26th November 2009

Our First Real Thanksgiving as a Family at Home

Last Thankgsiving, I was a new mom of four days in shock, on drugs (the hospital kind after you have a c-section), and quietly enjoying a near-empty hospital.  We were staying at the hospital for another day, as Melina had jaundice.

Here we are one sweet potato year later.  I have already had my first happy boo hoo moment over fixing sweet potato casserole.

Mom’s sweet potato casserole recipe vs my revised casserole recipe

As my daughter crawls, pulls to standing, and tries to cruise taking little first steps on her own, I am in awe.  While we had our first high fever scare, which turned out to be Roseola, we are suffering only from a cough this morning.  We are staying at home and cooking, having canceled our trip to see family in Missouri.

Melina missed any birthday party celebrations I had scheduled for her, but on this Thanskgiving we are so happy to be in one another’s lives.  Well, I can only really speak for myself.  I am happy to have her in my life.  It seems she is happy too, from what others tell me. ;-)

I am fixing sweet potato casserole topped with organic pumpkin flax granola.  I’ve snuck several tastes, and have decided it’s a good thing to keep on the menu.  The granola has softened enough in the cooking to offer some to Melina.

I’ve brined my turkey breast with a cranberry blend brining mix.  The turkey breast was about all we could get at Whole Foods the evening before Thanksgiving.  However, it’s more than enough for the two of us.  We are choosing to stay in to avoid any further exposure as M’s immunity is not quite normal after a high fever.

The theme this Thanksgiving is anti-oxidant and anti-inflammatory rich cooking on behalf of someone I know who has breast cancer, which has spread to many parts of her body.  So, we’re adding KALE to our Thanksgiving.  I’ll let you know which recipe is our final choice, but I’m reviewing a recipe from Andrew Weil’s 8 Weeks to Optimum Health book that includes kale and potatoes.

We’re doing fresh cranberries with apples Melina and I picked a couple of weeks ago.

We’re stuffing the little turkey breast with cranberry stuffing.

We’re managing without foil paper and cinnamon this Thanksgiving.

The pilgrims didn’t have foil paper.  Nor did they have refridgerators to store mass quantities of food, but I’m sure they had cold weather that helped keep food cold.

I’m listening to Il Divo’s Christmas album on my iPod to put us in the holiday spirit.

Taking care of a little one and preparing a real Thanksgiving dinner, if just for the two of us, should be interesting.  I’m curious to see what time we’ll eat, or will we just munch throughout the day as Mom finally gets things prepared?

I’ll add some photos later.  But we are healthy, we have one another, we are warm, we are surrounded by four-legged friends who don’t know today from any other day other than Mom is cooking something pretty good in the kitchen.

Enjoy your holiday.  While we don’t have lots of people around today, we have all we need.

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