Thanksgiving

I am grateful for what I am and have. 

My thanksgiving is perpetual. 

It is surprising how contented one can be with nothing definite-only a sense of existence. 

-Henry David Thoreau 

Happy Thanksgiving.  

A litte holiday post ex

We had a wonderful few days off.  It's been a quiet, relaxing, and reflective weekend.  It's wonderful to watch the sun rise, the waves pound, and yes, even the snow fly. 

We never do the traditional stuff on Thanksgiving.  For us, the traditional is the non-traditional food.  Paul made a magnificent beef tenderloin complete with shallots in a mustard and red wine reduction. 

And there was wine.  And a few pictures. I only have pictures of the beef before it's cooked.  By the time it's done, who cares about pictures?

From 2012-11-23

I do contribute.  I made the tossed greens.  It's complicated.  But I am always up for a challenge.

From 2012-11-23

Wine.

From Thanksgiving 2012

From 2012-11-23

So it's almost time to go.  Time to pack up the leftovers, the clothes, the camera gear, and recyclables and head back to real life.  This little slice of heaven is never very far from my mind. 

Cheers to the rest of the weekend.  

Thanksgiving Day

It's really simple.  We are grateful, thankful, and joyful.  Life is good.  And it needs pictures.

I made breakfast for the fam.  Don't mock me.  It's the best I can do. And no, I can't make the icing look like the picture.  

From Thanksgiving 2012

We walked north.

From Thanksgiving 2012

and then south.

From Thanksgiving 2012

he paused to let me take his picture.  I think he is such a handsome looking dog.  You can't imagine how sweet this precious animal is. Unless you are a small, hoppy thing.  Prey drive.  Can't do anything about that.

From Thanksgiving 2012

and he trots around, checking email through his nose.

From Thanksgiving 2012

We watched the eagle fly by, soaring high above us, the water, the sand, looking for dinner.  He circled over the water for many minutes but we didn't see him catch anything.  We just watched the seagulls scatter. 

Parades, football, a stunning backdrop, and the guys. Life is good indeed. Happy thanksgiving to you.

Impervious

The dog, Samson the dog, is crazy.  Certifiably nuts.  We are vacation at the happiest place on earth and we cannot keep that dog out of the water.  It's not August here, it's November.  None of us are swimming.  It's too cold to even rinse him off.  Too cold for me that is. 

Alas, we picked out flooring that would withstand the sand.  So be it. It's why we have a vacuum and broom.

From Thanksgiving 2012

From Thanksgiving 2012

From Thanksgiving 2012

From Thanksgiving 2012

If he is happy, I am happy.  Cheers from EOTE. 

Thanksgiving in the books

It was an epic day.  Epic lounging. Epic Samson.  Epic fun.  A good one for the history books.

Starting with dessert first.

From Thanksgiving 2011

From Thanksgiving 2011

From Thanksgiving 2011

From Thanksgiving 2011

It was SOOO good.  Then filet mignon in pepper sauce .

From Thanksgiving 2011

Cheers!

From Thanksgiving 2011

A cute decor

From Thanksgiving 2011

Delightful table for a wonderful dinner

From Thanksgiving 2011

And the best part?  It's 55 degrees and no snow in sight.  It won't last long but we will take it.

From Thanksgiving 2011

And now, for the rest of the weekend! 

Best Thanksgiving Memory

Thanksgiving has always been a wonderful holiday.  While we were in the Navy, Thanksgiving was a holiday observed by banks, the Post Office, and the rest of the world; but not the Navy.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I have memories of celebrating Thanksgiving on ships, in the air, and days before and after the "real" day, because the Navy had other plans.   There was the Thanksgiving when we invited our vegan friends to dinner and they brought garlic cheese bread.  It was moldy.  It was gross.  But they didn't mind the potatoes and stuffing.  We enjoyed the turkey.

There were many Thanksgivings spent alone.  And for an introvert, it was pretty okay to have some down time.  Many, many well meaning friends tried to entice me to dinners and parties and such.  I sometimes fibbed a little ... had other plans with other (not quite) people, like my sweet girl Allie.   I could imagine nothing more awful than making small talk with family members in tense situations and not knowing anyone.  Instead, when Paul was deployed, I would sleep, relax, read, write, and just BE.  It was awesome.

The best Thanksgiving memory ever was our first Thanksgiving in Guam.  80 degrees.  Sunshine.  Guam.  We invited all the single guys working with Paul on the Niagara Falls over for dinner.  We cooked the turkey, the potatoes (from a box.  Real potatoes on Guam were outrageous $$), and stuffing.  Everyone else brought something to drink and ... a plate, a knife, a fork, and a spoon.  We didn't have enough flatware for everyone.

