Random Thoughts About Thanksgiving

The pressure to impress diminishes the value of the feast.  Not only will it result in stress, it also defeats the purpose of the occasion which is to set aside a time to count the blessings we've received during the year and thank the God who graciously favored us.  Today Brahms reminded me yesterday to relax - just relax.  And I listened to him.  Today was a peaceful stress-free day!  And everything turned out great.

Early dinner is better.  Scheduling dinner at around 2 pm  eliminates the need for numerous hor d'oeuvres.  This relieves the hostess from preparing so many little things.  Today (Thanksgiving Day 2016) we did exactly this - dinner at 2 o'clock.  We ate dessert at around 5 pm after Tim and the kids played "Don't Starve Together" and after I finished my painting of crab apples.  A second dinner is in order as there are a lot of left-overs and a cornucopia of fruits sits on the table for eating.

And by the way, Tim did a great job grilling the turkey - which turned out beautifully golden with darkened wings and thighs and tender and moist white meat.  We used a different brand of turkey this time from an independent grower.  I was a little bit skeptical to begin with but ended up feeling happy and pleased with the quality.  Normally I have to rub the bird with a lot of oranges and lemons just to remove the strong smell of turkey but this one met my requirements when the packaging was removed and it delivered a delicious roast turkey.  In terms of aromatics, I put sprigs of rosemary and thyme in the cavity of the bird - and this I intend to repeat next year.

Thanksgiving is not the same when a family member is not present.  Shannon being in Madison leaves an empty space in my heart.  I now understand what my mother used to say when I was growing up.  (She used to work in Manila while I lived with my grandparents)  I am thankful that Miriam and Brahms still can be with us and thankful that we can talk to Shannon and still share experiences over the phone.  She might be far but we share the joy when she told us right before Thanksgiving Day that she got a raise and that she ran a 5K Turkey Trot early today.  God is good!


People think their food is better than yours.  No matter how you present your table spread, or how expensive the china you eat them on and the silverware you used to eat them with - it does not matter, people will still think that their food is better than yours.  This is not about you nor about them but it is simply because of tradition and experience that surrounds the table. Moral of the story:  Food pictures should not be the focus of social media posts on Thanksgiving Day. Just saying.

Thanksgiving is a celebration of gratitude.  Once-a-year exercise of gratitude does not do much good in the way we live.   However, if we can practice gratitude on a daily basis then we get the daily benefits of a calm and collected attitude regardless of our situation because we know where our help comes from.  And in turn we can love better.  Thanksgiving therefore is, more appropriately, a celebration of the completion of the year of gratitude.  That, I thinks, deserves feasting!  With the current way we perceive Thanksgiving, the mandate to be grateful tomorrow is missing.  In fact Black Friday ads tell us that we are inadequate at present and therefore we are all enjoined to get up early tomorrow to compete in the game of hoarders.  :)  

Give thanks, always.

The Day After Thanksgiving

Settlers of Catan

Thanksgiving is always on a Thursday.   Thanksgiving is always followed by Black Friday which marks the biggest shopping day of the year in the US.  This is the day when people go to the stores and start buying presents for Christmas.  The retailers also encourage people to do this by luring shoppers with great sale prices on so many items.  Sometimes the sale only last for a few hours depending on the store.  Once a shopper enters a store, she/he is trapped to shop till death.  There are a lot of stories about weird things that people do to be ahead of the line. 

Fortunately for me, I have never gone shopping after Thanksgiving (I think).  I'm usually very tired from all the cleaning and cooking for Thanksgiving.  The rest of the family like it when I am tired because it also means that I do not have any agenda for them.  They are free!  This is the time when they go wild in playing games - board games, computer games or video games.  The only time that they are required to stop is when the time comes for the Christmas tree to be set up.

Thanksgiving At Home

The siblings together again.

