Thanksgiving

The last Thursday of every November is Thanksgiving in the US, and not knowing what to do but wanting to experience it we invited ourselves round to our neighbours for the day. Thanksgiving is much bigger and more celebrated than Christmas – its when the Americans have Turkey with all the trimmings.

Our neighbours had a lot of family from out of town – 9 people on top of their family of 4. They stayed for 4 days, so it was very busy. Our 4 made 17 for dinner! Except, unlike I had believed, it wasn’t all about the food. It was all about the drinking!!! This started on the Wednesday morning (night for me!) and carried on all day Thursday. Probably the rest of the weekend for everyone else - I must be getting old!

Every one made us feel very welcome and the twins were (amazingly!), very well behaved. The food was lovely, but very different. It was an amzingThere was a big mix of sweet with the traditional savoury – such as the Frog Eye Pasta, which is eaten cold and consists of pasta, cream, pineapple, and other citrus’y fruits (I think!!). And the obligatory sweet potatos with marshmallows melted on top. Very indulgent! There was a lot left on the table when finished, and I think next door they must have been eating turkey for days.

Then it was back to the drinking and hanging out – playing games on the Wii or card games. And just when you thought you could leave they would draw you back in :-) It was a fun day.

The following day I felt like death! Ha ha!! And we had Sarah, Amir, Kameron and Amber coming from Houston for the night so we had to get the house ready. Somehow we managed! They met us early evening for dinner at Brick Oven, and then when we got back here we played pool, and games on the Wii. Everyone else drank (I didn’t!), and the next morning it was Geoff's turn for a hangover!

On the Saturday morning we went to a parade. Really it was a Christmas toy drive masked as a parade – and really fun. It happens every year and is hosted by Chuy's (pronounced Chewey's), one of the restaurants here. Its Children giving to Children, so the idea is that each child takes a toy, that toy gets taken by the volunteers and will be a Christmas present for a less fortunate child somewhere.

There were lots of floats, a giant inflatable Coca Cola bear and even Elvis! Bet you didn’t know that he is actually alive and living in Austin, did you?

These guys were very entertaining with lots of silly string!

Chuy!!

I guess Ron didn't want his picture taken ...

The giant inflatable Coca Cola Bear

He's Aliiiiive!!!!

Saturday afternoon Sarah, Amir and co drove back to Houston, but it was really nice to see them even if it was only for just 1 night. We spent the rest of the weekend relaxing and recovering.

And now Christmas is just around the corner ...