We were really poor, just starting out.  But it didn't matter.  We had such an awesome time.  Everyone thought the meal was fabulous.  No one minded that I left the little plastic bag with the giblets inside.  Well, no one really knew.  I made the stuffing on the stove top. 

Happy Thanksgiving.  Here is to you and your families - two legged and four legged.  Cheers.

Works of art and thanksgiving

A picture is a poem without words.
~Horace

The sand on our beach creates the most remarkable art.  I love walking the beach and looking at the beauty and creation that comes together in odd shapes and places. 

From 2011-11-13

It never gets old.

From 2011-11-13

As we begin the week of Thanksgiving, take a minute and share your thanks.  We have so much for which to be thankful.  

Fill the Frame

In photography, the technique of filling the frame is a common one - and a good one. Many pictures are taken from too far away, not up close and personal. To fill the frame, you need to zoom in or move your feet and this weekend, we did both. We traveled and zoomed around, filling the weekend with lots of fun, people, places and adventures.

For Thanksgiving, we headed back to GP to spend the holiday with family. Paul bucked tradition and made a wonderful beef tenderloin. We had a lovely time. I spent a good part of the day reading The Help - what an incredible book.

We did some visiting and checked in with Paul's friends John and Maria with their new dog, Enzo. I spent some time taking Enzo's picture. He is a cute little doggy and very photogenic ....when he will sit still. We also visited the Tworeks - our favorite Livonia peeps! We all went out to lunch at Red Robin and had a whole lot of fun taking pictures - including their new family member, Franco. He is a cutie too.

Saturday night we celebrated Paul's birthday and stayed downtown at the JW Marriott. We had dinner at six.one.six which was a culinary delight. It was crazy good and surprisingly reasonable for such a neat, trendy place. I had mac and cheese with seafood. Just heaven. We also walked around downtown and through the hotel. It's a beautiful and I will be posting pictures over at my photography blog.

Samson spent the weekend with his peeps at Whiskers Pet Resort. He always comes home with exhausted, but very, very happy. I took a few days off this week to catch up on things around the house, recover, relax, read a little and write some.

Enjoy the week!

Thanksgiving

The longer I live the more beautiful life becomes.
―Frank Lloyd Wright

Here it is - one of my favorite holidays of the year. What could be better than a national holiday to stop everything and give thanks? This year, we are having a wonderful rebel dinner of beef tenderloin with all the appropriate fixings and some great wine from Art of the Table. We will spend the time with family and friends, take some pictures, watch some football (and hockey), have a little fun and some serious chillaxing. We will NOT be the people out at 4:00 am shopping. That's what Amazon is for.

We are truly grateful. We celebrate this holiday with deep gratitude. We are grateful for our abundance of health, love, family, friends, neighbors, great jobs, a full table and Mr. Handsome. Thank you for being a part of it. Happy Thanksgiving.

Super Duper Day

We had such a nice Thanksgiving! It was the perfect combination of food, friends, naps and chillaxin' - all wrapped up in a delightful box. Paul's brined turkey was simply unbelievable - I wish that computers had taste and smell-o vision. It was without compare. Accompanying the turkey - mashed red-skinned potatoes, stuffing, gravy and a salad. We had a delicious Pinot Noir with dinner to boot. Just perfect. More details complete with pictures are available on the cafe. We also enjoyed visits from friends and checking on Deb's dogs. Just perfect.

Today is the perfect day-after. We slept in (thank you Samson) and have a little shopping to do (heaven help us - we AREN'T black Friday kind of people), errands, odds and ends and a fun trip to Calvin.

Enjoy your day, whatever is on your calendar!

With deep gratitude

It has been a busy couple of days. Sadly, I wasn't feeling too great on Monday and Tuesday. Monday night, I was fixed on the television with Dancing with the Stars; Tuesday night was the final dance-off and I was in bed. :( I was just not feeling very well. To my great surprise, I woke up Wednesday morning still feeling yucky but in a total protonic reversal (see Calvin & Hobbes), as the day wore on, I felt much, much better. So as a good Calvinist, I finished the work day.

In the vocation front, I must sadly close out my weather station pipe dreams with the CoCoRaHS group. The precipitation collector that I purchased already broke (POS) and I am not feeling too excited about spending another $22 to buy a new one. Srsly, we had one snow and it broke. Get better equipment and I will gladly help. I am going to drop the group a note, along with the maker and see if something can be worked out. Otherwise, I will say goodbye to my weather station.

