Well, first of all, thanks so very much for the Thanksgiving wishes. It WAS a lot of work, but Mike, Maya and Ted were fantastic in the help department, particularly in the clean up. Half way through dessert my mother knocked over a full glass of red wine that went everywhere on my brand new table cloth and that pretty much spelled the end of dinner. I had just said a couple of hours earlier to Ted that I was uncomfortable with mother having a stem glass at the table.
I kept Vanessa busy by asking her to distribute the glass charms before dinner then by having her do the honours of the whipped cream on the pies. That was the only thing I could think of to keep her from watching the TV in the den. I made the mistake (according to her parents) of showing her how the remote control works so she can access the list of recorded kiddie shows I had. At 4 1/2 years old, electronic gizmos are like second nature, lol.
Little Clarice slept through most of everything but I did get to hold her for a while so her mommy could get some dinner down. Q charmed the socks off me, as usual, with his infectious grins and huge spontaneous hugs. The highlight was his very first poop in the toilet! He had said to me,"Nanny, pooping now", so I scuttled him into the bathroom and TA DAH!! He turns 2 this coming week.
I'll post the "before" pic of the table in a few minutes. The "after" pic was a no-go because of the wine incident. :(
I hesitated to post that pic of all of us (except the photographer, Mike) at the table because it's such a bad one of me, but oh well. I look like I'd been inhaling helium, lol.
Wow, what a party!! Everyone looks like they're having a great time, so your hard work paid off. And I think that you ALL look great; no signs of helium anywhere...
I'm sorry about your new table cloth, though. I get nervous about stemware too, and it doesn't even take an elderly person or a younger person at the table to push that "nervous button" in me either.
How did the rolls turn out?
__________________
"It is our choices that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities"
(Dumbledore to Harry Potter)
The rolls were great. I liked that they were a wee bit sweet. I had a small basket of then on the buffet and all the women-folk had one but the men all dove into the Pillsbury, lol. I did manage to get them to eat the whole wheat Pillsbury rolls without complaint, for whatever that's worth, LOL. Then again, considering that there was nearly a pound of butter in the whole dinner, a bit of garbage grain doesn't really count.
All the red wine came out in the wash, thank goodness! Maya wrung it our over the kitchen sink right away and then put salt on it before I put it in a warm water wash. After all had left I popped it in the dryer for 20 minutes and Ted helped me fold it and put it on a hanger in the laundry room. It was perfect this morning.
Moore, I'm beginning to think Mike's suggestion could be the solution - sippy cups for everyone, LOL. Even on the patio this summer, using a plastic stem glass, mom spilled an entire glass of red wine all over me and I had to run inside to change everything, right down to my undies, I was THAT soaked. Yes to sippy-cups. (If we tried to stop mom from having her complement of wine, she would be very miffed. In a way it's kind of good that she forgets that she dumps her wine all over the place regularly. She'd be mortified.)
Oh, and guess what!! I bought some of the Whole Foods prepared cranberry sauce and put it on the table along with that gelatinous goopy crud from Ocean Spray and everyone LOVED it! Hurray!! If you have a Whole Foods nearby and were hoping for something other than the tinned gloop, try it. It was wonderful.
Here's a pic taken two days ago at a pumpkin farm. The guys were all excited about a pumpkin cannon and a trebuchet built by Ryerson University students. They had a contest to see which one could shoot the pumpkins further, lol. Now there's a good use of engineering expertise.
-- Edited by KaeEll on Monday 12th of October 2009 12:37:46 PM
I'm glad you liked the rolls. I love the fact that they taste so fresh, and can be heated in about six minutes! I'm going to look for the cranberry sauce at Whole Foods, KaeEll. I'd like to add it to our table, along with the canned stuff, which I freely admit I like! LOL... Another choice would be nice, though, and a little more grown-up. Of course, at this point I have no idea how many of us will be here for Thanksgiving. AZ-D said that she'd been invited to Wisconsin, but she was also making noises about boarding her kitties, so I think she's planning to be here.
I think that I'm rapidly reaching the point where sippy cups would be good for me too! I'm glad the wine stain came out so easily. I think the trick is to get to it quickly, which is exactly what you did.
Love the picture of everyone surrounded by pumpkins! What a great fall portrait of the family for the kids to look at many years from now. Beautiful.
__________________
"It is our choices that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities"
(Dumbledore to Harry Potter)
