Kate's Place: Thanksgiving in Arizona

The thanksgiving table

Let me start by saying a few things about Arizona, or at least the part where Kris is living in Gilbert, AZ. ...

1. it is DRY. Oh man it is DRY. DRY. DRY. I drank so much water the first several days. I couldn't get enough. My lips needed constant chap stick. I didn't think about the boys needing some, and Matthew's lips got pretty raw actually (bad mom) and we needed to keep Vaseline on his round the clock pretty much.

2. There are roosters. At first I was pretty cool with the roosters wild walking around wherever they pleased. Awww, look, roosters! NOPE! No one tells you the truth about roosters. You're made to believe that the nice birds wake up with the sun and cock-a-doodle-do at the sun when it rises to let the farmers know it's time to get up. YAH RIGHT. Those dang stupid birds hoot and holler and cock-a-doodle their dang heads off. If my dad would have had a shot gun or a bee-bee gun (however you spell that), there'd be some free dead roosters for the taking. OH MY WORD. They were so annoying, so loud, so everywhere and so so so all the time making noise. It often sounded like they were yelling at each other, trying to see which dumb bird was louder. Matthew at one point, while playing a game shouted "Enough with the crowing!" LOL it was great.

3. Speaking of game playing... in a week's time I have the final score sheet. 27 games of Train were played (the game is called Ticket to Ride, check it out!) and of those 27 games: Dad won the most at 8 wins, Jamie and I tied for second at 6 wins, Kris and Brian each tied at 3 wins and Mom won once. There were 6 rounds of Yahtzee played with Dad winning twice and Kris winning twice, Brian and I with a win each. Matthew played two games of Yahtzee with us and did fairly well. It's neat that he can start to be included on things like that. There isn't much to do without TV. As much as I think the boys were craving football and the kids missed Blue's Clues, it was also really nice. We were forced to read (gasp!) and play games and talk and take walks and do things that don't involve 23 hours of the day in front of the tube.

4. To speak of the actual holiday though, the getting ready, cooking, setting the table, inviting friends over and being surrounded with loved ones... it really doesn't get any better. I love cooking. As I mentioned in the previous post. I love getting it all ready and being in charge. With the turkey under a bucket (thank you Brian) and not in my oven, it really is awesome to get the sides all ready without the bird in the way. This year I also tried the stuffing in the crockpot to clear out one more item from the oven rotation. I was pleased with the taste but not the final outcome with the stuffing, it was too wet. But it was my fault, I added more liquid than it called for be/c it didn't seem enough. I will try this again, without straying from the recipe. I love everyone oo'ing and ahh'ing over the sweet potato souffle. I never in my life thought I'd like sweet potatoes (and outside of this recipe I really don't) but it is so cool to have everyone think the stuff is the bee's knees. Jamie likes having added such a winner to our traditional meal. ... Anyhow the meal itself food wise was wonderful. Dad did an awesome job on the gravy and Brian's bucket turkey was yet again amazing. He'll be in charge of the turkey forever be/c it rocks. But the real memories in the day come from not the food...

Before the meal started, everyone read their place setting, which was different printed verses of thanksgiving or thankfulness. Then Kris also asked that everyone say what they were thankful for. I started. I knew I was going to cry so I kept it really simple and held off the tears. We got around to Dad though, and he couldn't even get through his verse. He got choked up and cried which sent Mom, Kris and I into tears. I'm so thankful for my dad. I'm so blessed that he is a fighter and is still with us. I pray daily for the gift of life that God has given us and ask that he be allowed to stay with us longer each day. The reading and thankfulness continued around the table to Jamie who read his, said his and then closed us in our blessing so we could eat. During the blessing the sweet little child next to me, holding my hand who is normally so very good when it's time to pray, utters "I TOOOTED!" I heard muffled chokes and stiffed giggles all around the table as Jamie tried to continue his blessing. To be truthful, I heard not a word past that announcement from Mark. Oh God is funny.

5. Tiny OT update: Matthew did awesome this past week. I couldn't be more proud of him. Sure we had our moments of whining, fussing, unwillingness... but overall, he was so so good. He is eating a chicken nugget with peanut butter without much complaint or stalling at all now. We're working on tiny bits of tomatoes slowly as well. However the thing that surprised me and makes me proud is that he was willing to TRY new things while we were gone. He had a lick of a bite of ham, a tiny bird bite of turkey, licked a lemon, tried-liked and gobbled pumpkin pie, tried a berry smoothie, tried clementine juice, ate an almond, tried and liked crunchy peanut butter when we ran out of creamy kind. I'm just so so proud of him! We're making real forward motion steps now.

Thank you God for Matthew's progress thus far, help us to continue helping him. Thank you also for humor. Thank you for blessing us with love and family and laughter this Thanksgiving holiday. Thank you that we could all be together and celebrate what we're thankful for most together. Thank you for your Son. That you'd send Him down to earth and save us all. As we enter the Christmas season now, let us never forget that nor fail to be thankful for that most important gift. Amen.