Thanksgiving During A Pandemic

 Our Thanksgiving was small this year, but in some aspects it would've been small even had a pandemic not been raging. Our kids are (hopefully) coming for Christmas so we did not plan on them for Thanksgiving.

Still, our plans to invite friends over could not happen, and Steve, Cindie, and Eric did not come as Cindie was ill (not COVID, luckily.)

Nonetheless, we had a great spread and enjoyed our time with Lisa, Leslie, Rick, and Jenny plus Millie and Molly.

Around 3:00 we did a family Zoom chat - it was just the best!

We took several screen shots but never did we get the entire family in the photo. Still it was good to see everyone.

This one is almost complete - we are just missing Ashley (cooking) and Susie (napping.)

While we chatted, Jessie alerted me to a text that Cambria had just typed into the chat box.

She'd made me a card at school but since we were not together, couldn't give it to me. So, her mama sent pictures and she typed the words she'd written in the chat box.

"Dear Grandma, Thank you for leten my hav a unicorn toy. I love you Grandma. Love, Cambria." (Last time she was here, I gave her a Breyer unicorn out of my collection.)

Leslie, Rick, and Jenny all left around 4:00 but Lisa stayed with us on into the evening to watch football and play games. While I missed the rest of our family, I was content and very, very grateful for so many blessings, especially that of having been able to talk to all our family that day.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Anniversary Dinner

 Craig and I celebrated our 44th wedding anniversary on November 20. As a special treat, Curt, Vanessa, and the kids treated us to a very special dinner.

The family piled into the kitchen and promptly told us to shoo.

The Maitre'D, wearing a suit and tie, set out the china, crystal, and sterling silver place settings. 

And, he gave us each a copy of the menu (which he had hand written himself.) Such service!

A close-up of the menu. Love the fancy letters!

Vanessa streamed romantic music from her phone through our TV.

The Maitre'D brings us an update from the kitchen. He was very good at keeping our water goblets full.

Mila helped, too. She was wearing a pretty dress to honor the occasion.

Mila carrying out salads out to us on a tray while Chef Curt confers with the Maitre'D.

This was a time when I put kids over crystal, so to speak. In other words, I decided I would not worry if some of my crystal or china got broken and would simply enjoy the occasion. People are far more important than things. (And nothing was broken.)

A close-up of my salad. It was really good!

We were served rib eyes (they were huge; I cut mine in half and had a great dinner two nights in a row), green beans, and sauted mushrooms. All favorites of ours.

Dessert was a Keto peanut butter pie with ice cream on top.

A funny that happened during dinner. When Mila heard us calling Ian "Maitre'D," she announced that she would be "Cruz." It took me a moment to figure out what she meant, and then it hit me - Disney's Cars movie character!

She heard "Maitre" as "Mater" (the brown tow truck) and decided to be Cruz, the female car (yellow) in the story! 

Being served a delicious dinner in our home by people we love was a wonderful way to celebrate our anniversary and so thoughtful of Curt and Vanessa. We asked them to pencil us in for next year.

Mila Sews

Pony Pal Mila loves her new Breyer Cupcake. She is also aware that I make blankets for model horses. Naturally, we had to get together and make one for Cupcake!

She came over Friday morning, Cupcake in hand, and trotted upstairs to my office to get to work. She chose pink fabric with purple lettering, and wanted "fancy" letters so we went for cursive.

Once you've programmed the embroidery machine, you simply press the Start button and it sews by itself. No foot pedal is needed. Mila was thrilled to push that button and then sat and watched the machine work. (I agree with her - it is fun to watch.)

Then we took the fabric out of the hoop and cut it out, trying it on Cupcake to be sure it would fit. (That full mane is a bit of a problem!) Satisfied that the blanket was going to fit, we switched over to my sewing machine. 

Mila asked if she could sew. Since a blanket has multiple curves, I told her that we would compromise with her running the machine and me guiding the fabric. That worked better than I thought it would - I expected some Indy 500 stitchery speeds!

The finished product. Mila was thrilled and so was I.

Meanwhile, Lukie had quietly been busy. 

I hadn't been able to keep an eye on him while guiding that fabric through the machine, and he had had a little fun with his favorite horse in my collection. But he is getting good at being careful and no models fell or were banged around.

Mila went home one happy little girl. And you know what? Her Grammy was pretty happy, too.