Being Thankful In So Many Different Ways By Cindy Oriol
Psalm 100:4 tells us to “enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; give thanks to him and praise his name.” NIV When you think of the meaning of thanksgiving what words come to mind?” For me, some of the words I can think of are being grateful, blessed because of the Lord’s abiding love for me, precious in his sight and Child of God. Some of my blessings are my wonderful soulmate for almost seventeen years, my beautiful girls, my precious grandchildren, my family and my extended brothers and sisters of Christ. Other ways I am thankful for are: After being in and out of a wheelchair for several years, I am finally out and using a cane, the healings of my pancreatic and spleen and breast cancers plus several other health issues.
I remember helping mom butter that big bird that weighed around twenty-six pounds. The butter was so slippery as she held it while I covered each part. I was so glad I used a paper towel to smear it on with. Once we were finished, we put it in our heavy metal roasting pan and into the oven. One by one of my large family of three brothers and one sister, plus mom and dad of course, started arriving. They liked to come earlier to help with the other preparations for the rest of the buffet. Mom was busy with the cranberry sauce. I loved watching the sauce slide out into one large cylinder onto her favorite tray with the decorations of cornucopias and then she would slice it. She was also well known in our family for her delicious fruit salad of grapes, apples, mixed fruit, pineapples, and peaches. Several of us girls divided the preparation of the other foods. I went looking in the china cabinet for mom’s large Corningware dish with blue flowers on it to put the mashed potatoes in. I also found her heavy glass platter with a large turkey stencil in the center.
Have you ever had a Thanksgiving that you will never forget? Mine was the year without the turkey. I stayed up most of the night with my mom, helping her make her home-made dressing. Earlier that day, she told me to lay out several pieces of bread so they When the potatoes were finished cooking and being could harden, just enough to be crunchy. This made mashed and while no one was looking, I added extra the stuffing hold together better. butter to them to make them taste creamier. The creamier the better.
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