Gobble...gobble...gobble!

Thanksgiving this year was a huge success!  We decided to organize a Thanksgiving with our fellow Clevelandites who were going to be around for the Holiday.  Tim was a huge help to me, I couldn't have done it without him.   Not to mention our friends.  We had so much help with setting up, eating all of the DELICIOUS food, and cleaning up.  We had it at the church, and had a blast!  There is so much to be thankful for, especially friends who are family during the Holidays!

 A couple of weeks ago, I was not sure if I was going to be able to say it would turn out a success...  Holidays are supposed to be fun, stress free, and relaxing right? Yes, that is true, except for the part where you have to purchase a $30 bird with bones sticking out of it from the store (which was an experience in itself...I had no idea what I was doing, kind of like a turkey with my head cut off...), pull out it's neck and lovely giblets, wash it, then cry your eyes out while you cut the onion and celery to stuff the sweet old bird.  The best part was that Tim and I were doing this about 5:30am Thanksgiving morning, we were quite a sight. 

Here is a visual just to give you an idea...
Actually, this was the night before as we were figuring out a way to
thaw sweet little Tommy the Turkey.

Tom at the Ashworth Spa.  He is in his glory, that is for sure.
Leave it up to my engineering-genius-husband to think of a way to
plug up our sink when I realize we don't have anything to plug it with.
I put my full faith and trust in Tim when it comes
to stuff like this, his ideas (no matter how off the wall they may be) always work!  

I was very kind, and let Tim do most of the honors.  How nice of me, right?!?!

I'm not sure if this was after we had successfully set up the thawing
spa for Tom, but I think it is clear that Tim was relieved, or overjoyed, or...

The final product!!  I almost forgot to take a picture before Tim cut into Tom.  I know
that the pros have leaves and apples and fancy-shmancy decor around their turkeys,
but in reality, this is really how your supposed to dress up a turkey...with nothing at all!  We had so much
help from our parents and grandparents, which I'm sure were thrilled to get the 4th phone call in the same
15 minutes on what to do next when it come to cooking a turkey!
The verdict: It was amazingly tender and moist.  OOOHHH, it was so good!
And yes, it is 4 days after Tom made his debut, and we still have plenty of turkey to go around :)

Here are some pics at the church!  We had SO much yummy food, it was the best :) And yes, 

we needed a separate table for dessert, it was a must.

After we ate, most of us sat around and chatted for a couple of hours.  Each time I thought about

standing up, I realized that I probably couldn't even if I wanted to with the 50 pounds of food in me!!  

I decided to spend the rest of my Christmas money on a Turkey Trot!!  I haven't
been able to run a real race in a long time, and Turkey Trots are probably my favorite race.
This was the 30th annual trot put on in downtown Cleveland, and it was a HUGE event! There were 7,000
runners there, crazy, but awesome!  This is the reason why Tim and I had to wake up at 5:30am to put the turkey
in the oven.  Tim and Max were great sports, and cheered me on.  It was absolutely perfect running weather!!! 

Tim hurried and snapped this shot right at the finish.  There were so many runners,
I didn't even realize I was at the finish line after the 5 miles.
 I saw my time as I crossed, and thought it was
okay, but I wasn't too proud.  I looked online later at the results and had actually run
the race almost 3 minutes faster than I thought.  There was the gun time 39:53 (what I saw at the end of the race), and the
chip time 37:08 (time from when I passed the start and finish line).  It took me almost 3 minutes after the
gun shot to even get to the
starting line because of the crowds!  It was so fun to run one of my favorite races
and do well!

The best part of the race though, was seeing this little guy (and his Daddy) at the finish line!
Of course, the first thing Max did when he saw me was point out the trucks he was seeing...

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving!  We are so grateful for all of the blessings
that we enjoy here in Cleveland.  We are so thankful for our family and friends, the gospel, Tim being able
to attend medical school, our health, this beautiful earth, and much more!  We love you all :)