Thanksgiving Memories

We had mimosas on our third day of partying.

Somehow this blog post got published before I was ready.  I was posting some images from our family reunion on Thanksgiving and Clint's mother's 90th birthday celebration here at our house in Knoxville, TN.

The surprise birthday party was at least six months in the making.

Do you realize how difficult it is to keep a secret like this

from a close family member?  :-)

Since this blog post is also my personal scrapbook, I will continue to add some photos later to it since it published prematurely.

I laughed when Clint said me looking up napkin folding
was about 78th in importance on my to-do list.  I have to add
an artfully folded napkin does add something special to the table.

I had to get online to refresh my memory on how to make
a bishop's hat.

This pile of dishes are stacked up in a precarious manner.  There
was some method to my madness of piling them up
and none were broken.

I love glass, BTW.

Clint's daughter Debbie, her husband Fred and son Alex
sent us this beautiful centerpiece.

"The owl and the pussy cat sailed out to sea in a
beautiful pea green boat ... "  Clint's mother loves poetry
and recites it beautifully.  One of her favorites is the nonsensical poem
by Edward Lear.

Clint wanted to add each city that was
represented from our family members and guests
as they arrived.  I made these little
signs and stuck them on with Velcro.





Clint's daughter Debbie and son-in-law Fred drove
all the way from CT to TN!

Once again, a tablescape I literally threw together
using old, new and thrifted items.

This was how I set the smaller kitchen table.

The dining room table on Thanksgiving.

Eileen, Clint's mom with her three granddaughters ... from left to right,
Wendi, Diane and Debbie.

A group photo made on the day of Eileen's 90th birthday party
during Thanksgiving week.  The date is November 23, 2012.

(I am out of breath in this pic, I used a tripod and self-timer
on the camera.  I had ten seconds to run up the hill and pose
with the rest of the group.  :-)

Clint playing chess with his grandson Clint.
Grandson Canyon is observing and learning.
We are happy that both grandsons have expressed an
interest in chess.  Their grandmother is also interested.  ;-)

BTW, Clint is an excellent chess player so he is a great teacher
of the game.

For Thanksgiving and the birthday party, I made several
dishes/recipes that froze well.  We also had two kinds of quiches,
meat balls, biscuits and ham, cheese grits, crispy pecan
 wafers, homemade cookies, candy, cake, ice cream ...
the list continues.

This Hot Curried Fruit I had at a ladies brunch when we lived in
Plano.  My mother-in-law and I put this together one night
for baking the next morning.  It was one of
my favorite dishes of our three day party.



I made this cake with 90 candles on it for my mother-in-law
Eileen.