Thanksgiving 2020

 It won't be like any other ones we've had, but surely we can find some good food and fun pictures and lots to be thankful for.

Pictures can't get much prettier than this!  Emily is old enough to have made a pie before, but she swears she has not.  We're just not pie people.  We like to eat them but not to make them.  I'm so glad she picked this year to try an apple one.

I once made pie crusts from scratch back when I had time and something to prove.  We hosted Mama and Daddy one Thanksgiving in our little pink trailer in Pennville, GA, when we'd been married a little over a year.  The kitchen was pink too, but everything worked just fine, and I made a pecan pie and a red velvet cake for dessert.  Daddy was so impressed that I made the pie crust myself that he bragged about it almost every time we had pie for the rest of his life, and I let him!  Mama probably brought or cooked the rest of that meal since I can't remember anything but the desserts.

Now I get to say, "Emily makes her own pie crusts, you know."  "And bakes bread too."

They think it looks angry.  When I saw that, I started getting a little nervous that there wasn't going to be dressing this year, so I asked, and OF COURSE there's going to be dressing.

My two contributions are so easy the children could make them easily, but nowadays when something works for me, I'm pretty proud of it.  I haven't made the brown rice yet, but it's one of those recipes where you open some cans and a bag of rice and put everything in a baking dish and cook it.  It seems to be the one thing that everyone asks for a lot, so I'm glad to oblige.  Once again, I won't mention how much butter goes in it.

I did make the lime congealed salad, and we don't live in congealed salad country.  Also Ryan doesn't come from a place that appreciates the art of the Jello, marshmallow, cream cheese, pineapple, pecan bowl of goodness that's like getting dessert on your plate - before the apple pie.  I'm keeping a bowl for Elise and me and sending over one bowl with pecans for Emily and one bowl without pecans for the girls.  She's not going to let them see it before they taste it, because while she knows they'll love it, they probably won't like the way it looks.

I'll keep checking my texts to see if there's anything else good being cooked over there.  

She sent me this picture that she found on their bedroom door last night when she went to bed.  I was a little concerned that Santa had a leering spider on his bag, but when I enlarged it, I found out it was the gift bag cord.

The girls don't usually include Santa Claus in their Christmas art work or discussions.  Graysen called him Old Sick Nick one year, and that's stuck.  They don't really want him in their house but will leave the milk and cookies, I guess so he won't go upstairs.  Maybe they're making their peace with him this year.  He leaves only one gift and fills the stockings, so he's not a major player.  

I've done very little all day except talk with some friends and text with Emily.  I did start to try to figure out how I'm going to quilt those princess quilts.  I sat down with a good light and a thimble and tried hand quilting and just no, not with that needle - or something.  It may be the batting, but every stitch was a struggle.  I'm going to try to figure out a better needle to use, get that, and try it once more.  I did do one line of stitching on the machine without my walking foot on, and it wasn't horrible.  

If I can get the sides rolled up to fit under the throat plate of the machine, I think I can do a decent job of straight-line quilting.  I found this pattern I like.  I don't know how it will look on "en pointe" blocks, but we'll soon see!  They just need to get those quilts before they get tired of princesses.

I finished listening to East of Eden last night but fell asleep four chapters from the end, so I finished that this morning, and now I miss the people.  I've downloaded another long one.  This is part of one review.

The review I tried to copy didn't work, but it's set during the Spanish Civil War.  The main character has worked her way up from dressmaker to premier couturier and rubs elbows with the rich and famous.  She is asked by the British Army to spy for them as World War II begins.  She agrees and stitches secret messages into the hems of dresses.

I have Middlemarch by George Elliot on hold at the library, but I hope it doesn't come in before I finish this.  It will take me the whole 3 weeks to listen to this - nearly 22 hours.

I'll have to come back and record how our first (and hopefully last) virtual Thanksgiving dinner went.