Thanksgiving recap (plus last week’s content)

Phew, that was a long weekend. I had planned to start the festivities on Thursday with a Thanksgiving 5k at our local YMCA, but alert readers of TheSHUBox know that I bailed on that. It was pouring down rain and cold — not my favorite. My cross-country running son didn’t particularly want to go; I got him up to look at the weather, he declined, then went back to bed for four hours. So, since I was up, I wound up running a 5k up and down my street (where it was possible to bail if the rain got too bad or I got too cold). I was soaked by the end of it, so I imagine I would have been even more soaked if I had parked, walked, and waited at the starting line before running 3.1 miles.

Anyway, I hosted Thanksgiving this year, so much of Thursday was filled with cooking. My sister-in-law who makes the magnificent rolls was not with us this time, but my little brother made some sourdough rolls that were different but also excellent, so it was all good. He and his wife stayed overnight, and later in the evening we broke out some ice wine from the wine collection we got with the house (the previous owner was downsizing significantly, and also didn’t really drink, so it was a reasonable thing to throw in). My husband and I aren’t big wine drinkers either, so when we have parties we go down there and find something random. It was ice wine from Virginia this time. It was actually good!

On Friday we got our (live) Christmas tree in the morning from the local fire station’s fundraiser. Then, shortly after we got it into the stand, it was time for Sarah and her family to visit, so their kids helped decorate the tree (I checked to make sure this wasn’t problematic; I was assured it was fine). Then we did gingerbread houses and my husband made his oyster soup for the adults. Yum!

My husband and the two older boys then took off for Texas — they went to the Texas/Texas A&M game in College Station. Alas, the game did not go the way my Aggie husband was hoping, but they had a good time visiting the old haunts, including his childhood house (they know the people who bought it) — which was remarkably not that changed.

Meanwhile, I was entertaining the younger three. On Saturday, when I had some babysitting hours for the littlest, I took the next two oldest to the Brandywine River Museum of Art to see the holiday train exhibit, the critter tree, and the dollhouse. We drove 45 minutes to only be there 30 minutes, and I didn’t actually get to see any of the art, but hey. The kids were happy with this accelerated version of a museum visit, especially when we stopped at Wawa and then Starbucks on the way home. (I also had a really good time doing art with these two after the 4-year-old went to bed — with five kids it’s often fun to have different combinations of kids at different points and see how things play out…)

Given that my husband and older two sons (i.e. the people who will eat real food) were gone, I was really on my own for getting through the leftovers. I ate five straight meals of leftover turkey this weekend. I was also running the dishwasher multiple times per day until the kitchen was finally clean (I still haven’t dealt with the placemats in the dining room…on the list…). But I came up with a creative way to use the rest of the cranberries: Cranberry cookies! There’s a recipe on the back of the children’s book Cranberry Christmas, so we made that. There’s a lot of sugar, but it’s balanced out by the tart cranberries.

I did a lot of online shopping and I’m happy to report that a lot of the kid stuff is taken care of. There is more to be done still, but I’m feeling a bit more like there is a plan. I’ll probably wind up taking a half day Wednesday to go to the stores when they’re a little emptier. There are some upsides to self-employment…

I didn’t do a content round-up last week, but a few to check out:

At the Before Breakfast podcast I interviewed Joel and Matt! The hosts of the “How to Money” podcast came on to talk about staying financially sane over the holidays. For the shorter episodes, I suggested that you “Text your response” — even if you’re not sending holiday cards you can participate in the cheer. I also gave my number one tip for more peaceful travel: “Be ready to block out the world.” It can be frustrating to be in a hotel by the elevator or ice maker, or in a train car with someone who wants to share their phone conversation with the world. But as long as you have the power to block out the world, sound-wise, you can be much more calm. Of course if you are traveling with small kids and can’t block out the world, this is a different matter, but…

At Vanderhacks (my Substack newsletter) I reminded people that “All magic is just labor, hidden well.” I noted that “You have as much time today as you’ll ever have.” Then there’s the insight that “You can try again.” There are many reasons things don’t work the first time, and sometimes the answer is not that the thing is a bad idea! Please consider a free or paid subscription, and thanks for reading!