Eat Dessert First

Now as you notice, my blog is titled "Eat Dessert First," and Thanksgiving epitomizes this in our family. Several years ago, I read in a magazine about a family that has pie for breakfast on Thanksgiving Day. I implemented the tradition, and I wouldn't dare ever change it now, nor would I want to. It just makes so much sense. Thanksgiving dinner alone is enough calories for an entire day. Who needs the extra calories from breakfast? And if you are anything like me, I've never really enjoyed my pie after dinner anyway. I am always way way too full. Some people probably think -- all that sugar for breakfast? But as far as I can tell, it's no different than donuts and hot chocolate or pancakes smothered in syrup. We have been "eating dessert first" for several years now, and it is wonderful. The children look forward to pie for breakfast almost as much as I do :-)!!!! We actually even have pie for breakfast for two or three days in a row depending upon how long they last. Tonight, I was helping Joelle pray before bed. I say a phrase and she repeats the phrase. So I said,"We are thankful that today was Thanksgiving," and she repeated, "We are thankful that pie is for Thanksgiving........." Enough said :-). We had nine pies-- two pumpkin (for tradition's sake), two sour cream apple (Kamri's favorite), two pecan (with pecans all the way through it-- not pecans floating on top of a bunch of sugary goop), and three of our family favorite, chocolate macadamia nut. Yummy!!! I can't wait for breakfast tomorrow.

It was difficult to cook a huge Thanksgiving meal in our little kitchen. Boy do we miss three sinks, two dishwashers, two huge ovens and lots of counter space, but Rob managed to put together a delicious feast. Every year I (Mardi) complain about Thanksgiving dinner. Who wants to eat boring old turkey and stuffing when there are so many fabulous foods on this earth? Since we weren't having dinner with any other family members who might be disappointed not to have the old traditional stuff, Rob humored me and "kicked it up a notch" by googling (when did "googling actually become a word, anyway?) some wonderful new recipes. We still had turkey, but it was breaded Emeril style after being soaked in buttermilk and then fried in peanut oil. Yum!! We had mashed potatoes, but they were roasted garlic mashed potatoes. We had sweet potatoes, but it was a sweet potato souffle with coconut. We had cranberries, but it was a delicious cranberry salad with fresh cranberries, cream, sour cream, marshmallows, pineapple and toasted pecans. We also had stuffing, but it was sausage stuffing with crasins and apples. It was all very delicious, and I was very happy not to have the same old boring stuff. We even broke down and Rob made turkey carcass soup (which we usually refuse to do cause the carcass is gross), but it was turkey minestrone with parmesan reggiano cheese on top. We had that for dinner last night.

Rob is the main chef for big meals like Thanksgiving. He is a great cook. I think he should be the star of a new Food Network show called the "Singing Chef." We have a nice little arrangement (at least I think it is nice). He cooks, and I watch children and wash dishes. He does a few dishes, and I make a few things, but overall, he is the chief chef, and I am the chief bottle-washer. It's a fair trade, I think.

We had a nice day together--we even played outside together in our beautiful 74 degree weather. The little girls have colds, but that didn't stop them from playing. Well, we've entered the season so here goes my seasonal greeting to everyone.

Boo, Gobble Gobble, HO HO HO, Happy New Year!!!!!

Hawaiian Halloween

Halloween began with a trunk-or-treat ward party at the church. Doesn't look very cold and Halloweeny does it?

First we have swashbuckling Adam, I mean Jack Sparrow.

Next we have Kamri, the Ruby Princess, (a princess from the Jewel Kingdom series by Jahnna N. Malcolm for those of you who would like to read them :-).

Jairin says he's just a random pirate-- how about we call him Schmee (from Peter Pan). Ooops! Jairin says he's definitely not Schmee, but we'll call him that anyway.

Miri is Princess Aranelle from the book The Keepers by Jackie French Koller.

Caroline was happy happy happy thanks to a dose of hydrocodone. She even performed her "Amazing Pretzel Act" for us :-)!

Aria and Joelle were Disney fairies. They love the new Disney movie Tinkerbell. (We actually really enjoyed it too, and rather thought it should have been on the big screen.
Aria was Prilla.....

.......and Joelle was Rosetta.

Joelle forgot her wings for the church party, so here she is again Halloween night.

Ellanne was a wee bride who would not keep her veil or her shoes on.

We took the children trick-or-treating Halloween night, but our neighborhood is not a good area for trick-or-treating since we are on a highway and houses are very far apart. A few days before, Rob had driven through a neighborhood which he thought would be good for trick-or-treating, so we all (except for Adam who stayed home with Caroline) smashed into one car and went looking for the neighborhood which was not as easy to find in the dark. It turned out to be a GREAT trick-or-treating neighborhood for us and the hundred or so other children who beat us there. I guess everyone else had the same problem as us, trying to find a decent place to turn their children loose. I have never seen so many trick-or-treaters on the same street at the same time! I imagine the people in those houses get bombarded every year, but they don't look like they are hurting for money. One house even handed out giant-size candy bars. Here are some pictures of Halloween night. It was so nice to be out trick-or-treating without freezing our fingers, toes and noses. Here are some pictures on Halloween itself.

Rob made his famous spudnuts which we enjoyed hot and crispy-- better than Krispy Kreme, we think! We couldn't find real pumpkins to carve, so although we heard that some Hawaiians carve pineapples, we opted for miniature squash. They were cute.

HAPPY HAWAIIAN HALLOWEEN!