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This year will mark my first-ever holiday(s) away from my family. At least, the first in working memory. Amanda and I will be heading north to Minnesota for Thanksgiving this week.

It took a lot of debate back and forth, but we finally decided on the following holiday schedule:

We’ll spend Thanksgiving in Minnesota with her family, because she’s met a good portion of my extended family (on both sides), and I’ve met very little of her family (parents, brother, one aunt, one uncle, and two cousins). So, we’ll spend this Thanksgiving remedying that. And, hopefully, eating some good food.

Christmas is… complicated. Neither of us are perfectly happy with the result, and neither are/will be our families. That’s how we know it’s a good compromise.

We’ll spend Christmas Eve in Minnesota with her immediate family. It seems they have a long series of Eve-rituals that I don’t entirely understand but Amanda would be devastated to miss. As long as there’s a lot of eggnog (and rum) and a little good food to snack on, I should be okay. We’ll spend the night in Minnesota, and then have an early Christmas breakfast with her family.

Then, in an effort to only moderately annoy both sets of families, we’re going to hit the road, drive back down to Iowa, and spend the rest of Christmas Day in Truro with my family, where there will be lots of good food and very little rum.

So! We’ve a bit of traveling coming up over the next month or so. We’re leaving Iowa this Wednesday evening, and will be back Saturday sometime. We’ve hired a dog sitter to come look in on Miles while we’re gone, so we don’t have to bother friends or family with checking in on him on Thanksgiving Day. And then we’ll probably be back in Minnesota on the 22nd of December, and then back in Iowa in the early afternoon on the 25th. Whew.

Whew. This weekend, Amanda and I successfully hosted our first-ever dinner party. Or party of any sort in this house, actually. And although it was a lot of work, it was totally worth it.

The final and official menu turned out pretty kick arse:

• For Dinner:
  • Turkey (brined & roasted) (via Amanda and I)
  • Chive Mashed Potatoes with Turkey Gravy (Ditto)
  • Apple-Herb Stuffing (Same)
  • Green Bean Casserole (Us again)
  • Cheesy Carrot Casserole (Sara!)
  • Homemade Cranberry Sauce (Anne!)
  • Dinner Rolls (Amanda and I)
• For Beverages:
  • 5 bottles red wine (via Amanda & I, Kate, Lindsay, Megan, and Anne)
  • 2 bottles white wine (via Amanda & I and Julie)
• For Dessert:
  • Four-Layer Pumpkin Cake (Megan)
  • Pecan Pie (Hannah & Toño)
  • Apple Crumble Pie (two of ‘em) (Amanda & I)
  • Flan (Hannah & Toño)
  • Chocolate & Vanilla Cupcakes (Sara)

So, Holy Crap, in other words. We had a lot to eat. :)

We had 11 people in attendance in total, counting The Hosts with the Mosts. People started arriving around 5:30pm, we all sat down to eat shortly after 6pm, and people filtered out slowly until pretty close to 11pm.

Dinner-Related Happenings of Note:

After peeling five pounds of potatoes what for the mashing, we tried sticking the peelings down the garbage disposal. The intense vibrations from the disposal unit trying to handle the extreme overabundance of ‘tater peels actually managed to shake the drainage pipe lose from the wall, causing a small flood of extremely starchy water all over the new floor. I got the pipe reattached, though, and after a bit of plunging, it didn’t cause us any more problems.

Smaug was being his usual social self during the meal, hanging around the dinner table and playing with anyone who happened to glance his way. At one point, he got bored and jumped up onto the credenza under the window. The only problem with that was, the credenza was covered from end to end with our desserts. He realized his mistake at the very last second and managed a mid-air course correction, missing the caramel top of the delicate Flan by a quarter inch and then stepping carefully around the pies before I caught him an inch from the side of the cake. He spent the rest of the evening locked in the basement.

Miles spent the majority of the dinner outside, because he was just a little too excited by all the new people and smells. Around dessert time, we felt sorry for him, and let him in while we ate our sugary snacks. He happily galloped around the table for a while, saying hello to everyone, and then wandered off for a bit. A few minutes later, we realized that while we were stuffing our faces with cake and pie, Miles was in the kitchen finishing off the turkey left on the platter. He managed to eat a good pound and a half of turkey before anyone noticed. Luckily, I hadn’t finished carving the bird, so there was still some left for leftovers.

But other than that, things went really smoothly. We’re calling the party a success, and are hoping it turns into a yearly tradition. :) And if you would like to see my photos of the evening, you need go no further than right about here.