F is for Fanksgiving.

The first Thanksgiving we ever had was in 2001 when we were living in NY. At that time Oscar was in 2nd grade and Remi in Kindergarten, and through them we were able to learn about Thanksgiving. Remi delighted us with this little ditty which has come back to us this year through Ella:

The turkey ran away

Before Thanksgiving day.

He said "they'll turn me into roast,

If I decide to stay".

The cranberries ran away

Before Thanksgiving day.

They said "they'll turn me into sauce,

If I decide to stay".

and so on through the various dishes to be served at Thanksgiving. I find this highly amusing, especially as both of them have sung it in an American accent.

Ella added another one:

The turkey is a funny bird,

his head goes wibble wobble

But he can only make one sound

Gobble, gobble, gobble!

From Oscar we learnt what Thanksgiving was all about. He told us that the pilgrims were thankful for five things...food, family and friends...and after that he'd forget but we got the gist that it was shelter and clothing and all those sorts of things. It must be said that at this stage in his and Remi's life, neither of them could say a "TH" very well and so we heard all about Fanksgiving. This led Matt to the conclusion that it was infact an F holiday...and the Pilgrims were thankful for all things beginning with F...food, family, friends, fashion, etc and of course football, that modern day tradition of fanksgiving.

So keeping all that in mind I will recall our Thanksgiving break.

We left for Vermont about Midday on Wednesday. It was well and truely dark when we arrived at about 5.30 in deepest darkest Peru just near Manchester. So it wasn't until later that we were able to see what Vermont looked like. For me it was like being in Southern Norway again. The big red barns, the trees all totally bare except for a few pines. And it was SO quiet. No bird sounds or anything. The air was fresh and crisp and it was just gorgeous.

We were staying with friends in their weekend house with other friends (people we've known since we were in Singapore) so there were 6 adults and 7 kids. Fortuntely they had a big finished basement, and air hockey table and a playstation, so the boys were happy and occupied all weekend. With that many of us, much of the weekend was spent doing dishes, and eating...most mornings started with a traditional English fry up complete with English bacon, sausages, scrambled eggs and even baked beans...

On Thanksgiving morning the men went out and made a fire in the firepit. There had been much discussion late into the night before as to the best time to start the fire, and in the end it was 9.30 ish. This fire was roaring and it was so hot that logs had to be kicked off it in order to put the turkey on.

Kit had lots of fun collecting ice from ponds around the house and melting it on the stones around the fire.So why was the Turkey being cooked on a fire? Well you see, Matt had bought a Dutch Oven which was supposed to cook the turkey very quickly and without drying it out. We had done a trial run two weeks before on a small outside hotplate and it took 3 or so hours. The idea was that cooking the turkey outside would leave the oven for all the other dishes. Here it is heating away....and here it is all yummy and cooked.

I had mentioned to Matt while we were outside watching the turkey cook that it didn't really feel like Thanksgiving as we weren't rushing around frantically trying to get things done. Inside it was a different story. The turkey was cooking so well that it was ready well before everything else. So I went in to help peel and cut etc to try and get things going a bit. It was chaotic and crowded just as it should be. We started to put things in the oven when next thing we knew the whole oven had caught fire and smoke was going everywhere. We all stood there dumfounded for a minute until someone got the fireextinguisher and it went straight into the oven. So that was that. One cooked turkey and no sides!

That's actually when things became fun! We got the turkey out of the dutch oven and covered it in foil...we picked through the baked veggies to find ones that hadn't got fire extinguisher foam on them and they went into the dutch oven with all the other assorted veggies. The two stuffings had been covered, so they went on top of the webber BBQ. Everyone pitched in and somehow we managed to have a delicious Thanksgiving dinner by 4 pm! As we went around the table saying what we were thankful for it was mostly the fire extinguisher without which we would have been finished!

It was amongst all that choas that I put my camera down and didn't actually find it again until Saturday.

On Friday we attempted to find an alpaca farm nearby to take the kids to. Instead we went off to the town of Manchester which has many, many outlet shops. I was expecting it to be big malls, but actually they have to have the shops inside houses, so it was nice, although packed. There was no snow, so instead of being on the slopes people were shopping. We had fun though. We thought it was especially funny when we went into an outdoorsy kind of shop which had a huge Ugg display and also a Blunnie display. For those of you who are not Tasmanian, the Blunstone Boot comes from Tassie and used to be the classic work boot. Now it is being sold in trendy shops in the US for $140 US...and they have modified them somewhat. The guy in the shop was impressed that we were from Tasmania. When we caught up with the others for lunch, Nicola showed us her sheepskin hat she'd bought which was made in Tasmania! So go Tassie...doing roaring trade in Vermont.

After lunch we all went off ice skating at the local rink, but we only got in about 30 minutes before the session ended. They had fantastic frames there...like a walking frame that you could hold onto and went across the ice. Even with that Ella was terrified and cried most of the time as she and Matt used it together. Oscar and Kit were pretty uncomfortable too, but Remi was able to get around...it was only right at the end that I noticed his boots weren't even done up properly, so I don't know how he managed it.

On Saturday while our hosts went off to ski on sloppy slopes, the rest of us went off to the local cheese farm, as you do in Vermont...

Ella, who does love cheese, nearly cleaned them out of samples. We got some special ones to have for Xmas and some creamed honey, wool, and a lovely cheese board. The kids got lots of "I heart cheese" stickers...

From here it was off to try and find that illusive alpaca farm again. We drove past it and finally called to find where it was. It wasn't actually open and the crotchtey old English guy looked quite put out when we rocked up and unloaded all the kids, but to make matters worse 2 more cars pulled up at the same time. We had all our kids on their best behaviour and he actually warmed up to them and us and we learnt so much about Alpacas while the kids fed them.

But it was a funny place as we didn't pay for this priviledge, and his shop was closed, so we hung out there for an hour with him for free. I do have his details now though and he's happy to send me some fleece once I email him. .

The baby alpacas were only a month old.
And here's Remi and Ella feeding the only llama who is in with the herd to act as a guard dog.

I have often thought that I'd like a couple of Alpacas one day, but at $23 thousand a pop, I don't think they are for me!

On Saturday afternoon we went out to have a walk on one of the mountains, but they close them off for the hunting season. So we went to a big Country store in Manchester called Orvis after the man who invented the something or other reel used in fly fishing. They had big pond there filled with trout that the kids could feed. The shop was gorgeous actually, both inside and the architecture and detailing. The kids had a ball there watching fish. The light was just stunnning and I wanted to take a family photo, but Kit wouldn't participate, so I go Matt instead. It was only 3.30pm.

And on our last night there we were being very silly playing slaps with our boys...the game like knuckles where you take turns trying to slap the other persons hands and they have to try and move them quickly...well Oscar beat me as I missed him and hit the wall on the window join and ended up with a fractured finger (middle left). I thought there would be no way I would be type this post today, but it's actually so swollen today that it can't bend at all and if I'm gentle I can hit the keys. No crocheting though!

The trip home yesterday only took 3 1/2 hours and I think we were all a bit sad to leave. It was lovely up there and although it is a long drive, it would be an awesome place to have a weekend house to retreat to.

So I say "Fanks" to our Friends for a Fantastic "Fanksgiving.