So, what went wrong today?

[tawnya]

My turkey, that I put in last night, and followed the directions, came out looking like the one on Christmas Vacation. You all remember? They started to carve it and "dust" came out? husband, bless his heart, ran to Kroger and got another one (cheap this morning) and we salvaged the day.

The best thing was that I was laughing this morning instead of crying. A testament from a mom of a difficult child, I guess. The bad thing was that I was almost hysterical, laughing.

What else happened with you guys?

 

[TeDo]

I can't say anything did. It was actually a pretty good day. We are doing our big Thanksgiving dinner on Saturday so we'll see what happens then. Good for husband and I am glad your hysterics were GOOD ones. Not many parents of difficult children can say that.

 

[tiredmommy]

I know that hysterical laugh well!

Everything went fine except the turkey grease on the curtains, the window, the wall, the ceiling, the floor and the back of the portable dishwasher just minutes before my inlaws were due to arrive.

How does turkey grease cover that much area so quickly?

Why, the little plastic "lifter-thingy" gives out just as I'm transferring the bird from roaster to platter.

And do you know Jessica Tandy in "Driving Miss Daisy"? That's my mother in law, except Miss Daisy is a lot more easy going...

Fortunately husband helped me clean up quickly before they arrived.

 

[tawnya]

I'm glad someone understands the laugh!

I forgot to add that the dish towel that I was using as a pot holder at Dad's caught on fire, too. He wasn't laughing, LOL. I told him another one bites the dust!

Happy Thanksgiving!

 

[Josie]

I was making the filling for the pumpkin pies last night. I have made it before and not had this problem, but it was splashing out the sides even at the lowest speed. I was going to turn it off but instead, I turned it all the way on high. Pie filling went everywhere! On all of the cooking supplies I had out, the counter, floor, wall, etc.

I haven't seen B laugh so hard in a long time. We were still laughing about it today.

 

[tiredmommy]

My pie filling was sloshy too! But fortunately it didn't go everywhere.

 

[donna723]

Ours actually went very well even though it was just my son and I. Everything came out beautifully and it was all done at approximately the same time, which is a small miracle. Of course he had to throw a clinker in the plans by announcing that we probably should eat early because he was going to FLORIDA with three friends this evening. So I was up very early cooking, we ate in the early afternoon and now he's on his way to Daytona Beach! They're delivering a car that one of his drag racing buddies sold to someone who lives in Daytona ... just a few months ago they all went trooping off to Delaware to buy this same car!

He'll be staying back here with me for a while, at least part time, because he finally got out of his stressful, horrible roommate situation which is nothing but good! It's a 40 minute drive from here to where he works though, but he'll be here while he looks for another place closer to his job.

 

[DammitJanet]

My day actually went well. I did nothing. Slept well. Tony went hunting till noon, came home, we went out to eat at a buffet so we could just relax and do nothing until we have the real Thanksgiving tomorrow...or should I say today since its 1 am. Then I went back to rest up for my boyfriend onslaught...lol.

Well...Lindsay called and asked if I minded if Keyana came over tonite (last night now) instead of midday Friday like we had planned. Okay, sure, no problem. Im guessing someone else wanted to go to boyfriend! So we rearranged plans. Then Cory shows up earlier than we had thought he would. GREAT! Daddy is home!

So I head out at the ungodly hour of 7:30 pm for an opening of 10pm of ToysRus Doorbuster sale on Thursday nite that was supposed to start my ....three store dash....LOL. Oh yeah right. ToysRus had a line that wrapped around it twice and still going when I got there at 8:15 and I was not going to stand in line for another 2 hours just to get in the store!

So I drove back home got to Walmart where they were having their doorbusters starting at midnight. Cool...but its about 9sh now. Sigh. get a burger and a drink, walk around and see where everything is located so I can find stuff when I can get in...sigh. What is bad with our walmart is its 24 hours so people are everywhere and they try to grab things before they are allowed. Its a madhouse. People are screaming....DONT TOUCH THAT...PUT IT BACK...but no one is complying but the folks like me who follow rules.

I finally got some of what I went for and came home...completely worn out. I still have to go back out about 4ish to go get my ereader at Radio shack...lol. Im beat!

 

[Hound dog]

Janet you are far braver than I am. I did black friday once, it will never happen again no matter how poor I get. lol

Our dinner is today as like Janet it is now 2am lol and I should be in bed cuz I plan to get up in like 3 hrs. Guess we'll see what the day brings.

 

[gcvmom]

Ours went fine, mostly.

