Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving just happens to be Tom's favorite holiday.  Growing up, he would wake up early on Thanksgiving and he and the boys would go play some football with the ward.  Then, they'd go to the store and get some snacks for watching the Lions game.  They'd eat lunch, watch the Lion's game, then fall asleep.   Sounds great, huh?

Thanksgiving just happens to be my least favorite holiday.  Growing up, we would wake up and pile in the car to go to some relative's house.  None of the relatives were my age, and I always felt pretty out of place.  My siblings would ignore me and my parents would ignore all of us as they talked with the relatives into the weee hours of the night.  The entire day, I would be painfully bored.  Let me say that again - paaaaaainfully bored.  And, of course, at the end of the night when all of us kids couldn't stand to be there anymore, we'd beg and beg our parents to leave and at best they'd ignore us, at worst they'd get mad at us and then still not leave.  Sorry Mom, but I don't think this is news to ya.  I always thought this is how it was for every kid on Thanksgiving and am continually surprised each time I talk to someone who actually liked Thanksgiving growing up.

The last two Thanksgivings, however, I've been with Tom, and only Tom actually.  And you know what, they've been great!  Last year I was living in Virginia with my Aunt and Uncle.  Tom came to visit and my Aunt and Uncle left to visit their kids.  I'm sure it would have been great to spend it with them (since I actually like their company now that I'm older), but we really loved having it by ourselves too.  They even left us a Turkey!  Plus, the night before I'd gone to a friend's Thanksgiving celebration and scored a whole bunch of leftovers.  Thanks Whitney, wherever you are!  It was really perfect.

This year, we didn't get the day off work, so we decided to take Friday off and designate it "Thanksgiving."  We were determined to cook ourselves a great feast and it turned out to be a great adventure!  Some friends in the ward picked up a chicken for us at Costco (turkeys are hard to come by).        And, surprise!  When we took it out of the plastic it still had a head, claws and bits of what looked like hair come out of the skin.  Behold:

It shocked Tom pretty good and definitely grossed us out, but we were determined.  He got to saw off the neck and legs.  It was all very manly.  

I got the job of reaching in and taking out the innards.

We had to buy a pot for this meal because previously, all we had was one little one.  It barely fit.

We had some serious doubts about how this chicken was going to taste seeing as how neither of us had ever really cooked a chicken like this before, but we were pleasantly surprised!  It was scrumptious.  We also got a pie from costco, some instant mashed potatoes from costco, some vegetables (not from costco) and some grape juice.  It was really a lovely meal.  One of the best we've had here.  

Happy Thanksgiving (finally) !!!

On a completely different note: I am super sick today and my sweet husband has taken care of me so well.  He keeps bringing me whatever I need and making food for me and rubbing my back and stuff.  I love being married!