This year's Thanksgiving is going to be terrific.
The boys have been asking "how many days until Thanksgiving?" for a couple of weeks now, so today I was pleased to confirm to them that tomorrow is the day!
This afternoon I'll start cleaning and cooking. Most of the decorations are out, including the leaf rubbings Xavier did last year that we cut out. That kid loves leaves. He has a bag full of different leaves he's collected and it's always on the floor, begging to be stepped on.
Last night we finished up the boys' Thanksgiving shirts. Every year we buy a shirt or turtleneck and decorate it. I have several years worth of Thanksgiving shirts in storage. On the back I write "*kid's name* is Thankful For..." and then they tell me all the things they're thankful for that year and I write them down with permanent marker. It's really funny to hear the things that they appreciate most. So far I've made the list every year! And then there's "toys" "candy" "Obi Wan Kenobi" "life" "donuts" "TV"...hehe.
Then I dip their hands in brown paint and they make a hand print on the front of the shirt. I use paint to turn it into a turkey (some years it's been a tropical turkey or an Army turkey or a very colorful turkey) and paint the year on. The t-shirts are one of my favorite things about Thanksgiving.
Soon I'll have to start cooking. Even though it's just the four of us, we're having a Pineapple Pumpkin Cheese ball with crackers, deviled eggs, pumpkin pie, gingerbread with amber cream, mashed potatoes, baked ham, green bean casserole, squash stuffing casserole, home made macaroni and cheese...and probably some other stuff that I've forgotten!
We're going to eat and eat and eat!
In the morning, we'll get up early, and turn the TV to the Thanksgiving Day parade. I'll start cooking, with Adrian in the kitchen helping me (actually, groping me and asking if he can help with no intention of doing so!). Orian will follow me around like my shadow, asking what I'm doing, what's in everything, and if he can have some of that. And of course, Xavier will be in the living room, watching the parade and drawing pictures of parade floats he's made up.
After we've stuffed ourselves and put away the food, we'll watch Miracle on 34th Street. That's a "me" thing. I don't know why, but it really ties Thanksgiving and Christmas together for me. I love that movie. If we're not too full, we'll eat some Hurricane popcorn with nori and mochi crunch.
And when it starts to get dark, we'll bring in the tree and bring down all the decorations. We'll crank up a Christmas CD and act as silly as possible while the kids put the decorations up in all the wrong places and I bite my tongue and let them do it. We'll put all the ornaments on the tree and string lights around it. I think we'll use printer paper to make snowflakes to hang from the ceiling. We have so many Christmas decorations I don't know if we'll finish in one day. And of course we'll take out the stockings...no fireplace to hang them over, but the wall will do just fine.
I've already got most of the boys' presents bought, and I'm in the process of wrapping them, so they'll be ready to go under the tree tomorrow night. The boys will shake them and rub them and compare them to objects around the house. And Adrian and I will try not to smile when they guess a gift correctly!
It's going to be a wonderful day!