Except the power went out in the neighborhood about 30 minutes before the bird was done and just as my mom had set pots of water to boil for various things... and she has an ELECTRIC stove! Fortunately it went back on about 20 minutes later.

But about 1/3 of the people coming to her house today were an hour or more late for the previously announced serving time for dinner. At first, my mom told the kids to go ahead and eat, but husband and my mom's younger brother decided that meant THEM too! Mom and her sister in law and I were going to wait for the other guests to arrive. But after waiting an hour, we all decided we'd warm up the food and go ahead and start without them. Some people in our family are notoriously tardy and we've learned not to worry about it too much. I guess we just thought they were closer to getting there than they really were.

 

[SRL]

I'm responsible for making homemade rolls for our family gettogethers. The recipe I use rises in the fridge overnight and when I peeked in the morning it had only risen halfway. I gave it another hour and still no go. Finally I took it out and felt it and decided maybe the fridge was too cold and when left out at room temperature the little yeasties did their thing.

In the end, all was well, but I sure was sweating it. It's always been stressful ever since the one Easter morning I woke up and found the yeast was bad and my dough was flat.

tawnya, I think you need some new turkey directions! Often our family just makes it up the day before and reheats it.

 

[slsh]

LOL - I think the best thing about cooking oopsies is that in the end, it really doesn't affect the day with- family

I once again somehow managed to not get the durned turkey cooked. Twelve pounds, put in at 10:30, should've been done at 1:45. I usually leave it in a bit longer, just to be safe. 2:30 pulled it out, got the last pies in, let the bird rest.... the juice was still pink (thermometer read 180 in thigh - should've been okay). ARGH!!! Long story short, we finally just ate sides and pie (all perfectly delicious) at 5:00, and husband had a turkey sandwich at 7:00 (pulled the stupid thing out of the oven at 6:30). I was aggravated because I actually started defrosting it on Monday, so that wasn't the problem. I don't know... but I did tell husband that if he buys next year's turkey, it has to be Butterball. For some reason, those are the only ones that I can get right.

But the kids.... oh my goodness, they just crack me up. Had a similar problem with- the bird several years ago (though that time was my fault, forgot to defrost it before Wed nite), so that year we actually ended up eating corn dogs (only thing in the house) for Thanksgiving. First words out of thank you's mouth when he got here yesterday were "so.... when are the corn dogs being served??" I was NOT going to go the corn dog route again, LOL. The kids were all just fine with- the sides and pie meal, but they did give me a lot of ribbing about not getting their corn dogs. They feel it should become our traditional T-day meal. Funny funny kids. I can only imagine the stories they're going to tell their kids.

It was an absolutely wonderful day, one of the best in recent history. Kids together and having a good time. They are turning into some very cool people and my heart was just so full watching them goof around all day. They are very very neat people.

I was feeling a bit blue Wednesday because I realized that in almost 23 years of marriage, we have not spent a single major holiday with family. Not one. Felt a bit sad for my kids, missing out on that extended family thing. But after the Wild Turkey for husband's egg nog hit me on the head when I opened the fridge door and then proceeded to douse the entire kitchen floor, and with the raw turkey disaster yet again, I'm now thinking maybe it's best that the only witnesses to my incompetence are the ones who love me best, LOL. And it made me feel so lucky to watch them all together, and to be given a group hug by the 3 younger ones when we declared the turkey inedible (I disappear in them now, with the boys nearing 6'5" and Diva my height).... very very lucky.

 

[JJJ]

The day started off "great" when I thought husband was taking care of Tigger and letting me sleep in...only to wander downstairs to find Tigger alone, the dog tied to a a chair and mud all over the kitchen. It seems that Tigger wasn't listening to husband so husband left. Fun.

It could have had something to do with Tigger not being given his morning medications....ggggrrrrrr

 

[Wiped Out]

Ours went great for the most part but we did almost lose the turkey at one point. About 5 minutes after I put it in the oven, I realized I hadn't put in the meat thermometers (yes, I put more than one in-super cautious about that-I use the pop up kind). So I opened the oven and tried to do it with just sliding out the rack-big mistake with an almost 23 pound turkey! It started to slide and so I put my arms out and yelled for husband to help who was right next to me and saved the turkey!!

I do remember the first time we had husband's family over and I peeled potatoes and put all of the peelings down the garbage disposal-which is what I usually did-but you can't do that when you are peeling potatoes for 22 people!! I blocked up the sink!

 

[1905]

I don't know why I just can't seem to keep the turkey hot while the sides cook. I think the turkey may have been too well done also. My guests didn't show up until an hour and a half past the time we told them we were serving dinner. That worked out in my favor because I woke up an hour past the time I had to start cooking it! So, it would have been late anyway.

