help to me if he would go undo the new porch christmas trees we just had bought, rather than standing right beside me telling me a better and more efficient way to make the chicken spaghetti. So……finally at 8 we sit down to dinner. Monta, our friend from Houston, who works as a dr in the emergency room, begins to tell us stories of her internship while living in New Orleans. We laugh till we cry at some of the stories she tells us of how she was constantly trying to decipher what the people would be trying to tell her with their cajun accent and she would have to run and ask other dr’s what the people were trying to say, before she could treat them.

It is now 9 and the girls decide that we should now begin our crafts which we had bought to make at Hobby Lobby. So Frosty and Noel clean up and we get the infamous glue gun out…..Martha Stewart, look out! We put the puppy chow in the middle of the table and with the help of glue that would hold an elephant to a grain of rice suspended in mid air, AND the glue gun, we begin. After 30 minutes of doing more snacking than crafting, we cannot find the glue which we had just used. After looking for it for 15 minutes, I realized that I had picked it up and thrown it out in the garbage. Well, we are liking what we are seeing. The crafts actually turn out great and we want to go back and get more to make. But Noel, has had it. It is 10 and I am exhausted. I keep looking over at Christi and Monta and keep wondering how they are just sitting over at the table, laughing, snacking and gluing, no sign of exhaustion. What is wrong with me? Why am I so tired………then I remember………I have been laughing, shopping, snacking and gluing for 30 years longer than them………..So, girls, “turn out the lights when you are through” Noel is off to bed! But thank ya’ll for a most fabulous day. It will be a treasured memory in my life. Love to both of you, Noel Write to tell one of your favorite Christmas stories!

Only 4 more days to go. It is just an awesome time of year. It just smells good, no matter where you go, you are either smelling cinnamon for the pine cones everyone seems to be selling, or baked pies when you enter the grocery stores, or coffee brewing, since the cooler weather brings out the need to always be sipping something warm……..whatever you are near, there are just some aromas which signal Thanksgiving. It is also another reason to give thanks to our Creator for the wonderful senses He has given to us. Think about how good you feel when you walk in and smell the onions, celery and buttur simmering, getting ready for the dressing. Or that pumpkin pie, how it reminds you of so many wonderful past Thanksgiving memories. Begin today to think of something that you have not thought about in quite some time to give thanks. Don’t you think that it honors God to just stop for a minute to thank Him for His provision to us. No matter what kind of year we have had, we might have not gotten everything we wanted, but very few of us are in “need” of material things. He has met our needs and has given us His grace and mercy, but most of all, He has given us His Son, who took away our sin. Now that, is the most important gift. We need to pause and give thanks forthat most undeserved gift.  We can live, knowing we have eternal life, an abundant life, with God the Father, because of our belief and trust in His Son……..what an amazing gift we have, we need only to accept it. Think about that when you are stirring the green bean casserole. Thank Him when you are whipping the cream. Share the Good News when you are in the kitchen with a family member or friend who might not know what Jesus Christ has done. Pray that each and every person who walks through your front door this year, will feel loved and accepted and leave that day know ing that they have been in the presence of the One who loves them….Ask the Lord to be your honored guest at your Thanksgiving table this year and see what a difference it makes in the meal and the memories.  You will be surprised!

WEll, it’s already hapening, the doorbell is ringing, the suitcases are already beginning to line the front porch and the company, they are a coming. Am washing sheets, loading up on Dr Peppers and Tums, as all our out of state company is prepared to get as much Mexican food as possible the week they are here. So one Taco lunch is behind us, with, I’m sure many more to go.

But, I have to update you on the stuffed bell peppers we had on Fri night. They were a winner. So will post the recipe today. They were so easy to make, and warmed up well for leftovers. Just returned from Sam’s where we bought 2 more hams, and a turkey. Tomorrow, I guess we will be buying another stove for the garage, as we only have 1 oven and have no idea of how we will be cooking all this meat. Spent the morning in a Care Now clinic with my daughter who had been trying to fill out paper work while holding a screaming 3 month old. You know as a mom of grown children, how we still love to feel “needed”. Well, I got my fill of feeling “needed” this morning for a couple of hours holding Caleb. Bless his heart, his ears were red and hurting and filled with fluid, so our “little” 19 pounder 3 month old, had his first sick dr visit. And of course, Nonnie got pics of it. There are just some things which you cannot let slip by. This was truly a Hallmark picture. Jodi with no make-up after being up all night with no sleep, Caleb screaming and we are trying to figure out what the dr is telling us between the screaming and the accent, I just had to have a picture of this for his baby album. This was also a Krispy Kreme moment, but after driving to the parking lot, I realized that they had closed. So, I decided to come home, like a good little Nonnie and eat a piece of rye toast. And this is only the first day of the Thanksgiving week!. I can hardly wait to see what the rest of the week holds. It will be fun to see!…..3 trips more to the airport, inlaws, special diets, ah……….why can’t every week be a holiday?