I love Thanksgiving!  Every year we go to my In-laws for Thanksgiving, and I never get to cook - I love to cook - so we started our own tradition of "Thankful Friday"  a couple of years ago where we make our own Thanksgiving feast the day after.  (No leftovers is no fun!)

This year we are having turkey, gravy, stuffing, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, spaghetti squash - cooked with bacon and onions, yum - rolls, cranberries, and I think I will attempt some sort of asparagus, but I've never made it before, so I hope it turns out.  Also pie - apple/blueberry, and pumpkin.  Too much?  I hope so!

Your Thanksgiving sounds yummy, mmmmm - turkey and ham . . .

Ours is fairly traditional:

Turkey (deep fried, not roasted), ham (good Smithfield ham ... bought in Smithfield. ), yams, several types of green bean casseroles, several different varieties of cornbread stuffing, corn pudding, mash potatoes and gravy, and several types of bread (home made, mostly - sourdough, whole grain, and biscuits.  gotta have some biscuits). 

This year, we're tossing in a bit of a twist.  The kids are making desserts.  One's making apple bars, another's making a snowball cake, another's making pumpkin pies (with bits of the pumpkin he rescued at Halloween and then froze), and another's making peanut butter cup brownies.  All in all, it'll help them get more into it and enjoy everyone's efforts more.

The one thing that's got my wife freaking out ... this year, the whole family's coming over to OUR house.  Up until now, we've either lived too far away, had too little space for everyone or both, so we'd go to one side or the other's for the day.  Now that we have the space for it, they're invading us for a change.  A total of, oh, 15 people planning to be at our place Thursday evening.  She deserves to be able to freak out a little.    I'll just be right behind her to pick up the pieces and put her back together (like usual). 

Now, I'm off to see if I can find something appropriate for our 14th wedding anniversary tomorrow. 

Chaos, that's an excellent idea.  I wish I thought of that when my kids were growing up! 

I'm always looking for someone to invite over.  Right now I'm having my son and his soon to be wife.  I will also try my hardest to get a little old lady who lives alone over.  My guess is that I'll be making her a plate to bring over instead.  It's hard to pry her past her front door. 

I like to try something new instead of the typical greenbean casserole, corn, squash and mashed pototoes....although mashed potatoes will be on the list.  Can't resist them. 

I will be having turkey and gravy of course.  This morning on GMA Emril had what looked like a good cornbread/sausage stuffing to try.  I am going to make a to die for Chocolate Cream Pie that I made last week (for practice) and get this.....a Carrot Cinnamon Pie that looks just like Pumpkin Pie but it has two cups of mashed cooked carrots instead of Pumpkin.  I will also be making little cranberry muffin jello things that have apples,pineapple, walnuts and cranberry sauce in them.  This can be made a day ahead and put in the fridge to harden up.  When done everyone gets their own personal little cranberry jello thing. 

 Oh and of course Sweet Potatoes.  I never make them the same way twice.  This time I'm going to make them with peaches and brown sugar from a friend's recipie.  She said it was most delicious.  I probably will have a  Velvet cake with homemade cream cheese frosting since I've got to use the frosting I made up earlier for something else. 

I'm not making the whole meal.  I think I am going to bring mashed potatoes - they are yummy with sour cream and cream cheese makes them really rich.  I will probably make broccoli salad which is just broccoli, raisins, bacon, sunflower seeds and a mayo/sugar/applecider vinegar dressing.  I ususally make a relish tray just so there's something nutritious to munch on while everything is cooking.  Maybe a dessert too.  I can't decide between Apple Crisp or Oatmeal cake. 

At my niece's house. We're bringing ham (for the non-turkeys), apple pie, and real whipping cream.

Also, I'm on the clean up detail - so we get invited back next year!

Lots of food, kids, and fun!

Hot!  On a cold day!  It doesn't get any better.

Broccoli salad sounds like a keeper! I'm gonna dink around with it til I get it right.

Heya Mark, you've got mail!