At the moment I am completely burned out from working for a day and a half in that kitchen. I'm thinking about going to the mall- I have such good coupons that only last until 1. On second thought- I better not, I always say,"Never again" but every boyfriend, there I am going shopping.

If anyone needs tools today, my husband went to Home Depot and that for some reason all the tools are on sale, and things he needed, were all 10 dollars. He was so excited, he didn't know it was Black Friday.

 

[Mom2oddson]

Everything went fine....except for the banana cream pie. I make one every year from scratch. It looked great until I went to cut into it. It was banana cream pie soup. It was so running that you needed a ladle, bowl and spoon to eat it. But they ate it anyways. On the plus side, it was the first time I made a sweet potato pie and it was better than pumkin. I'm told to add that to the "I must bring to Thanksgiving dinner" list. Now that makes four desserts every year. But, I love doing it!

 

[Lothlorien]

I took my turkey and put it in the fridge Monday morning. Went to check on it Wednesday night and it was still rock solid. We put it in a water bath for several hours and it thawed fine. Nothing else went wrong, other than the turkey being done a little sooner than expected, but it sat on the counter and rested until my dad and aunt came. It was all good.

 

[Hound dog]

Ok our dinner was today so..........

I was up all night sick as a dog, not a wink of sleep.

husband was sweet and did last night's dishes and dug out the electric roasting pan and cleaned it up for me..................and I was so blah and yuk and tired that I thought he'd forgotten the insert pan.........which turned out to be in it all along. Evidently after 48 hrs without sleep my vision starts to go....

So get the turkey going, and was happy that for once it had actually thawed in the frig instead of staying frozen. Took the ham out and plopped it in the oven. Then went to find my cassarole dishes for the brocolli cassarole and couldn't find them anywhere. So husband had to make a run to the store for some disposable ones. He wasn't very happy with me. lol Had Travis cutting pads of butter and slicing cheese..............now this actually tells you what shape I've been in. LOL We get to the sweet potatoes and I suddenly remember that my potato masher is at Nichole's apartment from when we had dinner over there. ugh So Travis did a fine job mashing the sweet potatoes with a fork.

We get to the meal.........we made enough for an Army becuase katie and family normally eat enough for 3 families by themselves.........well evidently they don't do that at easy child's house, must be behavior reserved for me because they didn't eat much of anything, even the kids. And M had the nerve to make the comment he'd had so much pie yesterday at the shelter he couldn't look at another piece. I had a few choice words for him but bit my tongue. I just kept reminding myself this was for the grands instead. But then darrin showed Alex his little video game and Alex zoned out on everyone completely, and I do mean completely. I had to take it away so the boy would eat. And katie whined about the shelter to which no one felt sorry for her or even acted like they gave a darn, cuz we didn't............I must have heard more than 100 times that Alex's backpack for school had been stolen in what less than 4hrs time. I just kept saying oh, that's too bad. And changing the subject.

Like I said, typical difficult child holiday. I am sooooo glad katie and M are on their way back to the shelter, that the meal is over, and I can go take a much needed nap. yay!

 

[KTMom91]

Yesterday went well, with dinner at my mom's, except for a few minor moments.

This morning, Miss KT and I got up and headed out to Target at 3:30, were home by 6, and I started baking because I'm bringing dessert to Hubby's sister's this afternoon. The pumpkin pie (Sara Lee), the pear pie (from scratch), and the lemon bars (also from scratch) turned out nicely. HOWEVER...one of the panther boys knocked over stuff in Miss KT's room, smashing her full-length mirror, tipping her TV, and spilling water all over everything. She is not amused.

I still have to shower and get organized to go to sister in law's, and I'm really having motivational difficulties. I need a nap, but I don't have enough time to take one.

 

[jal]

No problems here luckily. It was small and simple for us this year as my mom usually puts on Thanksgiving with me doing all of the deserts, but she and my dad are in CA visiting my brother and his wife for the holiday. husband and I bucked tradition and opted out of serving turkey. I did beef tenderloin instead and it was great. Had to do to a few of the family favorites, sausage apple stuffing and sweet potato casserole with pumpkin pie for desert. All went well and it was so relaxing not having to go anywhere and worry about difficult child being a PITA! A nice little perk was work closing early on Wed, so I got all my prep done then!

Tomorrow we are off to see A Christmas Carol on the stage. difficult child is very excited to go. He went on a class field trip the other week and saw a company put on 3 different plays. He was very into it and has been counting the days until tomorrow!