This past Thanksgiving had to have been one of my favorite yet. The weekend started with bowling on Wednesday night where my bonehead friends and I usually wear some stupid outfit to bowl in the night before the feast and this year was no different. Our team decided that this year we were going to wear onesies. I bowled with a camouflaged hunter looking guy, a man in a bunny suit that looked like something from a Christmas Story, Bruce Wayne and last but not least Clark Kent. And me well apparently I was a lumberjack. The good news is we won all 5 games.
The next day was one heck of an early morning waking up at 4:00 am to get the turkey on the smoker. This was very early and I kind of felt like we were headed to a show. The Turkey had been in the brine for about 16 hrs before we put it in the smoke and it didn’t come off until around 1:30. I am proud to report that it turned out pretty good! This was the second Turkey that I have cooked and the first that I smoked and boy was I nervous, really, really nervous. And I didn’t know right away but I wasn’t done with the cooking for the family nerves for the weekend. We were able to spend the day with my parents, sister and brother-in-law, Grandma and Grandpa Blin, one Aunt and two Cousins, Great Aunt Judy and Uncle Dick as well Great Aunt Frankie.
Next up was the Iowa Game on Friday. The family went over to Uncle Bob’s house to watch our Hawks stomp a mud hole in the Cornhuskers. It was an awesome game and great to see even more family then we got to see on Thanksgiving (not to mention all the tacos and margaritas one could handle!).
On Saturday we celebrated Christmas with our family as we will be in Canada to celebrate on Chistmas and Jaci and Jason will be in Texas. I always have a good time giving gifts and heck I like getting them just as much. This year we started another tradition and had Prime Rib for supper, and this is where more food anxiety came into play. I had never made one and it is a good thing that I have a Traeger grill because everyone seems to have everything figured out and all you have to to is follow the footsteps of the pros on the message boards. My advice is if you love to eat protein that comes from animals as much as I do get one of these amazing grills and keep them full and happily eating tasty meat treats.
All that was left for Sunday was washing the cattle that we are consigning to the Iowa Beef Expo. We hope to get pictures of them soon and are very excited for you to see them. This weekend was not only one of my best Thanksgivings but probably one of the best weekends of my life. Thank you to everyone for all of the help, knowledge, friendship and joy that you bring to my life.
