Grateful
Friday, November 27, 2009 Edit This 4 Comments »
I think this was the very best Thanksgiving evah.
So many things to be grateful for that I wouldn't know where to begin the list.
This year I am just so happy to be here with my family. I'm so happy to have the rest of my life still to live... to see my children's faces, to compare their eye colors, to hug and kiss them and know that I will be here to care for them.
Everything seems to be glowing these days... so sacred... so precious...
We're living the most simplified version of our life; the worries and plans put aside.
Even the big meal seemed to come off at an easy leisurely pace despite it's gourmet components.
Jeff and I have been cooking Thanksgiving for 10 years, working out the menu as we've gone. Each year we've repeated only what dishes were absolutely lovely and tried something new for those that weren't just right.
I think we've finally got it. Every single thing was so delightfully perfect that I can't remember a better meal.
This year we applied the Zuni kitchen method to our turkey and were blown away with the results. The Bird was so flavorful and looked like something of a magazine spread with it's crispy, deep mahogany colored skin. The gravy was even better. It was flavored by all the fresh herbs, as well as the white wine I added to the cast iron skillet we roasted it in, and was the same deep dark color of the turkey. Oh, so yummy on the turkey and the potatoes. Our next favorite was a recipe we've been using since 1999, a Pinot Noir spiked cranberry sauce spiced with crystallized ginger, curry and Chinese 5 Spice powder. Heaven.
With that we had Sausage, Apple and Cranberry Stuffing and green beans almondine.
And topped it off with the cherry pie we froze a few weeks ago.
Neeka ran commentary on the meal with an endless stream of "delicious" and "so good".
Unfortunately, Jeff got to clean up her meal later that night because it turns out she was harboring a stomach/intestinal virus that was to rear it's ugly head around 1am. Today she's eating her turkey in broth form. Luckily, Jeff started a stock with the turkey bones before going to bed last night. Her fever is hovering around 101, but she's in good spirits and drinking plenty. I don't think Nichola has slowed down this much since she was Simone's age though. She's slept most of the day, poor baby.
Please send her some healing thoughts if you would.
Truthfully, my favorite thing about Thanksgiving day is that it means that Christmas trees and garland, carols and popcorn balls, paper snowflakes and twinkly lights are just around the corner.
Though I worry that gifts will spoil the fact that our kids play happily for hours a day without ever picking up a "real toy," we are doing a few gifts this year. About a week ago Quinn and Nichola picked through their shelves, which hold the toys that we had on the RV with us, and put a good number of them in a box to donate in town. Though I am truly delighted that they can play imaginative games for a half hour with just a stack of baby hats, I feel good about the gifts this year.
Some of their favorite games center around the theme of cooking. They play restaurant and tea party, coffee shop and kitchen, utilizing props they make of paper and crayons, blocks and other things they find around the house. So, Shhhhh, don't tell: we're getting them a wooden kitchen set with pots, and plates, and wooden food.
Normally I don't care that much for the gifting part of Christmas, but I am excited for them this year. I feel like watching them play without their playroom full of toys (the ones that were donated back in Austin) has really allowed me (and I think them) to learn what they really like. In the past, Christmas was filled with endless gifts of plastic toys and other things that would wind up broken or untouched within a few days. Every year they would run out of enthusiasm for opening the mounds of gifts before they could all be unwrapped. It never felt right and I'm so glad to have taken a stand against that consumerist crap and found our ways to a simpler more abundant time of enjoying what we really dig about the holiday.
I'll leave you with a tid bit of a conversation held in the Target bathroom some months ago:
Quinn to me: Why is there so much stuff here?
Me: Because it's a store, Baby.
Quinn: No, I mean why is there so much junk from China and other places? What is it doing here?? Why is there so much of it?? It's all going to break really fast. I can tell.
He's one smart cookie.
So many things to be grateful for that I wouldn't know where to begin the list.
This year I am just so happy to be here with my family. I'm so happy to have the rest of my life still to live... to see my children's faces, to compare their eye colors, to hug and kiss them and know that I will be here to care for them.
Everything seems to be glowing these days... so sacred... so precious...
We're living the most simplified version of our life; the worries and plans put aside.
Even the big meal seemed to come off at an easy leisurely pace despite it's gourmet components.
Jeff and I have been cooking Thanksgiving for 10 years, working out the menu as we've gone. Each year we've repeated only what dishes were absolutely lovely and tried something new for those that weren't just right.
