The one with the... Happy Thanksgiving!

We have so much to be thankful for this year (and every year)! Although we try to be grateful every day for all that we have, we dedicate a special holiday to celebrate with  friends and family where we eat until we can't stuff ourselves anymore! This year was certainly no different.  Every year we get together with a group of our good friends and we have a potluck Thanksgiving dinner.  We rotate the hosting responsibilities, and the host opens up their home to everyone and is charge of the turkey.  Everyone else brings the sides and desserts!  It works out nicely because it's almost impossible for one person to cook all that food in one kitchen!  

This year, we had the honor of hosting Thanksgiving dinner at our house!  I was SUPER excited but admittedly a little scared because this was the first time we have hosted Thanksgiving at our house and I had never cooked a turkey on my own before.  We ended up with a total of 12 for dinner and enough food to feed at least 12 more.  Our dining room table usually fits 8 people comfortably max but to fit 12 we brought up an extra table from the basement so that we could have 6 comfortably on each table.  Luckily I had the foresight to buy additional sets of diningware and silverware (I have enough for 16!) so I had enough plates and silverware for everyone.  

I wanted to make sure the dinner table was nice and inviting so for the past couple of weeks, I had been "pinning" centerpiece and place card ideas on my "Holiday" board on Pinterest.  Here's how it turned out: 

I was looking for festive fall table runners, but I couldn't find anything that was long enough to fit the large tables that didn't cost an arm and a leg.  I also didn't really see anything that I liked in terms of colors and patterns.  So while I was at Bed Bath and Beyond, I saw these festive tablecloths in fall colors on sale.  I had the idea of making my own table runners by cutting up the tablecloths and sewing the edges.  For only $12 ($15 with 20% off) and about half an hour of cutting, ironing the seams, and sewing, I had two long table runners!  

For the centerpieces, I got two pots of mums (one in yellow and one in orange) from the grocery store and some greenery, and divided the mums among three vases. While I was in the storage room in the basement looking for my extra sets of plates, I found two small round vases.  I think they were a wedding gift from some family friends, but I had totally forgot I had them! Good thing I found them because they were PERFECT!     

Using my limited floral arranging skills and the leftover flower tape from our wedding 2 years ago (where my awesomely talented girl friends did ALL the flowers), I created two small bouquets and placed them in the round bowls.  Here's one:          

 

And here's the other:

Then for the larger centerpiece that would go in the middle of the two tables, I re-purposed the fake pumpkins (that we didn't end up carving from Halloween because we didn't have time), cut out the top and placed a large mason jar inside as the vase. 

For the placecards, ended up quilling some Thanksgiving-y things and used calligraphy to write everyone's name.  This is all 12 of the placecards all lined up. 

 

And here are the 5 different designs that I ended up with. First I started by making a turkey:

Then a pumpkin: 

A pilgrim hat: 

An ear of corn: 

And when I got really tired after making 11 placecards and the little corn kernels, for the last one I just went with a simple turkey leg!

This is what the final place setting looked like.  The square white plates are our regular everyday ware.  

I planned ahead and had the table all set by Monday evening so that I didn't have to worry about it later in the week.  Also on Monday I had put together a list of things that needed to be done in preparation for the big turkey day.  That included cleaning up the house, sweeping/mopping floors, other general "getting the house ready" tasks, prepping the turkey, making sweet potatoes, and getting last minute things at the grocery store.  Dave was a HUGE help-- he did a few loads of laundry and swept and mopped all the floors of the ENTIRE house!  By Wednesday night, we had everything checked off the list and were able to relax!  Dave is really good at project management, so giving him a list of things to do is the best way to utilize his skills.  

This morning, we got to sleep in, enjoy coffee and donuts in the morning, watch a few episodes of 24 on Netflix streaming (we just started Season 3 and Jack Bauer is our hero!!!), all before we had to put the turkey in the oven!  On my sister Lulu's recommendation I used Alton Brown's Good Eats Roast Turkey recipe.  It got 5 star rating based on 3603 reviews on the Food Network website and my family had used the recipe in years past (which unfortunately I didn't get to enjoy because we usually don't go home to California for Thanksgiving).   After 16 hours of brining and a quick shower, the bird was ready to go into the oven.  All 18 pounds of it!   

And two hours later... the thermometer read 161 degrees Fahrenheit!   Here she is in all her glory! 

 I expected the turkey to take much longer to cook, especially with an 18 pound turkey, but  we used the thermometer to check multiple spots and they all read at least 161.  After the turkey came out of the oven, we covered it in foil and it continues to cook a little.  Our friend Nathan who has experience carving a turkey very nicely volunteered to tackle this bird while Dave watched and learned. 


Nathan did an awesome job of carving the turkey! 

And this is our amazing spread of YUMMY DELICIOUS SCRUMPTIOUS goodness!  We had Lorene's sticky rice, Jamie's corn casserole, Jenn's mashed potatoes and stuffing, Alton Brown's Best Gravy Ever made from turkey drippings, Christen's pumpkin muffins and buns, and Ashley's green bean casserole.  Not pictured was the candied sweet potatoes and the sweet potato casserole that I forgot to take out and heat up!  Oops!  

Also not pictured are the AWESOME desserts that we had - pumpkin pies, pecan pie, pumpkin rolls, whoopie pies, and cool whip!  Everything was absolutely DE-LICIOUS!! In the many years that our group of friends have been doing Thanksgiving gatherings, each person has perfected their signature dishes.  So it was no surprise that all the sides and desserts were absolutely amazing.  What I WAS surprised by was how moist and flavorful the turkey turned out, even the white meat!  Not bad for a first turkey!  To be honest I have to credit the recipe for its great success-- I will definitely be using Alton Brown's Good Eats Roasted Turkey recipe again-- it's a WINNER!  


Oh you see the butternut squash on the table in the picture above?  In honor of our dog Pluto, who was named after the Disney character and the former planet, I made a  "Butternut Pluto."  That was also a Pinterest inspiration!  Using some black and white felt, black and yellow cardstock, and a hot glue gun, I had this baby put together in about 20 minutes. Most of the time was actually spent on making the hat.     

 

And that's it!  That was was our fabulous Thanksgiving! A big thank you to all our lovely guests who once again shared their signature dishes and a special thanks goes out to Dave's parents for lending us a lot of the servingware and other supplies!  We are SO thankful for everything that we have -- each other, loving families, great friends, our health, good jobs, a roof over our heads, and a dog that loves us unconditionally.

Happy Thanksgiving from Dave, Julia, and Pluto!