Turkey, Ham or Pizza?

For several weeks I've been bummed that my husband, son and I had no Thanksgiving plans to look forward to. My sister's family which is 40 minutes away, is the only immediate family around and they spend holidays with her husband's parents.

I have 3 pairs of aunts and uncles and a 97-year old grandma within an hour of our house, but we rarely see any of them. If my parents were here, I know they'd have all the extended family over for Thanksgiving. Every family would bring something to go with turkey or ham, and we'd sit around, play games and enjoy each others company. But without my parents here it's just kinda strange.

We ran into the same situation last year. So Ben, DT and I drove out to Maryland to spend the holiday with my parents. This year they're in New Mexico which is too far to drive for the short weekend, and too expensive to fly. So... back to my original dilema. Bummed and lonely for the holiday.

I expressed my sadness to Ben. He suggested starting some home improvements. I suggested going to a bed and breakfast. Derek suggested having pizza. It just seemed so sad.

Then my sister called. She knew we didn't have plans and asked if her family could come over. Just when I thought pizza could honestly be in our future, a real Thanksgiving began to unfold.

The Black Pilgrims

Earlier this week I noticed student work on the walls at my school already showing evidence of preparation for Thanksgiving.

In a second grade display were turkeys with bodies made of construction paper on top of tail feathers made of painted paper plates. In the same case were Indian villages. Each student made a teepee by decorating a piece of brown construction paper with Indian-looking symbols and rolling it into a cone and setting it with the others in a fall scene.



A kindergarten display showed autumn-colored tissue paper leaves glued onto construction paper trees.





Just outside my office were colorful 3rd graders' scrarecrows painted on large pieces of white paper with short pieces of straight brown yarn for hair, and small square fabric patches glued onto painted pants.






Then, this morning I saw my first pilgrims... my first black pilgrims. Each student in this class created a mixed media mug shot of a pilgrim. Boys made boy pilgrims, and girls made girls. The girls used pearlescent wallpaper remnants for dresses and white paper doilies for collars or bonnets. Boys made black hats with gold buckles out of construction paper and put real buttons on their white paper shirts. Their scary smiles had pointed teeth and as a true reflection of themselves, the students cut their urban pilgrims out of brown paper.