Thanksgiving 2011 took place on a cold and rainy day. Fortunately, all of us were together and all cozy in the warmth of our own home. Shannon is back from Irvine for the weekend and we are all happy to a complete home again.  This may not happen very often anymore but we rejoice at every opportunity that we can get. 

Shannon got to meet Lexy River for the first time - although she suspects that Lexy was meant to replace her.  

Thanksgiving dinner with Dave and Haidz.

Dave and Haidz Diezer joined us for the Thanksgiving dinner which made the night a little bit less Lewis-focused.  We met the Diezers at the Folsom Community Church a couple of months ago and we've getting to know each other slowly since then. 

Okay, I was not in the picture but my plate can be seen in the picture - still empty but it would soon be filled with all sorts of  traditional Thanksgiving food.   This year's menu:

Appetizers:

Shrimp Cocktail

Fruits (prepared by Haidz)

Pancit (prepared by Haidz)

Main Course:

Grilled Turkey

Yukon old Mashed Potatoes

Giblet Gravy

Italian Sausage Stuffing with Mushrooms

Green Salad

Baked Butternut Squash

Whole Cranberry Sauce

Buttermilk Biscuits

Drinks:

Sparkling Apple Cider

H2O

Coffee and Tea

Dessert:

Homemade Pumpkin Pie with Whipped cream

Homemade Apple Pie with Vanilla Ice Cream

This year we had to replace our meat thermometer but the one I bought was not properly calibrated.  The turkey ended up being over-cooked but the great thing about grilled turkeys is that they tend to taste better and remain relatively moist even when the skin is already very dark.  The grilled bird is cooked evenly all around - the skin get crispy and very yummy.  Since Tim learned how to grill turkeys in the barbeque we have never went back to baking again.  

In our family, I like the dark meat (drumsticks and wings) while everyone else prefer the white meat (breast).  Everyone look forward to making turkey sandwiches from all the left-overs.  Today I saw Shannon pilled turkey and mashed potatoes drizzled with gravy on top of a piece of sourdough bread.  Miriam always likes to add cranberry sauce on her sandwich. 

 

After dinner, Brahms set up the game "Perpetual Commotion".

Long Break is Over

Avocado-Tomato Panini

As we end the long break, I cant help but thank God for blessing us with the time that my children and I have spent together uninterrupted by long hours of being in school.  Among the things we shared were hugs, kisses, remembrances, eating in and out, working together, watching "Jeeves and Wooster", playing games, joy-riding to nowhere, making paninis, planning, reading, watching birds, riding with a student-driver, frustration in erradicating ants, walking to Starbucks for coffee and hot chocolate, baking and eating cookies, and many more...  

Tomorrow, we will get up early, eat breakfast quickly,  pack lunches, kiss goodbye, go to music lessons again.   Fortunately, there will be evenings when we will be all together once more.

Chocolate Crinkles

Reasons To be Thankful

Miriam helped me set the Thanksgiving table and she also came up with an activity that we could at the table.  She put a folded sheet of printer paper under each plate.  In between servings of mashed potatoes and stuffing, she asked everyone to write one thing that we are thankful for.  Then we had to pass the paper one person to the left.  Then we had to think and write something we're thankful for which is related to the first one on the list.  Then pass the paper again one to the left and did the same thing until the paper got to first person who wrote on it.  Here's the result...

• Pie
• Spending time with my kids
• Eating ribs and pumkin pie
• Having people over for a meal
• Custard or whipped cream
• Travelling
• Suitcases
• Blankets in planes
• Visiting new places
• Shopping in other countries
• TMTV
• Checkhov (turtle)
• Shared mivie jokes/quotes
• Pride and Prejudice and other British movies we like
• Time in between watching Jane Austen, classic, and other related movies
• Nights with my family
• breakfast together and donuts
• Tables
• Custard donuts
• Dreaming about the amazing race
• For the person who led me to Christ - Peter
• Potatoes
• Cucumber
• Baked Lays
• Friends who remain friends over a whole life
• Daddy's job
• Computers
• Laptops
• Computer games
• Pineapple Upside-down cake
• Working at home
• Going out to lunch on Mondays
• Getting all my music lessons over with on Mondays
• Tickle fights
• Going to the library on Mondays
• Kuya's Marble Shooting Robot
• Creativity
• Legos
• Gardening and homemade planters
• Inspiration/Light-bulb-turning on ideas
• Long good books
• Fireplaces
• House with three fireplaces (even if only two work)
• Heaters
• Borders
• Time in between getting haircuts
• Razors
• Getting haircuts
• Kids laughing together
• Beautiful smiling kids

