Happy Thanksgiving!

 

A very Happy Thanksgiving tomorrow to all my U.S. friends!  Preparations for a somewhat smaller holiday have been taking place here.  Yesterday I made our traditional Apple Cake from the recipe passed down from my Grandmother.  Today I baked Pecan Pies (my favorite!) and also cornbread for the stuffing.  Tonight, I have a date with some sweet potatoes.     

Peeling apples for cake.

Tomorrow we will go to my son’s house.  We have put much thought into whether or not we go since it is being recommended that you stay home this year.  We see my son, Chris occasionally and if there are “covid bubbles” as some describe the small group of people that you do see, my son and his family would be that “bubble” for us.  Local authorities are asking that groups be under ten and our group will be.  It will be my son, daughter-in-law, two grandchildren and grandson’s girlfriend.  Our other son, Sean has decided to not go anywhere so we will deliver some Thanksgiving treats to him afterwards. 

 

Apple Cake

We will take all the goodies I have made to Chris’ house for our family dinner.  Kristi is making the turkey and many other delicious dishes.  She is an excellent cook!  I make the stuffing every year because I use a family recipe that my Mother used to make and everyone loves it.  I’ll also be bringing the sweet potatoes, Apple Cake, Pecan Pies and a few other treats. 

I know Thanksgiving may not be the same for many of us this year because of covid.  The important thing to remember is that we each have many things and people to be thankful for in our lives.  There are some people I would love to be with that I won’t see but they are still in my life from a distance and I am very, very thankful for them all.  I am also thankful for good health for myself and my family.  We have a warm home and plenty of food and I am certainly thankful for those things.  All of my blog friends are also a blessing to me and I am very grateful for each and every one of you!  Happy Thanksgiving! 

The Rocking Chair

I've inherited many small, yet special items from my Mother and Grandmother.  One such item is a small, hand carved toy rocking chair that belonged to my Mother.  Her Grandfather carved it for her when she was very young.  My Mother was born in 1922 so I would estimate the toy rocking chair is over 90 years old.  When I was growing up Mother always had the little chair on a shelf or somewhere around the house where she could see it.  It meant a lot to her since her Grandfather carved it for her and she loved him very much.  In turn it has meant a lot to me and I keep it on a shelf near my sewing machine.  I never knew my Great-Grandfather because he died before I was born, but I heard many wonderful stories about him as I was growing up. 

I don't know if it is just me or not but small items like this mean more to me than anything of any monetary value.  I love to hold it and think about it's history and how something so simple can come to mean so much.

My Mother between her two older
brothers in about 1926.

My Great-Grandfather that carved the
rocker and one of his other grandchildren.
(he lost his leg when younger and working with the railroad)

It's funny when we think about the things that come to be important to us.  Do you have any small, special items like this that have been passed down in your family?  

Easing into Winter

 

Some years we quickly slide into Winter with snow, ice and sharp winds.  Other years it is an easier process, more of a gentle teasing of the cold weather to come.  We are fortunate to have the gradual arrival of Winter this year only making itself known more clearly after the change of time that brings the dreaded short, dark days. 

Neighborhood Trees

We had our first snow this year almost a week before the end of October.  Luckily when we get an early snow, we usually have more warm days to come and we did.  Those warm days continued through yesterday when it was sunny and beautiful with a temperature of 74 F (23 C).  I finally decided to tackle the many leaves in our back yard and spent four hours raking and bagging.  I ended up with eight bags of leaves and some pretty good back and knee pains!  Believe it or not, that was from only half of the back yard.  Our yard is not that big but we do have a lot of trees and that means more yard work in both Spring and Fall.  That is fine with me though because I love trees!  By the time I stopped working the sun had disappeared and the sky had that dark, foreboding look.  This morning I stepped out onto our deck and was hit with that sharp cold that is unmistakably the beginning of winter.  We went from temps in the 70’s to the low 40’s (4 C).  Then the heavy, cold rain started.  Oh well, I didn’t feel like finishing the raking today anyway. 

 

Sophie sleeping with her friends

Time does move fast and before we know it the holidays will be here.  For those of us in the U.S. Thanksgiving is just a little over two weeks away and as soon as that is over, we are into the Christmas season.  There is no telling what the holidays will be like this year with the pandemic still here.  We don’t travel over the holidays so the main thing that will change for us will be the lack of local Christmas activities.  I am hopeful that we will still see our kids and grandkids Christmas but these days I know there are no guarantees.  Are you making different plans this year for the holidays?  Maybe someone will come up with some new ways for those of us staying home to celebrate this year?

 

Done!

 

We voted this morning and I am happy to say it went smoothly and easily with no problems or delays.  Even though we live in a small town there are many different places to vote and based on where we live in town we are assigned a particular location.  This time it was one of the town's small churches.  Before we even got to the church we could see the line wrapping part of the way around the block.  We were expecting this and actually I am happy to see so many people getting out to vote.  There is usually a good turnout of voters for Presidential elections but this year I believe is a record breaking year throughout our country.  

Line partially around the block

We parked and walked around the block to the end of the line.  Tom was concerned about how long we might be standing in line but it was moving much faster than we had expected.  We were fortunate to have beautiful weather with the sun shining brightly and before we knew it we had reached the church.  Once inside the whole process went quickly.  All Covid precautions were taken with the use of hand sanitizer, masks and the spacing of people voting.  We signed in, received our ballots and were done quickly despite the fact that we had quite a few local issues on the ballot in addition to the Presidential election.   Including the time we were in line, we completed the entire process in 30 minutes.

Beautiful blue skies and good weather

The line moved quickly

So now we have the hard part - the waiting.  It is entirely possible we won't know who won the Presidential election until tomorrow or later.  This is a record breaking year for the number of people voting and that can take time to tabulate.  But I really, really hope we at least have a good idea of who won tonight.  I am also hoping that regardless of who wins there will be no problems as a result of the election.  In most large cities, including Kansas City here, merchants are boarding up windows in anticipation of potential problems.  There have been some rumors of problems if Trump loses.  I hope those are rumors and nothing more.  Our country has gone through so many negative changes in the past four years, it is time for us to heal.