Happy Thanksgiving... under the wire

The day is nearly done, and I will be waking up in 4 hours to take my friend Toni on our annual 'get Christmas presents for the kids and husbands and then go out for breakfast while they are still sleeping' extravaganza.

But I did want to say Happy Thanksgiving to all my American friends. I am most thankful for all of you, and the chance to get to 'meet' you through this venue. And to those of you who I have had the privelege of meeting in person, I want to say that I truly feel blessed to have had that chance. The modern age is a magnificent thing, for bringing people like you into my life.

I'm getting into the groove of this late-season Thanksgiving, and it's starting to grow on me. And tomorrow? Tomorrow I get to put up the decorations.

Here's a taste of our Thanksgiving.

This is in our back yard. Yes, I'm evil. Thought I'd take a photo of the lemon just before I picked it to put into the apple/cranberry/raisin pie. That was a good lemon, too.

And here we have Ken's "I'm making too many dishes for the feast" coping-skillz t-shirt.

(rats, I thought that was in better focus when I uploaded it)

And what's this? Children wielding knives?

Yes, we put our slaves to work, making comestibles for our culinary pleasure. Cut those apples! And don't lose any fingers while you're at it.

And as a tip of the hat to the upcoming season, I pulled out ONE of my Christmas plates to put the cheese course on.

Here, you can see Ken's hands, building the pie. You can also see his father's wedding ring on his right hand. Look how similar it is to his own wedding band.

But now, I *MUST* get to sleep, lest I slumber in the chaos of Black Friday sales, and thus be accused of not bolstering the ailing economy enough.