Thanksgiving 2012

One of the worst part of not having any family living near us is holidays.  We haven't exactly been able to afford to buy plane tickets for every holiday that has rolled around for the past 12 years, which means we're on our own for a lot of these special occasions.  Sometimes a friend will invite us over to spend the holiday with them, and a couple of times family has been able to come here or we've been able to fly to Seattle, which is fun.  However, there do end up being years where it's just us.  

Now, I like to do what my husband calls "event cooking."  The thing is that it just seems like such a huge waste of effort to make a huge dinner just for us.  A whole turkey for just two people?  That's crazy!  Even after Bubba was born it didn't seem worth it, because the boy just doesn't eat very much, and he sure as heck doesn't eat most Thanksgiving foods.  It's still pretty much just my husband and me eating dinner so it never seems worth it.  We usually end up hemming and hawing all day trying to decide what to eat and then end up grabbing whatever we can find.

Last year, our Thanksgiving dinner came from Jack in the Box.  It was sad.  It made me sad.  I decided we wouldn't do that again.  Last weekend I took advantage of a sale at a local store that scored us a free turkey with a $30 purchase.  I picked up some stuff to prepare sides and dessert.  A sure sign that I was meant to make this meal?  

I found an old Pyrex pie plate at the Goodwill Saturday morning.  The mark on the bottom says Patented PYREX May 27, 1919.  From what I can gather, that mark was used from 1919 to 1924, and the 209 (my plate's model number) was introduced in 1920.  It retailed for 90 cents.  :)  That makes this not quite as old as my 193 oval casserole without the date on it's stamp, but still pretty darn old!

I made pies last night.  The boy got his first lesson in how to properly flute a pie crust.

Today I roasted our turkey.  It's been a while, but I've still got it!  One day I'll get a grown up roasting pan.

I busted out the good dishes.  I love my vintage ironstone.

One day, I'll have autumnish napkins too.  :)

We all sat down and had a feast!  Everything came out so good and I'm really glad I did it.

(Let's add "gravy boat" to that "one day" list.  Thank heavens for cream pitchers!)

After we let our dinner settle a bit, we tucked into that pumpkin pie for dessert.  I actually made two.  This is the second one made in my Flamingo Pink Pyrex pie plate. The boy did a decent job on that crust, huh?