We also had a different list on the fridge which got updated everyday for a week by anybody (in the Lewis family) before Thanksgiving:

• The Bible
• House
• Our family
• Pie
• Smart kids
• Sunny mornings
• Foggy mornings
• Rainy days
• Sleep
• Milk
• Awesome parents
• Music
• Van Gogh
• Cushy pillows
• heaters on the bus
• Costco
• Chicken bakes
• Good health
• Dad has good job
• Enough to help other people
• Books
• True friends
• Librarian
• Loving brother & sister
• AWANA
• Good schools
• Memories
• Relatives
• Knowing God
• Family's faith
• Cameras
• Kids get along
• Down comforters
• My turtles
• Good schools
• Saturdays
• Birthdays
• The movie "Titanic"
• Applesauce
• Pomegranites
• Persimmons
• Warm bread
• Rolls
• Devils Food Cake
• Steady job
• Chances to travel
• The Actis family
• My wife
• Popovers
• Canned stewed tomatoes
• Sausages
• Paper
• Pens
• Taste
• Touch
• Sight
• Hearing
• Smell
• Kitchen appliances
• Cookies
• Potstickers
• Hammocks
• Pilgrims
• Laptops
• Relatives
• Dollhouses
• Cookies
• Apple crisp
• Danish cookies
• Turkey
• Potatoes
• Cranberry sauce
• Gravy

God gives us everything we have and enables us to do everything we do.  He allows us to enjoy and experience life to the fullest.  To Him be all glory and honor.

The Night Before Thanksgiving

No guest is scheduled to come spend Thanksgiving with us. God must have been behind this design because none of us anticipated that Tim would be working like crazy all this week. He had a deadline to meet today. That is enough stress for the family right now. He is done for now and we are just sitting here watching Myth Busters and eating Death by Chocolate ice cream. Just doing as little as possible.


Earlier today we did some preparations for the big meal tomorrow. I made sure that Tim has a good supply of eggnog. Shannon helped me make Overnight-Pumpkin Dessert. Apple pie is going to be made tomorrow- we like to eat warm apple pies. Miriam helped make the Fennel-Orange Cranberry Sauce. This is the same sauce we used last year. Since we do not have guest coming, I also went ahead and experimented on another recipe - Cinnamon Apple Cranberry Sauce. It turned out really good. We'll see how it will go with the rest of the food tomorrow (see recipe below). The dining table that is hardly used as dining table is ready for the feast. It is now set with newly ironed linens, beautiful Denby plates, fancy crystal goblets and a tray of fresh fruits for centerpiece. I'm still wondering whether we will actually use our silver ware considering that we don not have guests...why not? After all, Thanksgiving is one of the two occasions when we use them during a given year.

I realize that it is difficult to impress people and be grateful at the same time. Impressing, aka keeping up appearances, requires that we do and crave "above and beyond". It requires so much energy.  Impressing is all about other's opinion. Thanksgiving is all about gratitude. Thanksgiving is agreeing with the One who gives us everything. We acknowledge that He is good to us. With gratitude we accept all He gave us with contentment. Forget about what we don't have, and be happy with what we have. Since I am not busy trying to keep my house looking great for guests (there will always be something wrong anyway) this year, I actually have time to think about all that I am thankful for. I've been thinking about the people who God brought to my life. These are the people whom God used to change the course of my life.  For them I am thankful.