Wordless Wednesday-Fall Themed Mantel Decor

As part of my 31 for 31 goal, I have decided to decorate my mantel for each season.  Here is my weak attempt at Fall.  Considering I will probalby decorate for Christmas next week, I didn't go all out on this one.

Amazing, right?

I hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving!

4 Thanksgivings and a 5K

I pretty much had 4 Thanksgiving meals this year.  And I know you want to know all about them.

1-Dinzee Buddeez Festival of Fakesgiving.  This occurred last Sunday.  When my husband and I were first dating we would spend holidays apart so I made up some fake holidays that we could have together.  Such as Fakesgiving.  Fakesgiving is basically just eating Thanksgiving food on a day other than Thanksgiving.  It allowed us to share a turkey (or perhaps a rotisserie chicken or turkey sandwich) together before we left to hang out with our families.  This year I decided to see if my Dinzee Buddeez friends wanted to have a Fakesgiving before Thanksgiving since we'd all be going different places for Thanksgiving.  (Side note, Dinzee Buddeez is a group of 4-8 people who go out to random restaurants sometimes to eat.  It's very exclusive-ok not really.)  This basically ended up being a long con to get my friend Shanzie to prepare a turkey for me to eat at her house.  So Shanzie made a turkey breast and dressing and the rest of us brought sides.  We had a ton of food including...cider, spinach dip, green beans, mashed potatoes, macaroni, sweet potatoes, turkey, dressing and cranberry sauce.  I also made a pumpkin pie.

2-Thanksgiving Day Lunch with my immediate family, aunt and cousins.  Normally I go to B's Aunt's house for Thanksgiving but due to a work event he had we decided to stay in town for all of Thanksgiving.  So we ate lunch at a restaurant near my Aunt's house for Thanksgiving.  It was a lovely Thanksgiving buffet with all the normal stuff plus prime rib.  However I mistook some horseradish for potatoes and accidentally put a huge spoonful on my plate.  Fortunately I figured out what it was before eating a big bite and dying.

3-Me, B and Hobie Thanksgiving night (our Fakesgiving even though it actually ended up on real Thanksgiving).  Since we ate early in the day but I still wanted a Thanksgiving themed dinner for my small family I made us Turkey, Brie and Cranberry Sandwiches.   They were delightful.  I also made some pink stuff per B's request.  Then we read out of our Thanksgiving Basket of Thanks that we had been keeping throughout November of daily things we were thankful for.  Then Hobie tried to eat our leftovers.

How to Make a Delightful Turkey, Brie and Cranberry Sandwich.....
-Toast some croissants for a few minutes in the oven.
-Put some canned whole berry cranberry sauce (don't be a canned cranberry sauce hater, but you can use homemade cranberry sauce also) and deli sliced turkey on one side
-Put slices of brie cheese on the other side
-Toast for a few more minutes
-Then carefully stick the two sides together

4-My Mom's Festival of Fakesgiving (although she hates the word Fakesgiving.  She thinks it means I give Fake Thanks which is just not true).  This was on Friday.  My mom made all of her amazing Thanksgiving foods including a turkey.  I like her dressing the best and her mac and cheese is awesome as well.  Everything was very good and I definitely ate too much.  My sister and I got in a brief shouting match but I think that's what makes the holidays fun/memorable, right?

Then there was the 5k.  Gboro apparently has a Gobbler 5k every year on Thanksgiving morning so B and I decided to participate.  This was awesome.  I mean not while I was actually running it.  But after.  I just felt really good and positive and semi athletic and not as bad for binge eating 4 meals as I normally would have.  And I beat my last 5k time by a little bit.  Plus I got a t-shirt with a turkey on it.

What did you do for Thanksgiving?
Anyone have more than 4 Thanksgiving meals?

PS-Don't forget to enter the giveaway!

I Really Want Some Leftovers...by Hobie

I really want those turkey sandwich crumbs in the middle of the coffee table.

I will just go over this foot that's blocking it....

 Hmm didn't work, maybe under the foot.....

 Other side?....

 Nope, maybe from this side....

I don't think my parents will notice if I just jump on the table....

Hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving....I did!

I am Thankful For...

I don't want to get too deep here, but my life is pretty good right now and I'm thankful for many things.

