Day of Bird and Pumpkin

This will be the first Thanksgiving I've had without any of my kids .. since Jenna was born. Seems strange. The past several have been the boys (and Abby, before she and Orion packed out for Kentucky) coming over for dinner and that was about it, but still, they were there. This year I only have the one day off so we did the airport math (wasn't all that hard) and realized we simply didn't have time to go anywhere, not even down to Southern Califonria -- which, btw, is farther away than one might think -- and also not enough holiday to play hosts here, either. Not this year.

So it's kind of sad and I miss everyone. I sort of miss having four pumpkin pies sitting out, but I can't honestly say I miss having mixed and rolled four pie crusts, and tomorrow morning I probably won't actually miss getting up at 6 to make stuffing and put a bird in the oven and then knead rolls that won't rise very well (although they always tasted good) and all the rest of it. But I did it for a lot of years and was kind of proud of myself. :o)

This year, something different. We're going to get together for dinner with a conglomerate of friends over in the East Bay and I expect that will be nice. Only having to make one thing (NOT the turkey!) and not having a kitchen to clean up afterwards will also be nice. But I still think we need to plan a big get-together with the Fam before too long.