We did it! Twenty-six guests: kids, cousins, sisters, aunts, a boyfriend, uncles, buffers, the Reverend-Doctor, a couple in-laws, friends, grandparents, and even an estranged Great-Aunt Thanksgiving crasher and still, Thanksgiving was great!
Kids connected, turkey was eaten, pies were baked, cards were played, memories mocked, photos taken, and it was all so blissfully calm and bright. I don’t mean to brag, but . . .
No one threw dishes. No one stomped out of the room in a 40 year-old sibling rivarly flashback. No one drank a complete bottle of _______ (fill in the blank) alone and ranted, raved, or ralphed.
The foul-mouthed sister, for-once-in-my-life-not-me, did throw the F-bomb across the holiday table in front of the kind reverend-doctor, but lightning did not strike.
Kids played, grandparents ate, teens texted. All was good. We were all in the house, together, not fighting, not even with a political divide the size of the my thighs.
And it was so very loud. I think there was music, there’s always music, but it was overwhelmed by the laughing and shouting and arguing and interrupting and over-talking and the remembering. I love the remembering! And dinner rolls were indeed thrown. And kids laughed and grandma cheated and eyes rolled and grandpa slept and a muted TV played football, and it was loud loud loud.
And long after the coffee got cold, when it was time to go home, the littlest Cindy-Lou-Who cousin, the youngest of them all, cried for it to be over so soon.
What a gutsy move.. to have all of those people in one house. Was there something in the punch to keep all calm?
It is so fabulous to be able to have that kind of gathering without any major fighting. Every Holiday get together inevitably leads to my mother have a meltdown and guarenteed someone is gonna cry. Your gathering sounds way more fun.