Mama and my sisters and brothers in the area would come and bring their families. Sometimes friends and cousins would come too. I'd drag out my good china and we'd have a huge feast.
There were dishes for days!!
A typical menu would be something like:
- Turkey
- Dressing (both fried and baked)
- Giblet gravy
- Regular gravy
- Mashed potatoes
- Rice
- Sweet potato casserole
- Green beans or green bean casserole
- Fried squash or fried okra (depending on the garden that year)
- Yellow squash casserole
- Garden salad
- Fruit salad with nuts from Mama's pecan trees
- Homemade cranberry sauce
- Homemade pickles
- Homemade biscuits
- Homemade cornbread
- Homemade pumpkin pie
- Homemade pecan pie
- Homemade fruit cake
I'd always do the turkey, mashed potatoes, rice, gravies, fruit salad, whatever was fried, fruit cake and pies. Mama would make the biscuits and the dressing because nobody will ever be able to do those as good as my Mama. My sister, Debbie, always made the casseroles and cranberry sauce. My sister, Miniver, would bring whatever she had that was good to eat, and my brother, Howard, and his wife, Juliette, would do the same.
We'd eat so much that we'd barely be able to move, and then the children would all go watch TV or play those old Atari video games while the adults cleaned up everything and washed the dishes.
Our dogs and cats would feast on leftovers. They'd be sooooo excited!
After the dishes were done, the adults would generally sit around the table in my formal dining room and gossip! Both the men and the women. We'd tell all the stories of our lives that year. We'd retell all the stories from our childhoods. We'd laugh and laugh and laugh.
As the children grew older they would join us and contribute their own stories.
Those were the best of times. Those 1980s Thanksgivings.
We had big curly permed hair and huge prescription eyeglasses. The fashion was flashy, and the family was home.
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