As a child I remember having such excitement and anticipation leading up to Thanksgiving. The best part is that none of those feelings have changed. I was just as excited and anticipated Thanksgiving this year as I have in years past. When people talk about having dread leading up to the holidays, dreading spending time with family, dreading being stuck in the same house together, dreading being forced to talk to those "long lost relatives"... I have never understood why. My family ROCKS! Plain and simple, they do! And I am not just saying that because I am trying to flatter or butter up any of them that will read this post in the future (wink wink). I am very blessed when it comes to family, not only immediate, but in regards to aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents, etc. Along with having big extended family on both sides, we all get along and are great friends! It's true! Whenever we are together for a reunion or a holiday or whenever, it has always been (and still is) a party! My family is the best and I just love the holidays when we all get together. And even when it is not the holidays, it is so much fun to be with them.
Thanksgiving has always been a memorable holiday in my memories. The Thanksgivings that stand out in particular are the ones we celebrated with my Dad's side of the family. These are the ones where we have traveled to my aunt's home in Yorba Linda, California and pretty much partied non-stop from Wednesday-Sunday of Thanksgiving weekend. We have always had such a great time all together for this holiday in particular.
I am going to do my best to give a vague Reader's Digest version of my childhood memories about Thanksgiving but also including the activities that we participated in this year. Just keep in mind that everything I tell you is about 100xs better than what I am describing. The first thing that pops in mind is setting the mood. My aunt is the epitome of "homemaker", to the "T".
Her house always sets the mood for whatever the season or occasion. She is the one who came and decorated the church for my wedding reception in Utah - for all those of you who remember how AWESOME it was. And for those you didn't see it, well, it looked and felt as though it had been done professionally. So, arriving at her house and seeing all her holiday decorations is just an expectation which she rises to the occasion to meet every year. Fun little knick-knacks strategically placed welcome all as you walk up the brick pathway to her front door. For Thanksgiving red, orange, gold decorate her tree bed, flower bed, and doorway. Walking into her house you feel as though you are in a magical holiday wonderland. The feeling of Thanksgiving is just in the air. And on Thanksgiving Thursday the tables are just majestically laid in preparation for the ultimate feast that is about to come.
Food, ah man... the FEAST!! Not only is it a one meal occasion of enjoying delectable yumminess. The entire weekend is stuffed to the max of foods that you wait all year long to consume. Before each meal, the countertops are stuffed to the max with vast varieties of anything and everything you could want. Thanksgiving meal itself consists of not only the traditional turkey (typically 2-3 different birds) and mashed potatoes (so creamy and delicious - my personal favorite) but we have bacon and pea salad, regular mix green salad, sweet potatoes, sweet potatoes with marshmallows, ham, rolls, gravy, rainbow jello salad, sunshine jello salad, stuffing, cranberries and sparkling cider (of multiple varieties with each person getting their own individual bottle along with the big bottles all over the tables). Now that doesn't even count dessert! We typically wait a couple of hours after people have digested food and helped clean up the dishes in order to make room to lay out the sweets. Once again, countertops are completely full of: pies: apple, cherry, pecan, pumpkin; pumpkin surprise (family favorite involving pumpkin mix and cake mix combined), brownies, cakes, cookies, krischiki (traditional Polish holiday cookie - a must have since my Dad's family is Polish), puddings, and candies. Thanksgiving meal itself I think everyone tends to gain at least 5 pounds... but it is soo worth it. Of course I can never get a photo in before the meal starts because everyone is biting at the bit to eat so typically once food is prepared, we eat and then devour!
The thing is, not only is Thanksgiving meal a feast, but once again this aunt is just the ultimate chef in the kitchen with food pouring out of every nook and cranny, and everything that is homemade and fresh. I am still trying to figure out how she does it, but she is the master! I will admit that once the other aunts get there they do pitch in which I am certain she greatly appreciates. If anyone gets hungry during this weekend though, it is their own fault.
Now, something to understand about my Dad and his brothers is that they grew up playing with guns and still play with them to this day. All three of them are avid hunters, enjoying in helping exterminate unnecessary animals throughout the year which are then stored in each of their own individual freezers. When it is a big Thanksgiving family year, each one of these "boys" brings a variety of "meat" to then share with everyone else on Friday night, a night which we have dubbed "Wild Game Night". Each time we have this "wild" game night, no one can ever be disappointed in the variety of meats that are offered to be sampled. Let me just say, if you are vegetarian, then you wouldn't want to be with us on this particular night. The variety has included all types of wild game: of course the traditional venison, beef, elk, buffalo/bison... but then it starts to get into the more unique: pheasant, dove, quail, fresh tuna, caribou... all the way to the completely rare and eyebrow raising: jackrabbit, rattlesnake, chicken heart... You get the idea. One word: YUM!! Some of them are not as bad as you would imagine... seriously! Guess you just have to have an open mind and grow up in a hunting family where meat is just meat, no matter where it comes from.
