Two Blog Postings in One Day? It’s A Thankoween Miracle!
Since I was in Ontario so soon after Thanksgiving, my family decided that we’d have a belated Thanksgiving feast while I was there. Being that it was so close to Halloween, my niece dubbed the event “Thankoween!” Thankoween was celebrated this year by my sister, her bf & their kids, me, my mom, my Aunt Eileen, my Aunt Lynn, my Uncle Michael, and my Uncle Pat. That’s a lot of Thankoween celebrators!
Before the Thankoween feast, however, there was the awesomeness that is the Hoot & Howl. The Hoot & Howl, for the uninitiated, is a Halloween-themed fundraising extravaganza held at my niece’s elementary school. It’s part-bake sale, part-Halloween party, part-silent auction, and 100% awesome. Every year I hear about my family going to the Hoot & Howl, but this was the first time I ever got to take part. In celebration, I donned my best witch’s wig!
My niece and I, ready for the Hoot & Howl ((There’s no picture of me and my nephew with my wig on because he didnt’ recognize me when I was wearing it!))!
The best part of the H&H, IMHO, was the exotic animal room! I got to pet a freaking kangaroo! There was also a parrot, a very big owl, a boa constrictor, and a thing that looks like a ringed tailed lemur but apparently isn’t ((Though I didn’t catch what it actually was.)). But mostly, omg, a freaking kangaroo. I took some photos of my niece with the animals, but since there were other people’s kids in the photos, I’m not going to post them. Instead, you’ll have to be satisfied with this picture of an owl and some of the kangaroo attacking my sister.
After the Hoot & Howl, it was back to my sister’s place for Thankoween dinner! There was turkey and two kinds of stuffing and potatoes and turnips and carrots and cranberry sauce infused with cinnamon & star anise and sausages and brussel sprouts (barf!) and Harvard beets (yum). This, of course, was after the pre-feast appies of truffle hummus and spinach & artichoke dip and marinated goat cheese and various pickles and a million types of crackers and cheese & caramel popcorn (sounds strange, but tastes surprisingly OK) and a sweet dip made with marshmallow fluff and (I think) strawberry ((This should give my friends a sense of why, when I have a party, there is enough food to feed an army. I come by this tendency honestly!))? And then for dessert there were three kinds of cookies and homemade pumpkin pie, made by yours truly, from real pumpkins!
These pumpkins…
…were cut in half and cooked…
…and then made into pumpkin pie ((Also made but not photographed were toasted pumpkin seeds. So delish!))!
Pie, properly served with whipped cream.
Did I mention there were three kinds of cookies ((I’ve only just now realized that I only took pictures of the desserts. Don’t have a single photo of any of the meal!))?
Thomas, enjoying his pumpkin pie (sans crust).
Thankoween celebrations were, of course, less festive than a typical year, because we were all missing my Dad. My Dad loved Thanksgiving and Halloween and the Hoot & Howl. He would have loved Thankoween.
And look at these two little munchkins:
I wish I could be woken up every morning by such cute little faces!
Credits: This blog title was recycled from a joke Jeff told at dinner last night. Not To Be Trusted With Knives.com, saving the earth, one recycled joke at a time.
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I’m going to invite myself to your place for Thanksgiving! That sounded like an amazing meal! Also, the kangaroo, how awesome is that (and really tiny too).
Last year, the Navy Bean dressed up as a princess, and I dressed up as an evil stepmother, complete with long black wig, and she didn’t recognize me either. It took her about 10 minutes to even walk over to me! Glad you had a great time.