I think we've finally got it. Every single thing was so delightfully perfect that I can't remember a better meal.
This year we applied the Zuni kitchen method to our turkey and were blown away with the results. The Bird was so flavorful and looked like something of a magazine spread with it's crispy, deep mahogany colored skin. The gravy was even better. It was flavored by all the fresh herbs, as well as the white wine I added to the cast iron skillet we roasted it in, and was the same deep dark color of the turkey. Oh, so yummy on the turkey and the potatoes. Our next favorite was a recipe we've been using since 1999, a Pinot Noir spiked cranberry sauce spiced with crystallized ginger, curry and Chinese 5 Spice powder. Heaven.
With that we had Sausage, Apple and Cranberry Stuffing and green beans almondine.
And topped it off with the cherry pie we froze a few weeks ago.
Neeka ran commentary on the meal with an endless stream of "delicious" and "so good".
Unfortunately, Jeff got to clean up her meal later that night because it turns out she was harboring a stomach/intestinal virus that was to rear it's ugly head around 1am. Today she's eating her turkey in broth form. Luckily, Jeff started a stock with the turkey bones before going to bed last night. Her fever is hovering around 101, but she's in good spirits and drinking plenty. I don't think Nichola has slowed down this much since she was Simone's age though. She's slept most of the day, poor baby.
Please send her some healing thoughts if you would.
Truthfully, my favorite thing about Thanksgiving day is that it means that Christmas trees and garland, carols and popcorn balls, paper snowflakes and twinkly lights are just around the corner.
Though I worry that gifts will spoil the fact that our kids play happily for hours a day without ever picking up a "real toy," we are doing a few gifts this year. About a week ago Quinn and Nichola picked through their shelves, which hold the toys that we had on the RV with us, and put a good number of them in a box to donate in town. Though I am truly delighted that they can play imaginative games for a half hour with just a stack of baby hats, I feel good about the gifts this year.
Some of their favorite games center around the theme of cooking. They play restaurant and tea party, coffee shop and kitchen, utilizing props they make of paper and crayons, blocks and other things they find around the house. So, Shhhhh, don't tell: we're getting them a wooden kitchen set with pots, and plates, and wooden food.
Normally I don't care that much for the gifting part of Christmas, but I am excited for them this year. I feel like watching them play without their playroom full of toys (the ones that were donated back in Austin) has really allowed me (and I think them) to learn what they really like. In the past, Christmas was filled with endless gifts of plastic toys and other things that would wind up broken or untouched within a few days. Every year they would run out of enthusiasm for opening the mounds of gifts before they could all be unwrapped. It never felt right and I'm so glad to have taken a stand against that consumerist crap and found our ways to a simpler more abundant time of enjoying what we really dig about the holiday.
I'll leave you with a tid bit of a conversation held in the Target bathroom some months ago:
Quinn to me: Why is there so much stuff here?
Me: Because it's a store, Baby.
Quinn: No, I mean why is there so much junk from China and other places? What is it doing here?? Why is there so much of it?? It's all going to break really fast. I can tell.
He's one smart cookie.
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4 comments:
I saw people in a store today spending money they probably can't afford to spend on cheap junk and crap their kids/grandkids really don't need because they've all bought into the over-commercialization they've been sold all these years. I find it so sad to watch. I want to shake these people and tell them to teach their kids that happiness isn't found in cheap toys. You're teaching your kids such a valuable lesson and I love hearing about it!
Of all the toys out there, a kitchen set is such a perfect toy! There is no set outcome, they can be as creative as they choose, and it is the perfect kind of play-practice for real life. You made a great choice, and they will love it!
Our budget this year for our kids was small compared to many families---$50 each. When you're in the middle of the toy store, it's so easy to get sucked into the commercialism of the holiday. I felt so guilty, choosing only three toys for each child. Once I had a few days at home, those feelings subsided and I came back to the sanity of wanting more for my children than the latest toy from overseas.
Thanks for writing. Sharing common values helps others feel less alone.
that is just what I want to get my kids. I saw this one, and I so want to buy it. Its out of our budget though
http://kansascity.craigslist.org/bab/1449296708.htm
comes with a fridge too.... I might just find a way to snatch it up
Smart Kid! I'm starting a dress up box for my grandchildren this year - and no 'trademarked' disney stuff either. I'll make them a cape, an apron and a few hats to get them started.
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