So many things to be thankful for

But first let's talk about food.

It's been a good year for us so I splurged on food and even bought flowers for the table. I haven't bought flowers all year. It felt good to have them in the house again.

I was only making dinner for our little family of three. But I still wanted it to be special so I asked everyone what they wanted, and that's what I cooked. Don wanted dressing, Elli wanted pasta, and I wanted gratin potatoes with gruyere cheese. So that's what we had with our smoked turkey (from New Braunfels Smoke House in Texas), gravy and cranberry/pomegranite sauce. It was delightful.

It took me all day long to fix everything. I had pots and pans juggled everywhere. Somehow I got it all done without an incident. I sure would like a bigger kitchen again. But for now we'll be happy that there are flowers on the table.

I used Don's dressing recipe. I usually buy a jiffy cornbread mix for the corn bread and I forgot so I had to make it from scratch. I realized it's not hard to make from scratch, so I may do it that way from now on.

And of course there was pie. You can't have Thanksgiving without pie. Don loves his mom's Coconut Cream Pie. It's become a Thanksgiving tradition. I made a home-made crust that turned out perfectly light and flaky. (Thank you Elise from Simply Recipes. Her tip on freezing the butter made all the difference. You can find the recipe for her perfect pie crust here.)

The coconut pies before the meringue.

Elli joined me throughout the day.  She was a big help with the pie crust and made the home-made crescent rolls with very little help from me. I showed her how to flour the board, and kneed and roll the dough. Then I let go of my desire to have everything perfect, and let her roll all the crescent rolls herself. Okay, maybe I did cut the dough. I promise, she did the rest. And guess what? They're perfect.

Making crescent rolls.

Here is the recipe if you would like to make the Flaky crescent rolls. It's Jenna Weber's recipe from her blog Eat.Live.Run  Click here.

Dinner is served!!!

As I cooked today I thought about all the wonderful things that have happened this year. It didn't start out wonderful, and there were a lot of stressful moments, but it has turned out to be an amazing year.

~ Don successfully ran his first half marathon in honor of our brother-in-law Mike who was battling leukemia. He is now in remission.

~ Don's mother, Rose, has been in and out of the hospital as was our sister-in-law and niece. They all seem to be on the road to recovery. We're so thankful they're all healthy.

~ Our store in Napa has had a major turnaround this year - just in the nick of time, too. We couldn't have survived another bad year.

~ I've been able to use my new social media/writing skills by working freelance for an old client. It's been a great career change for me. I love what I'm doing and am so grateful for the opportunity.

~ Elli is thriving. She's put up with our transition this year without a single complaint. When I grow up I want to be just like her.

~ Don and I celebrated our 20th wedding anniversary this summer. It's been an amazing and wonderful journey. We've had our share of "in good times and bad." this year. But we've weathered those storms and still like each other. : )

~ And my parents celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary this year. They're happy, healthy, and busy as ever.

Life is good.

I hope everyone had a very happy Thanksgiving.

Love,

Kris and Elli (the celery Queen!)