Pawn started off her day pretty early by smoking and grilling the pork for the meal. She's getting very good at doing this and it is one of the highlights I look forward to each holiday. It's become a tradition, and I think she likes doing it. We enjoyed watching her from the kitchen windows. She's got a lot of knowledge about how to control the heat and smoke.
One of my stress points was to buy a turkey or not to buy a turkey. It's never been high on our must have list, but this year I started considering it a few weeks ago. Rusty said if you want to buy one, buy one. :) It sounded easy when he said it like that, but I couldn't just plop down $30 for a turkey that easily.I went to the store early Thursday morning with the intention of buying a turkey, but then I chickened out. Haha! I picked one out that was the smallest one, but I left without it. Friday afternoon rolled around, and I figure it was the absolute latest that I could buy it and still get it defrosted in time to cook for dinner on Saturday. When I got to the store, they only had 3 turkeys left, and one of them was the one I had picked out. Into the buggy it went, and I rushed home to defrost it.
Because of the price we were very intent with it turning out just right. We had a pretty good quality turkey...a Norbest young turkey. I was pretty excited about it having the red pop-out signal, but it didn't pop out. The turkey temperature got up to 170, but it still didn't pop out. Finally I decided to take it out.So Rusty began checking the temps for the various body parts to make sure they got up to the right level. We decided to put it back in the oven and covered it with foil. Then we heard it pop. The red signal finally popped out, and Rusty said, "That's settled. It's not going back in the oven."
This was my first time to have Thanksgiving dinner outside, but I thought it worked out well. We would have been cramped in the house, and I don't like for it to be too stuffy when we have a lot of people over. It gave us some space to play around, and the kids really enjoyed playing in our yard. I guess even the adults enjoyed laughing and playing around as well.
We all finished up the evening happy and full. Unfortunately by the time I brought out the desserts I got quite a few complaints. They were of the variety that I should have told them about dessert at the beginning. They all ate so much regular food they didn't have room for dessert.
These are the pictures from the actual Thanksgiving Day. Since it's not a holiday here, we sneak in a few treats here and there. We had Dr Peppers with our supper and some egg nog with pumpkin roll for dessert. I found some liquid pasteurized eggs this year so we're really looking forward to the whole holiday season. :)We also fit in It's Thanksgiving Charlie Brown with our neighborhood ESL students and then used it for a trivia game. I think the kids enjoyed the different lesson format.
I have wanted to invited people over for the holidays since we've been here, and I decided this year was the one. I'm so thankful that I had the opportunity to let them know that I was thankful for each one of them and that Rusty had the opportunity to pray and thank God for them and for the food. I can confidently say that each person there has heard the Gospel either through us, Pawn, or Hope. Although there were only a few believers with us, it was a great opportunity. We had four different people groups represented, and I think everyone had a good time together.
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