B and Hobie-They are both awesome and fun to live with.  B is a pretty awesome husband, is mildly hilarious (to me), and hardly ever makes me drive us anywhere.  Hobie always listens to me and hangs with me when B goes out of town on work trips so I don't get lonely.

My Family-They are pretty cool and fun and I'm excited I get to hang out with all of them tomorrow and some of them on Friday.  They also support my plan for multiple Thanksgiving meals which is key.  I especially loved brother and sisters beach trip 2010.

B's Family-They are pretty cool also.  And without them I probably wouldn't have visited the states of Indiana and Colorado or gone to a 90th birthday party.

My Friends-My friends (most of who I've known since high school/college) are fun and supportive and have been putting up with me for a really long time.  I deeply enjoy trivia, wedding/bridal shower/baby shower/bachelorette party planning, 5K's, beach trips, dinner parties, dinzee budeez (especially ones where I long con someone in to baking a turkey), occasional trips to Durham/Las Vegas, etc.

Photo by Robert Ross

My House-I love my house and am lucky I live somewhere that I love.  I'm also excited about attempting some decorating renovations over the holidays.  I'll keep you posted on that.

My Job-Ok, this might surprise some people reading this, but let's think about the positives.  I get to leave at 11 on Fridays, can listen to my headphones whenever I want (or need) and I have free health insurance.   Not a bad deal.

My Hobbies-I don't love all the things I do at my job but that's what hobbies are for.  And this year I've picked up both blogging and sewing which I think are adding a lot to my life.  (Plus there's all the wonderful/semi-wonderful tv shows out there that I watch.  TV watching is a hobby right?)

You-I'm thankful for all the people who read and/or comment on my blog. 

I hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving!

What are you thankful for?

Easy Last Minute Thanksgiving Dishes

pic from wikipedia

Are you still looking for the perfect side dish or dessert to take to Thanksgiving Dinner?

Well here are some ideas...

I was feeling a little under the weather on Friday evening and Saturday morning so I spent a lot of time watching the Food Network in my bed.  I found this awesome show called 5 Ingredient Fix.  The host made a full 9 dish Thanksgiving Meal with all items having 5 ingredients or less.  Pretty amazing.  Now I haven't tried any of these but here were some of my faves that looked pretty easy to do.
-Brie and Onion Puff-Seems very simple as long as you have access to an oven and would make a great appetizer.
-Spicy Cranberry Chutney-It might sound weird, but she adds some jalapeno in to her cranberry sauce and I'm all about a little extra spice.
-Sauteed Green Beans with Garlic Chips-She actually fries the garlic in some oil before adding them to the green beans.
-Pecan Bars-These seemed easy to make and would be a great alternative to Pumpkin Pie (if there must be an alternative to pumpkin pie).

Now, if you are in charge of the dessert and want something a little different (or extra desserts), I definitely recommend the Mini Pumpkin Cupcakes with Honey Cinnamon Cream Cheese Frosting.  These were a hit when I brought them to work.  Plus Shanzie made them for her work the other day and they were gone by the end of the day.

If you have vegetarians or vegans coming to dinner, quinoa salad is always an option.  Here is a vegan one and a vegetarian one (with feta).

I also really like this salad I made a few months ago that has apples, granola, cranberries, and blue cheese in it.  It's ingredients are Fall themed and therefore would make a great addition to Thanksgiving Dinner.

Mac and cheese is always good.  I loveeeee the kind my mom (Gammy's recipe) makes but if you want something a little healthier, here's a recipe for one that has some squash hidden in with the cheese and noodles.

These rich and creamy cheesy potatoes are also a great option and a nice alternative to regular mashed potatoes.

But really if you can't figure out anything to make but want to take something to a Thanksgiving dinner, there's always the classic pumpkin pie.  It's really easy to make.  The recipe is on the back of the can of pumpkin and people typically like it (unless they have a weird aversion to pumpkins).  Plus I made two different pies this weekend and I'm pretty sure pumpkin pie is not that bad for you as far as pies go.  It doesn't have a ton of sugar in it and pumpkin has a lot of vitamins.  (This is in comparison to the other pie I made which had 2 sticks of butter in it and multiple kinds of sugar.)

So Happy Thanksgiving week!
Are you hosting Thanksgiving or going somewhere for Thanksgiving or do you live in Canada and have a whole different day for Thanksgiving?
What are you making for Thanksgiving?
What is your favorite Thanksgiving Dish?