Or rather, my guests survived Thanksgiving. Had I not had an 8 year old helper, I would have gotten out my camera to document my first ever Thanksgiving where I, not my mother, did all of the cooking. However, then I would have had to explain it all to my nephew, which would have lead to lots of questions about why I was taking pictures, and what were they for, and could we look at them after spending 8 gazillion hours on Neopets? So, I forewent the pictures.

I made Pumpkin Soup with Chili Cran-Apple Relish, dressing with onions, celery, and apples (left out the raisins for the picky family members- Mom!), mashed potatoes with way too much butter, milk, and cream, baked corn, and a turkey. We also had a layered lettuce salad, carrots and dill dip, pumpkin roll, and canned cranberry sauce (yuck!). I followed Alton's rule of taking the turkey out when it reached 161 degrees F, but I think I must not have had the thermometer in exactly the right place. It certainly was moist and juicy... but it was also undercooked! Luckily, my stepdad just didn't put that on the serving plate! I think it could have maybe cooked for an additional 20 minutes or so, which meant that it wasn't terribly undercooked, but there was still some pink right next to the bones. Now I know what to do next year. Oh, and I also found out that that plastic thing in the bird is actually supposed to hold its legs together. Huh, I thought it would melt so I spent 15 minutes wrestling with it trying to get it out. Next time I'll just leave it in.

I hope everyone had a Happy Thanksgiving!