late

Well, I haven't been on the computer much this week. The last time I sat down and thought about the blog was before I went to bed on Christmas Eve, (really early Christmas morning) and I failed to post a holiday greeting. Sorry! I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas! We have been enjoying our time with Jason very much- he has had to go to work very little even though he did not take leave. We have just been eating and playing and relaxing. Here are a few highlights and pictures from our holiday meal:

The bird.
This thing was ginormous. Jason's boss gave it to him- I'm sure he walked into the store and bought the biggest one they had. TWENTY-FOUR POUNDS, people. That's a lot of turkey. But we wanted to be able to put other things in our freezer at some point, so we decided to cook him up. Got him all thawed out in a water bath in our large cooler (no way was he going to fit in the sink to thaw) and then on Christmas Day we got to work. Jason was my right hand man for this project, let me tell you. I am not a big fan of meat that still resembles an animal in any way. All the bones and veins and skin (shudder). So he was the one who got to stick his arms up inside the turkey and rub all over it. He said he really felt like he got to know the turkey in an intimate way. We used the instructions here and found them easy to follow and the turkey turned out great. We even got to use fresh rosemary sprigs off the bush out front. I just love that.
Jason did a fabulous job carving Mr. Turkey up, following Martha's guidelines. And I even took the plunge and made gravy right from all that gross junk in the bottom of the pan (ew). I think the polite word is "drippings" but I thought of a few other words for it. Anyway, I followed this recipe and it actually tasted really good.

The cranberries.
We made them from fresh this year, and they were out of this world. The recipe came from the October issue of Mothering Magazine, and we made these both for Thanksgiving and Christmas. We will never buy another can of cranberries again.

The nog.
See previous post. But I just had to say again that this stuff was fabulous. I was not too sure if I was going to like it but it was very easy and we really enjoyed it. A once a year treat that will become a tradition for us I think.


A meal like this is heavenly: skin-on mashed potatoes (and gravy!), bread stuffing made from scratch (with celery, onion, apples, and sausage), a fresh loaf of dill bread, and of course the turkey and cranberries. Daisy got to eat the biggest drumstick of her life too! We are getting our fill of leftovers now and it should hold us until the holidays next year.

So anyway, Merry Christmas again- I hope you all enjoyed the holiday in your own special way as well. :)