Thanksgiving

Yesterday, our very first think to be thankful for is that my friend husband was safe and away from the violence in Mumbai. He is due back here in London this morning. She may never let him leave again! It is just too tragic what is happening there.

It's always odd to spend a major holiday in a country that doesn't celebrate said holiday. Life went on as usual here in England yesterday. And that's a good thing, as it meant I was able to pick up my car. Am SO thankful to have it back.

Called a cab to take me to the car dealership and hauled my cupcakes and cookies with me and then drove directly from the service center to Maddie's school. I spent the next four hours helping at the German table at the International Fair for ACS. It was a lunch thing for the junior and senior high school students and the lower school students ate lunch in their rooms and then came in for snacks. There was all sort of food: American, Canadian, English, South African, Swedish, Spainish, Egyptian, South African, Greek, Korean, Japanese and Chinese. The most interesting thing about it was that there were very few "purebreds" at any of the tables. Helping at the German table were a German woman who really has spent most of her life in Germany, a Japanese woman who graduated from the same school Maddie went to in Duesseldorf, another German woman who has lived abroad (Houston, Kazahkstan, Romania, Moscow and England) for the last 15 years and yet another German woman who has lived most of her life in Canada. Several of the women helping at some of the Asian country tables aren't from those countries but have adopted children from there. And there were people like me who helped out at tables of countries that have lived in, but aren't originally from.

Came home and helped Maddie with her homework and started in on the cooking for our dinner today. My first pumpkin pie turned out really ugly, so we just had to go ahead and eat that one. I was following the recipe on the Libby pumpkin can and it said to cook it at a higher temperature for 15 minutes and then a lower temp for the next 40. In my oven, that makes the top bubble up and brown like the top of a toasted cheese sandwich. I made another one for our guests without the altered temp that is much prettier. We're also having pecan pie, apple pie (maddie's request) and little mini-mince pies in honor of our country of residence. Our guests are bringing traditional stuffing and I'm making cornbread dressing. We'll have mashed potatoes, carrot souffle and cucumber/tomato salad, bread and, of course, corn. I didn't think of the corn, but Maddie said that this is a traditional Thanksgiving food because that's what the Indians brought to the first one. They also supplied deer meat according to one of her books, but she opted out of that tradition.

Just put the turkey in the oven. This year, for the first time, I have the advantage of a double oven. Awesome. It will still get dicey when we try to get everything hot and on the table at the same time! Hope everyone had a happy Turkey Day in the US.