By Trent Rosser

Well, Thanksgiving is upon us again. It seems like we just celebrated Thanksgiving a little less than 365 days ago and here it is again. And again, we had it here at our house. Due to everyone’s work and school schedule, we did Thanksgiving early again this year. We had it this past Sunday. This time not everyone that usually comes was going to make it. Which made my heart happy, that we wouldn't have to make so much food. Or so I thought. We actually had more people over this year than ever before. So, it was up to us to make sure everyone has plenty of good food to eat and to make sure that they have a good time. What fun! (yes, that's sarcasm). As you can probably already tell, we don’t get a lot of company because I am not much of a “People Person”. But, after all, it is Thanksgiving.

One of the things that we always have to do before the big day is house cleaning. Luckily my wife takes care of most of it. I did get the “pleasure” of cleaning the carpets. We do have a carpet cleaner, but is is very small and it takes about 2 hours just to do the living room. Then of course, you have to go over it again and hit the high traffic areas and spots. So I go to work Saturday morning and when I get home, I spend the next five hours cleaning the carpet. The only good thing was that the dogs were outside and not bothering us as we were trying to clean. My wife got everything clean and started prepping the food for the next day. Finally around 9 pm that night, we were able to sit down and take a sigh of relief. We were done for the night. Or, so I thought. We let the dogs back in and the carpet was still a little wet. Now when we opened the door they came running in like always and I was expecting them to hit the kitchen with wet paws and go sliding across the room. It didn’t happen. This might be a good time to mention that somehow, the dogs figured out a way to turn on the water faucet in the backyard. Earlier this week they flooded the backyard, and it still hasn't dried. So when they came running in the living room on the slightly damp clean carpet, they left muddy paw prints everywhere. Yep, time to redo the carpets…. Again….. For the third time!

While I was doing the carpets, my wife was prepping the food and found a new recipe for fudge. It was Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup fudge. It was the best thing ever! I would almost trade a 16 oz medium rare rib-eye steak for this fudge! It was that dang good. She also found a recipe for sausage and cream cheese pastry thingamajig. It too was pretty good, Did I mention the fudge?! I keep going back to the fudge because that what I kept trying to do that night as well. Finally, after everything was done, it was time for bed!

The next morning I woke early to redo the carpets, again, and start on the ham. My poor wife kept waking up throughout the night to finish the turkey. So when I woke up the oven was free to put the ham in. After a while we finally finished everything and did not even have a chance to sit down before everyone started to show up. A few years ago I told you about the Thanksgiving where our grandson decided to start a food fight with flying mashed potatoes. This year I was hoping that he was a little more mature and wouldn't do something like that. I was right. Instead, he didn’t want to eat anything except a dinner roll and pie. We tried everything we could to get him to eat something. I actually had him convinced that the deviled eggs were candy, but it was only until he touched it and then he realized that I was lying to him. So he would throw his fit and his mother will tell him no pie until he eats something. Another words, just another typical Thanksgiving. That was until his mother was out of the room and the neighbor snuck him some pumpkin pie! When his mom came back and seen him eating the pie, she immediately blamed my wife. My grandson was smart, he just watched as my wife was denying everything slowly eating his pie. Then the neighbor walked back into the room and my grandson points to her and yells, “Grammy didn’t give me pie…..she did!” He not only threw her under the bus, but he backed the thing up and drove over her again!

All in all, everyone had a great time with some good food, and great friends and family. Everyone left with full bellies and plates to take home with them. One thing that they did find was my fudge and there was not much left of it when everyone was gone. As we were putting what leftovers away, we noticed one small thing that we forgot. We had ham, green bean casserole, yams, deviled eggs, sausage pastries, sausage balls with cheese, mashed potatoes and gravy, rolls, all kinds of deserts and of course the turkey. And up in the cabinet, still unopened in the box, was the most traditional Thanksgiving food. Stuffing. Yep, we forgot to fix the stuffing with the turkey! Next year we will be doing it again, and I will sneak desserts to my grandson just like my neighbor did. I just hope I don’t get thrown under the bus. If I do…. No one gets any fudge! It really doesn't matter though, because next year….. No one gets my fudge but me!

Have a Happy Thanksgiving and………... stay away from my fudge.