Fractured Family Thanksgiving

I am really glad I came to Oklahoma for thanksgiving. With Mom and Taylor in Moscow, Dad in Bulgaria, and and few of my friends in town, I would have had a very lonely Thanksgiving. However, the ones that were in town did generously offer to have me over at thier thanksgiving dinners, if I didn't have anywhere else to go. Touched as I was, after the school moved the project due date up, I decided to go to Oklahoma. I wanted to be surounded by family on my first major holiday really apart from the immediate family, and I didn't know when I'd be coming back to Oklahoma.

Had a bit more laid back morning then yesterday. Slept in and then spent the rest of the morning helping Grandma Perkins get dinner ready. Grandma Case showed up first with a pumpkin and pecan pie. It was really good to see her, and we all talked while getting the feast prepared. Jeff, Ashley, and Karsten came next. Jeff really reminds me of Dad, made me miss him even more. He made the whipped potatoes and they brought green bean casserole and some other things. We had a ton of food. Besides the green bean casserole, there was a corn salad, a fried okra salad, cornbread stuffing (with and without oysters), a whole smoked turkey, baked rolls, gravy, a ham and cheese platter, and cranberrry marshmello salad. I stuffed myself, but less than usual, saving room for a slice of each pie.

Karsten has grown a lot, although he still loved posing for pictures. He's into legos now. So is Jeff, but he's more interested in buying and selling them on ebay. Ashley was interviewd on the local Oklahoma news for her role as a coordinating director for the downtown Oklahoma City christmas decorations. Josh came by for a short while after dessert and had a plate. He's thinking about a job at UPS. He's as tall as I am, and still couldn't believe that Taylor was taller than us both. I took a few pictures. After dinner, we all sat around talking for a bit, Jeff trying to fix grandpa's computer, Karsten playing with his trains and trying to make a pryamid with mummies in my FormZ computer modeling program.
In all, a very fine thanksgiving.