Thanksgiving is one of my very favorite holidays; Paul and I are grateful to be home with each other while other military families endure the hardship of separation. We have been there and understand, we pray deeply for those deployed and those in harm's way, especially during the holidays. So when we sit down for dinner, our first toast will be to those men and women deployed around the world, their families and loved ones; a toast to all of you who work and sacrifice to keep us safe. Deep gratitude.

Paul took a half day of vacation and has the turkey soaking in brine. It smelled SO delicious and I can't wait to taste it. Our holiday will look something like this. Perhaps on just one day, Mr. Samson will let us sleep in. If he doesn't, he may be free to a good home. (Just kidding). I love a good fire, some hot chocolate and the parades. We will watch the football games, check on a friend's dogs, bother our neighbors for some holiday cheer and have dinner, about 7ish or whenever Paul says the turkey is done.

We have a really busy weekend. We are getting a private tour of the Spoelhof Fieldhouse Complex (SWEET -thanks Henry), fun with friends and dogs and some serious chillaxin' with both Mr. Handsomes. :)

With deep gratitude. We are grateful for our abundance of love, family, friends, neighbors, great jobs, a full table and Mr. Handsome. Thank you for being a part of it. Happy Thanksgiving.

Good things happen here

These are Paul's words for Sammy. Our lives have changed dramatically with Paul's retirement, the loss of our dog, Allie and the adoption of our new dog, Samson. When we lost Allie, we lost more than just a dog, our constant companion for 13 + years. We also lost a rhythm, a routine and our private "Allie' language. We lost all the silly names we called her, buried her funny foibles yet continued to clean up dog hair the wafted around the house. Not only did we mourn her passing, we missed talking to her. Unless you have a furry companion, I don't know that this could make any sense.

Allie would dream hard, so hard in fact that she would wake herself up. It was one of the funniest things that she did ... she would wake up and then look around, eventually settling her eyes upon one of us, accusing us of waking her up. At which point, Paul would say her to, 'Are you having furry little dreams?" She would put her head back down, with a loud snort, as if to say, don't wake me up again....

With the addition of Samson, we are creating a whole new language around him. He loves and I do mean LOVES his toys. He has many of the toys that Allie could no longer chew; among the toys are a buddha, a large Kong, several bones and a nylon ring that was a gift from our friend Catie. When Samson follows Paul into the kitchen, he says to Sammy, "Good things happen here." And they usually do ... a few snitches of turkey, a sample of bacon, a piece of toast that falls on the floor.

Good things happen here. A wonderful Thanksgiving, great neighbors, a good fire, a great job with fabulous people, a bright future. And now, a new furry friend that fills our heart, a little bittersweet but he doesn't know that he is living with a ghost. Allie would be happy that we opened our home to a lonely dog in need of a good home. And hopefully good people who found themselves in need of a little fur and love.

Thanksgiving morning reflections

What's for breakfast? I remember when parades used to be real parades. Marching bands, floats, funny clowns in little cars and dressed up turkeys waiving to the crowds and police on horses. Now 'parades' are broadway medleys, productions and lipsynced songs. Yuck.

We spent the morning playing Frisbee with Sammy. I don't know who had more fun - Sammy or the two of us! It took no time to train him to fetch - we used two Frisbees and he figured out immediately that if he returned one to us, Paul would throw the second one. That dog is SOOOO fast. He loves just tearing around the yard. We spent 20 minutes throwing the Frisbee before he even began to tire ....and we took him out a second time, and he had all the energy all over again!

Sometimes things work out better than we deserve. We are blessed with fabulous neighbors on both sides. Our neighbors to the east (Amy and Dennis) have a similar sized yard and we have no fence between our yards. It allows for good football and soccer games in the far back, as well as amazing room to run for our dogs. Annie is their dog and she is one of the cutest dogs that I have EVER seen. Annie used to sit by our back slider and bark and wait for Allie to come out so they could play. Allie was too old and Annie didn't understand that Allie couldn't run and play. It broke our hearts. Oddly, when we lost Allie, Annie would come nowhere near us ... even when we came by Amy and Dennis' house, Annie would run away from us. It was definitely a statement! But Annie met Sammy and they hit it off. Paul was out with our neighbor Amy, and Sammy and Annie were tearing around the backyard. We all win.

As I type, Sammy is collapsed on the floor. I am watching the Detroit Thanksgiving Day parade and we have a lovely fire going in the backroom.

Paul's apple pie is done and it looks fabulous. This is one of my favorite days of the year!