Thursday, November 25, 2010

Thankgiving 2010

This was my first year to cook the whole Thanksgiving meal, and I was pretty excited to try it out. I viewed it all as an experiment, so I wasn't going to be terribly upset if something didn't work out.

We had a very relaxed day, and it was wonderful. I was so behind on laundry, so Todd and I worked on that a lot this morning. Right now, that is a huge time commitment in our family. We were in casual clothes and sweats all day, and I never even put on makeup.

This was my turkey. It was covered in a paste of dry mustard, vinegar, worcestershire, and something else I can't remember. Then bacon on top and some veggies stuffed inside. Oh, and big evil hunks of butter. This recipe comes from a "famous" cookbook from Monroe.


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Then when it was cooked, it was supposed to be covered in a cheesecloth soaked in olive oil.


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And here it is when it came out. I basted over the cheesecloth - it looks like a nasty bandage at this point.


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Somehow I don't have a picture of the turkey without the cheesecloth. It was pretty!

Here are my rolls - they were half whole wheat and half white flour. It is a recipe that Carla recommended. Well....they had to rise a little too long b/c both ovens were busy....so they turned into muffin rolls.


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Todd carving the turkey. He watched a YouTube video to learn how to do it.


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Cheese grits. This is an old family recipe from my Grandmother Mildred, but Kraft has stopped making the cheese that this required. So this year I tried Velveeta, and it turned out great. It is a little difference consistency....that's the reason why it got so brown - I was trying to get it to firm up. But it was firm enough.


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Roasted Brussels Sprouts and New Potatoes. I was planning to do these separately, but it got down to the wire. This is also the "Betsy photography technique" - get as close as possible to the subject!


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The big feast!


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Store bought pie. It was pretty good.


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Our annual tradition with the Cool Whip.


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The beginnings of "Henry"

Henry has started writing his name.


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Thursday, November 18, 2010

Henry's 4th Birthday

On Oct 27th, Henry turned 4 years old! We started the morning with presents.

A bike from Brooksie and Papa.


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We're pretty relaxed on the rules around here.


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Lots of presents from Gran, Grandpa, and Aunts and Uncles...

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He loved this!

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All Henry wanted was this Buzz. So we bought it for him. The wings are supposed to go out and in with the push of a button.


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Well, he was pretty quickly broken....so I took him back and we got this...


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Henry's party at school...

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Sunday, November 14, 2010

"You're hungry, Leo? Follow me."

Tonight, I was a little late getting dinner cooked. I have a memory of seeing Henry go into the garage at some point....and I said, what are you doing?.....and he said "I'm hungry"....and I told him to come on out of there, that I was working as fast as I could.

A little later, Leo came through and said loudly (of course, how else does he speak?)..."Dinner, dinner, dinner, food, food, food." And I heard Henry say quietly, "You're hungry, Leo? Follow me." Well, Leo didn't follow him, but that caught my attention. So I followed. And he walks out to a ziploc full of animal crackers that was left over from a huge bag I bought at Costco. The bag is already open, and he just reaches in and snags himself a few.

Leo is so huge and loud and constantly demanding attention. This little guy is going to fly under the radar and get away with everything.