A Fabulous Thanksgiving

We enjoyed a great traditional lunch with family at our home on Thanksgiving Day.  While I did not get a picture of everything we had to eat, here are a few quick photos that I managed to take amid the process of getting everything served.  Sadly, I did not get a picture of the new brussels sprouts recipe that I made, and it was most definitely a hit with everyone, too.  It also had fresh cranberries, pecans and feta cheese in it, and it was such a pretty dish, as well as a tasty one.

Recipe for Pan-Seared Brussels Sprouts
(To make it a bit more diet compliant for me, I omitted the barley and used sugar-free maple syrup.  I used feta cheese crumbles since I already had it on hand.  It came together in a skillet nicely right before we were ready to eat lunch, and this will likely be a regular holiday dish for us now.)

We also had mac and cheese and hot rolls, of course.  I’m glad that my family was just fine to skip any kind of green bean casserole this year.  It seems that we have all grown a bit tired of that particular dish, at least for now, and it’s just no fun to prepare a dish that really doesn’t even sound good.

Thanksgiving Turkey – Alton Brown Recipe

Cornbread Dressing Ingredients – I did not get a picture of it after it cooked, but it was so good!

Pioneer Woman Mashed Potatoes – yum!

Pea Salad – Marinated – used fall colors in the peppers

Salted Caramel Fudge – a new twist on my fudge recipe

Lemon Chess Pie – “ta die fer” – extra lemon, of course!

Pumpkin Pie – a must have pie at Thanksgiving

We took off in the RV once again this year after our big Thanksgiving lunch for a nice, long weekend away, carrying most of the leftovers from lunch with us.  After some brutal winter weather only a few days earlier, we had absolutely gorgeous weather for our quick trip, even though it was a little bit windy at times.  A little wind seldom stops us these days, though, and we had a great outing once again this Thanksgiving weekend, instead of opting to stay home and fight the crowds in town for Black Friday weekend shopping.  I am just so done with that now.  I also got to see a friend from high school while we were in the Abilene area that I have not seen since 1976, and that was quite a treat for me indeed.  She is as sweet as ever, too.

This was our first trip to Abilene State Park in the month of November, so it was interesting to compare this trip to past trips there in different months.  The park is actually located near the tiny community of Buffalo Gap but is still only fifteen minutes from the main retail area in Abilene.  I still have not written a post about this nice park yet and need to do so sometime.  We have now been in each of the seasons except summer, and I honestly do not think we will try to go in those very hot months either.  We are quite happy to visit there in the cooler months, even though we ran our air conditioners in the RV on two afternoons on this trip.  Almost every weekend is often booked at this park in the large trailer sites, and winter is definitely the least crowded time for this park.

I also completed the NaBloPoMo blogging challenge on Sunday, having posted every day in the month of November at my new site at Animal Wonder.  If you haven’t yet taken a peek there, I hope you will do so soon.  It is an ongoing project and one that I really enjoyed working on in November.  Many of the photos I shared over the past month are among my favorite bird photos, even though I still have many more favorites to share, too.  I’m excited to continue working on even more animal posts going forward, not just limited to birds that I focused on during the past month.

And speaking of birds, there is some big news right now in birding circles (picture at that site) that is based in my area.  A very rare bird, a Eurasian Common Crane, has recently been spotted among the many Sandhill Cranes at the Muleshoe National Wildlife Refuge.  After the news broke a few days ago, I followed their page on Facebook and have been following updates on the rare Eurasian Common Cranes that have been spotted there.  These rare birds have created quite a “circus” at the refuge, according to the people posting the Facebook updates, and people are traveling from as far away as California to see these birds.  So far, I think two Eurasian Cranes have been spotted.  I would love to drive over there soon to see if I could see them, but I’m not sure our crazy December schedule will permit me to do so.  We’ll see.  How I would love to personally take a photograph of this rare bird that is most typically not even seen on this continent!  Birding in our area may be better than normal this year, thanks to some nice fall rains that have left many playa lakes with some much-needed water.

Wikipedia – Eurasian Common Crane

E-Bird Common Crane Sightings (Range Map)

All Original Content — © fivefs.wordpress.com — All Rights Reserved