Great food and chaos for one and all

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving. We certainly did.

The cast: Six adults, six kids (four of them under 7).

The menu: Smoked turkey, chestnut stuffing, gravy, collard greens, and broccoli with homemade cheese sauce. For dessert: pumpkin and apple pies.

(I made the pumpkin pie.)

(Yay, me!)

Charlie did his usual culinary magic. Everything was perfectly-cooked and delicious.

Oh! And we narrowly avoided a food poisoning disaster! Wednesday evening, Charlie discovered that the turkey – which we’d bought early this year for the first time in possibly forever so it could actually be thawed – was spoiled.

(Nothing like running to Publix at 9 pm for another turkey.)

(To our local Publix’s credit, they graciously credited us for the spoiled turkey and sold us a fresh one.)

(For about a dollar more per pound. But what’re you gonna do?)

***

Back to Thursday:

After our 3 p.m. meal, football was watched. Ads were perused and shopping lists made. Dessert was enjoyed. Stemware was dropped and broken. Fights over Legos were mediated. Fights over the trampoline were mediated. Fights over Barbies were mediated.

A lot of fights were mediated.

Fortunately, we saw no blood, broken bones, or fist fights.

(Since the fight over the TV channel was ended by putting the daddies in time out.)

(Oh, I kid. The only yelling done by the men was at the football players on TV.)

Clearly, the first line of Charlie’s prayer to bless the food — “Dear Lord, thank you for this chaos” – was apropos.

***

Friday was L.A.Z.Y. At least for me. And the kids, who spent it in front of the TV.

(Charlie overachieved by working on the treehouse all afternoon. Showoff.)

Anyway, having talked myself out of waking at 4:30 a.m. to do battle over $5 DVDs at Target, I did a little bit of laundry (not nearly enough) and took down all the fall decorations. Since we don’t have a lot of fall décor, this didn’t take long. Surprisingly, I felt sad about saying goodbye to the paper turkeys and leaf-appliqued towels.

Of course, my mood was improved by listening to Christmas music.

(Which I’m allowed to do now that we’ve gotten past the Thanksgiving “playoffs,” and my “teammate” in the “Super Bowl” of life can’t complain about it.)

(I heart “air quotes.”)

(I mean I “heart” them.)

(I crack myself up.)

Today: Christmas decorating! We’ll be wrestling with our tree, unwrapping dozens of Santa tchotchkes, mediating fights (of course), drinking eggnog, and singing along with Perry Como and the Ray Conniff Singers.

I heart Christmas.

I’ll be back Monday with something either inspiring or hilarious.

Or at least verbose …

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