Brazilian Thanksgiving

Just a couple of days before leaving for Thanksgiving Break, Kathy hosted a Thanksgiving feast for all the EAB apartment dwellers. There were about about 20 people who were able to attend.

Kathy emailed us all an invitiation and asked us each to sign up for dishes to share When I saw the list of foods that people had already signed up to bring including turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, pumpkin pie, I was really excited. It's things like this, celebrating Thanksgiving, that when you are far away from home that give you a high. Those traditions that you need to feel secure when you're so many miles away from your family and friends. I couldn't wait to taste the dishes, but what would I bring since most of the traditional ones were already taken?

I decided to bring corn casserole which is one of the dishes my family always has at our Thanksgiving dinner. I was ready to email my mom for the recipe and decided to take a look online first to see what ingredients were needed. Living in Brazil, some foods and spices are easy to find while others are not, what I found is that some of the ingredients, alright, several, for corn casserole are not so commonly found in Brazil. Foods like: cream corn, sour cream and cheddar cheese are impossible unless you visit the American commisary (which is rumored to be open now to all Americans at a small fee but no evidence yet). I was outta luck. I'd have to come up with some other dish and I wasn't thrilled about it.

Then, upon returning from the fazenda, we had a last minute cancellation, the family that was supposed to bring the mashed potatoes couldn't attend. You can't have Thanksgiving without mashed potatoes and I brought those a couple of years ago with the Goo for Thanksgiving back home so I knew I could do it. This time round I just hoped not to get potatoes all over the walls and floor.

I borrowed a big pot and handmixer from Kathy and just had to break down the process for the size of my pots and kitchen. Here's a few shots of my potato process.
Washed potatoes
Had to use 3 pots because I don't have quite a large enough one yet. This also meant I actually had to make mashed potatoes four times since nothing was quite large enough to hold it all for mixing at once. Pretty funny process.
Then, after the potatoes were ready, I walked next door in the beautiful chilly summer evening (temps in the 70s) to Kathy's apartment building which is next door to mine. The whole time I was carrying this large pot of mashed potatoes hoping not to drop it since I'm a bit of a klutz. The photo above is the set table in Kathy's party room .

Hirsch, Gallagher, Monica and Vanessa waiting for dinner to begin.
Erica and our hostess, Kathy, carving the birds.

Yum! The food and fellowship were so delicious.
Digging in! Full table, full bellies. We had all of the traditional Thanksgiving favorites including delicious stuffing, turkeys and pumpkin pies.
Happy Thanksgiving everyone!
Vanessa, could you please pass the potatoes?
Just like at home, after eating dinner and dessert, people sat around chatting and began cleaning up and washing dishes. Unlike at home for me where the weather is usually quite chilly, Savanna and Ellie wearing shorts and a dress, went outside to dance and play. They took a break from dancing outside for a picture. You can see the X-mas lights reflected on the floor. No football games either.Ellie wanted to be in all of our photos to celebrate the day.Mark and Isabel did a little bit of yoga to help aid their Thanksgiving digestion. Our Thanksgiving feast couldn't have been more deliciously perfect. The food. The friendship. The laughter.

Earlier in the day, I was reminded about the larger meaning of Thanksgiving. I had received a bit of mail from Ansley. I miss playing with her a lot. In fact we have a soccer date when I return. I just had better get my ankle healed quickly or if not will have to have a snowdate since I think the weather may not cooperative with our plans. The point though of including this and taking my picture that night was it reminded me of why Thanksgiving's important. It's about taking some time to be thankful for what you have. I could write a post and list all of the people that help me to be me, support me, love me but instead, I think the photo says it. It's the little things, it's the handprint turkeys, the emails, the calls from the people we love and care about that makes me thankful. I'm such a lucky girl and a few weeks past Thanksgiving, I'm still thankful for it. And I'm even more thankful that in 6 days, less than one week, I'll get to tell everyone in person just how thankful I am for them.