Thanksgiving Dinner at Casa de KASA

After earning our Thanksgiving dinner at the Turkey Trot, we had a massive gathering of all our extended family both on my side and Kevin's side (minus only my parents-not bad, eh?). Total number in attendance? 2(ohgoodlord)8. Plus it was Kevin's 31st birthday. Happy Birthday Kev! And since it was his birthday, he wanted to do all the cooking on his own. He wouldn't even let me help him. Well, he let me help with the menu decisions, and I got to do all the baking beforehand, but other than that, I was on clean-up/hostess duty. Which was great by me! I made 3 pies: Light Mint Chocolate Mousse, Double Layer Pumpkin Cheesecake, and a Cinnamon Blueberry Pie. I also made the biscuits- whole wheat pumpkin and classic Joy of Cooking white dinner biscuits. Flaky hot goodness that went right from the oven to everyone's plates (I popped them in the oven as soon as the turkey and ham came out). Here's how awesome Kevin is- he made the following:

*French onion soup, from scratch (everything was from scratch), and man was it ta-STY!
*turkey and (spiral-cut-honey) ham
*baked potatoes and sweet potatoes
*dirty rice (instead of stuffing, 'cause I can't stand the stuff for whatever strange reason- I like everything in it! Just not combined and cooked in a turkey, I guess.)
*green beans and bacon
*green salad
*asparagus
*cranberries (of which there is so much left over that I made fruit leather out of the extra)
*gravy
(plus there were my biscuits and pies, and Kevin's mom surprised him with a sheet carrot cake, also from scratch of course!)
*Bottles upon Bottles of wine, sparkling lemonade and cider. I don't even WANT to know what our our recycle collectors think of our house with the amount of bottles they will be picking up next week! Ha!

Now for a picture for you to appreciate how many people this is all in one place (Kevin got permission to borrow some extra tables and chairs from his school in order for this dinner to happen):

You can't even see everyone from this angle, so here's a shot from the other end (and again it's hard to see faces, but you get the idea):

And a picture of a couple of my cousins- Dave and Michael, and my brother Scott being himself.
And then some twin-on-twin ping-pong action with Aunty Alice and Ashton against Sean and cousin Georgie.


It was a bit of some all around crazyness trying to get dinner on the table, but once everyone was settled, there was a lot of passing, and all went smoothly. It was wonderful to catch up with family from as far as Alaska and L.A., and even from across town! Wonderful food, and memories~ Thanks everyone for traveling to the south side of Reno, and letting us host Thanksgiving this year!

Happy Turkey Trot Thanksgiving!

I am happy to report that many of my extended family participated in the 10th Annual Sparks Turkey Trot with me (my first!) before coming over to my house for an even more extended Thanksgiving dinner. We all met beforehand for a quick picture before heading up to the street for the race start~ first, my library posse, Dave and Turi:

Next is the family picture. From left to right- Lori, her husband Mike, Aunt Linda, Me, and Lori and Linda's parents. (Not pictured, Sara, because I couldn't find her until about 2 minutes before the race started.)

Linda and Lori did the 10k with me, and their parents did the 2 mile walk! L&L were going pretty quick- they started ahead of us in the initial sardine pack, and Sara and I didn't catch up to them until mile 5.5. It was a chilly wait for the race to begin, but it didn't rain on us, and was actually the perfect temperature for a run. :) Sara and I kept to an almost 9 minute mile pace, running negative splits for a finishing time of 56 minutes even (although our watches said 55:39 since we didn't start them until we reached the start line). Thanks so much for running with me Sara, even though it's difficult coming up here from sea level to run at this altitude. You set a perfect pace, and I greatly enjoyed our run together! Here is a 3 second video clip of Sara and I finishing, compliments of my Uncle Paul:
My friend Dave also finished the 10k in under an hour. As for Turi, he took off with the fast runners on the front line with a 45 minute goal to beat- which he shattered with a 43:16 new P.R. Yeah, congrats Turi!

On Coffee

Yes, two blogs in one day after a week of nothing. That's what homework does for a girl. I had some thoughts on new (to me) controlled substance I've let in my life this year: coffee. I've always been a tea drinker, and decaff mostly at that. Caffeine has an adverse affect on my system- I get super wired from even a small amount of it, and then an hour later, I'm dragging like I haven't slept for a week. I've always loved the smell of coffee, but never much liked the taste of it. Unless it has chocolate in it. Almost anything tastes good with chocolate in it! But even with chocolate added, it's not something I drink very often. Until now. Over the past year I've started having a cup here and there when I needed to stay awake at work- usually because I was tired from staying up ridiculously late the night before doing homework. And now, I drink it everyday! With chocolate and vanilla soy milk in it, of course. Lots. I look forward to my daily coffee, even. But is that because I want the chocolate, or the caffeine? I don't get wired anymore, but it's not like I get headaches if I don't have any. And I've also come to appreciate different flavors and brands. Like flavored coffees. And the Trader Joe's Wintry Blend.

Does this mean I'm an adult now? (And is that a good thing?) Almost 30, and I want coffee everyday. Seems like a sound definition to me.

Getting Ready for Thanksgiving

This weekend we had some friends over with their children, so we had a craft night! In honor of the upcoming holiday, we made Turkey Breadbaskets. It was pretty wild at our house, but they did manage to sit still for about 45 minutes and color, while I stapled everything together and tried to keep the crayons all in the same room. Here they are, all hard at work:

Sean and Ashton and I worked on their turkeys for a bit more detail the next day- a waddle, some feathers, and GLITTER! My kitchen is still shiny. :) The baskets (which will be used for the dinner rolls I'll be baking- white, herb and possibly pumpkin spice) make for perfect center pieces, along with the mini-daffodils the boys grew from bulbs in their classroom. Well, the fun part is taken care of; now for the cooking, cleaning- both inside and out- before the people come...

My little baseball players

Today was the perfect beautiful day for hitting some balls, practicing catching and throwing with Sean and Ashton. Kevin did all the pitching, whilst I helped race after the successful ball-bat contacts. While their fine motor skills need more work (although their handwriting is improving greatly!), the boys' gross motor skills have always been very advanced. They can drop-kick a ball, ride scooters, dribble a basketball and shoot (successful) hoops, ride two-wheelers, catch a ball, throw with an amazing arm (Ashton throws a perfect spiral football!), and yes I am bragging here. Here is a little sample of their hitting abilities. I have a couple of pictures (Sean is in the red wearing glasses, and yes he did throw us off all day by wearing Ashton's signature color), and a couple short video clips. First up is Ashton:



And next is Sean:




I think I need to get them in tee-ball next season... :)