Thanksgiving

At pre-school on Tuesday Jack's class did an activity called "Let's plan Thanksgiving Dinner."  The teacher had cut out all the color ads of food items from the Sunday paper and since it was the paper the week of Thanksgiving, it was full of ads for the traditional turkey dinners.  The children then picked out what food meant Thanksgiving to them and glued them to a paper shaped like a plate.  Jack's friend Evan had a plate full of classic holiday fare: turkey, mashed potatoes, rolls, pumpkin pie...  Then I looked at Jack's project and he had a plate that had 2 different kinds of pizza, 3 different kinds of hot wings, chocolate chip cookies and Scooby snacks.  Jordan wondered aloud why Thanksgiving dinner meant bar food to our four year old, and I just chuckled and shook my head.  Who knows what Jack is thinking?  Not me, that's for sure.

Wednesday night was Pie Night at our house.  Pie Night is a wonderful tradition where we eat the dessert the night before Thanksgiving.  My mom came up with the idea after too many years of having to throw away uneaten pie after Thanksgiving.  She decided that everyone was too full after eating turkey, yams, potatoes and rolls to really bring their all to the pie portion of the evening.  Thus Pie Night was born.  It's brilliant.  This way, you know exactly which piece of pie to save room for the next day and you don't feel obligated to make yourself sick.  We invite everyone we know who is still in town for the holiday to come eat delicious things and visit at our house.  Jordan brought the dominoes out this year, so the men sat around the table mumbling while they ate, while the rest of us caught up with each other.  Most people bring their favorite pie to contribute, so we really get a variety.   The kids had so much fun playing with all their friends and eating junk food, it's like a child's dream party.  The night was a success in that I had just enough pie left over for after Thanksgiving dinner the next day, and everyone left full and happy. 

That night Jack got sick however.  Not from eating too many sweets, but fever and stuffy nose sick and I was up all night with him.  I felt awful that he probably got all the kids sick who had been here playing, but what's a major holiday without a little guilt coloring the festivities, you know?  Because I didn't want to contaminate anyone else, we had to cancel going to Aunt Linda's for Thanksgiving dinner and I just didn't want to think about what ever else we were going to eat.  I was tired.  I was grumpy.  I didn't get Megan's broccoli salad or any of Linda's stuffing.  I just didn't want to think about any other kind of dinner, so when Jack asked for pizza I said yes without checking to see if Little Caesars was open or not.  They were not, and that almost sent Jack into a tailspin until I remembered that I had a pizza in the freezer.  Hooray!  When I showed it to Jordan, he started laughing and said that it was kind of spooky how Jack had called it at school on Tuesday.  The pizza was a combo pack that included boneless buffalo wings with the pizza.  Jack's Thanksgiving dinner project came true.  Despite my best laid plans, we had pizza, hot wings and chocolate chip cookies for Thanksgiving dinner this year.  Spooky.