Gratitude Tree

Thanksgiving has never been one of my favorite holidays if I'm being totally honest. I mean, I love the food but there just isn't a lot else to it. This year I really wanted to go deeper and connect with the true meaning of the holiday, this year I wanted to focus on gratitude.

 To that end I am keeping a gratitude journal for the month of November but I also wanted to get my family involved so I decided to try a gratitude tree this year. A gratitude tree is just a vase full of sticks and some paper leaves, very simple to make but lovely! Whenever the mood strikes us throughout the month we take a paper leaf, write down something we are grateful for and tie it on the tree. Above you can see one of my leafs on the left and one Clover wrote herself on the right! (she tells me that it says "my toys")

The gratitude tree has been an instant hit from the moment I put it up on November 1st. My kids absolutely love it and I love hearing the things they are grateful for which include family, pets and treasured toys to name a few. It gives me the warm fuzzies to hear that Eric is grateful for my cooking or that Echo is grateful for mommy so it is really contributing to our happiness as a family to reflect on what we are grateful for and hear what others appreciate about us as well. I can see that this is a new Thanksgiving tradition that is sure to last.

Thanksgiving

I opted not to host Thanksgiving this year since I knew I would have a newborn. Instead We let our parents take the lead and had a mini Thanksgiving in Knoxville with Eric's folks last weekend and spent actual Thanksgiving at my parent's house so Logan would get to spend some time with his new niece Echo! It was fab as usual and everyone stuffed themselves, here are some pictures from the day.

Echo sleeps through the preparations 

There were games of course

Mom's Pfaltzgraff dishes and leftover wedding napkins (which we will be using until we die)

We found the best recipe for turkey ever this year, it's basted in bacon grease!

This blend ov herbs, bacon and butter gets rubbed under the skin of the turkey. I thought it was WAY better than the brined turkey we made last year, we will be making this one again.

Logan's vintage recipe for Bishops Punch

Gravy and cranberry relish

Pass the turkey!

After lunch we went to the park for family photos. Here's a picture of Eric and I with the thing we are most Thankful for :-)

It was a great weekend of food, family and fun! What a wonderful way to kick off the holiday season!

Rustic Modern Thanksgiving

 HOsting our first real Thanksgiving was a huge success! The food turned out delicious and everything was lovely. All I can say is we couldn't be more thankful :-)

Centerpiece and table runner, this is before we rearranged the furniture to accommodate everyone.

awwww...

Family enjoying Logan's punch that he brought.

                       

                         

Fridge the night before Thanksgiving. The turkey is brining in that big metal bucket.

Fridge after the Thanksgiving meal, so glad I bought new tupperware before this  holiday!

My plate, full of brined turkey, hash brown casarole, sweet potato casserole,  Mom's cornbread and  sausage dressing, grape, pecan and goat cheese salad and cranberry orange relish.

My famous butternut squash soup and a cheesy corn biscuit.

The most beautiful turkey ever :-)

Pecan, grape and goat cheese salad with balsamic vinaigrette. 

Eric carving a turkey for the first time

Logan's grapefruit pie with candies grapefruit peel on top.

We set up two tables put together (making one long table) in the living room where we are dinner. We set up an extra table in the dining room to use as a buffet to hold all the food.

Lots of wine was consumed

We got to use our wedding tablecloths, napkins and wine glasses as well as using the dishes and flatware we received as wedding gifts.

top view of the Thanksgiving table.

 This is what the menu ended up like, I've linked all the recipes that I can in this list :-)

Brined Turkey, Sweet Potato Casserole, Cheesy Corn Biscuits, My Mom's Amazing Cornbread and Sausage Dressing,  Goat Cheese, Grape and Pecan Salad, Hashbrown Casserole , Fruit Salad brought by my mother in law Jody, Cranberry Orange Relish, Butternut Squash Soup, Apple Bourbon Pie, brought by my mom, Grapefruit Pie, brought by Logan, Pumpkin Pie, brought by Jody, and Oreo Cheesecake brought by my parents.

Now all we have to do is try to recover from our food comas and enjoy our leftovers as the weekend goes on :-)

Thanksgiving Menu Planning

This year I have taken on the big challenge of hosting Thanksgiving at our house. I came up with this genius plan right after we got married last year and I was surrounded by all these fancy new casserole dishes and flatware. Hey, why not have all the family over for Thanksgiving next year and get a chance to use all those snazzy dishes? I had to call my plans in to question when the oven stopped working in our rental house last year. However now that we have a our own house with a brand new oven and enough guest bedrooms to accomodate out of town guests the plan is back on. I actually have hosted Thanksgiving once before when I lived in my awesome condo in Atlantic Station but it was really just my immediate family and Eric, all people I feel extremely comfortable with so it wasn't too much pressure for me. Now that I'm a married lady and head of my own household I somehow feel that the stakes are higher. We've invited Eric's Family including his grandma so we have the potential to have 8 or 9 people here for Thanksgiving this year. Needless to say the pressure is on. So in true Audrey from I have been planning super far in advance and making out my menu well ahead of time. I'll also have help from my mom since she has generously volunteered to bring desserts and stuffing, two very key ingredients to the perfect Thanksgiving meal. For my part this is what I'm planning so far.

Turkey- The star of the show. If it were up to me I would just cook a turkey breast since I hate dark meat and it would make my life a lot easier but unfortunately a lot of the men in my life just can't do without dark meat at Thanksgiving. I'm going to try brining the turkey this year since the internet seems to think this is the best way to cook a moist and delicious bird.

Hashbrown Casserole- Just like the Cracker Barrel version! It's so easy to make and delicious, every time I make it it gets gobbled up in no time. It's super fatty and unhealthy which is pretty much why it tastes so good, perfect for Thanksgiving :-)

Sweet Potato Casserole- Mom, Dad and Eric all hate sweet potatoes but Logan and I love them so I'm making them any way :-p

Butternut Squash Soup- Seriously the best soup in the world. We had this at a restaurant in NYC one year on Thanksgiving and it has been a holiday staple ever since.

Cranberry Orange Relish- Not your typical cranberry sauce, this uses all raw ingredients and is just the right amount of tart citrus, the perfect compliment to all those rich foods.

Salad of some kind- Who are we kidding? No one is going to eat salad when there's hashbrown casserole to be had. This is really just so that there is something green on the table.

So that's what I have planned. What are the Thanksgiving staples in your house? I'm trying not to stress myself out too much about this whole thing, if worst comes to worst we can order Chinese :-)