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| The Mighty Hunters |
Along with hunting, this is a family that loves to play. Not just play in the great outdoors of extreme sports, but we just love to play and have fun. Thanksgiving weekend is full of fun activities and tons (and I mean TONS) of games! With family arriving to California from other parts of California, northern Utah and Arizona, we typically get into town sometime Wednesday day. If occasion calls for it, some go early to enjoy the delights of Disneyland on Wednesday, perhaps if they are lucky even Tuesday. On Thursday morning it is off to the park in the mid-morning for our traditional scrimmage of... that's right... you guessed it: FOOTBALL!!
This game typically goes on for a couple of hours. Depending on time constraints and energy levels; it is then off to the sand volleyball courts to throw-it down and continue working up an appetite for the feast. As we have gotten older we have gotten married and started having families of our own. This being the case, a lot of young moms have toted our young ones along to play with them at the park while the "big boys" play. I know that being there in the AWESOME California weather playing at the park is a great enjoyment for some of the grandmas with their grandkids (especially those coming from Utah).
After everyone gets cleaned up and stuffs their faces (and bellies) it is once again time to bring on the games. Every time there was one of these big family Thanksgivings my aunt really went all out and completely set up her garage to facilitate having a big video game playing area. Back in the day we were lucky if there were 2, maybe even 3 TVs hooked up to Nintendos and Sega Genesis... Well as technology has changed, so have the gaming units hooked up to the growing number (and size) of TVs. We have progressed our way through Nintendo-64s, PlayStations, PlayStation 2 and now 3, Wii, WiiU, and Xbox 360. I probably missed some gaming units in there, but that is the area of expertise for my brothers and boy cousins. With this "electronic haven" that the boys could disappear to, it was a wonder we ever saw them throughout the course of the weekend. And typically, we didn't, unless it was time for food or they were forced to leave for outdoor recreation (mainly this was to give the garage time to air out - and "boy" did it need it!). I am pretty certain that the guys played until early hours of the morning every morning (around 5-6AM from what they told me... boys will be boys).
We girl cousins would typically all do a big sleepover in one of the rooms inside. We were more than welcome to join the boys in their all-nighters, but sleep got the better of us girls most of the time, at least by 2 or 3AM that is. Even as grown men and with children these boys were still boys and played their games this Thanksgiving. But hey, it wouldn't be Thanksgiving unless there was the garage set up just as it should be. I will give my aunt props this time around, because instead of setting up the entire garage for the video games, she only set up half the garage like this with the other half filled with little kid toys so that the dads could participate in raising their kids and give the moms a little bit of a break here and there... smart thinking!
It wasn't always about the video games either. We just love games in general, especially big group games. A majority of our nights were spent filling the house with laughter and screaming in our antics of attempting to win each and every single game. So many great memories of these games... psychologist, animal game, card games, board games, noise games, just lots and lots of games!!!
To top off the weekend and end it on a good note we always went to the beach. We would typically spend a couple of hours of our last day at the beach. It didn't matter that the water was FREEZING!! and that it was the middle of November, it was tradition. And it was also tradition that all, or well most, of the cousins would go swimming... or at least get completely soaking wet and then run to the shelter of their warm towels. We would spend hours just playing on the sand, building sand castles and burying one another, playing volleyball, pretty much just having a blast. It was a perfect way to spend that last day before feasting on the wild game. Unfortunately this year the weather didn't cooperate to our liking (raining and freezing cold) so we just played lots more indoor games. Luckily in the afternoon it did clear up a little bit so we headed to the nearby park so the little kids could play on the play set and the big kids could play Ultimate Frisbee. It might not have been the beach, but it sure was fun and memorable.
Well, maybe Reader's Digest wasn't the appropriate way for saying how I was intending on describing our Thanksgiving extravaganza. But you have to admit that it sounded like one of the best weekends ever... and it totally was.
I love my family and am so grateful that we have the relationships that we do. I feel so blessed and I was definitely thankful this Thanksgiving.
