Thanksgiving

This year for Thanksgiving we decided just to stay home and have our first Thanksgiving as a family.  It was really nice!  I was worried we'd be sad that there weren't other people, and it always nice to see friends and family, but it was nice not to have to rush off to someplace else or worry about transporting food or any other logistical issues. 

I cooked for several hours and made a pescatarian dairy/soy/wheat free Thanksgiving dinner!  We had salmon (from a sustainable fishery certified by the marine stewardship council), mashed sweet potatoes, quinoa with red pepper, butternut squash, and caramelized onions, and risotto with acorn squash, yellow pepper, and onions.  We also had wheat free rolls (made from a Pamela's bread mix).  Oh, and we also had deviled eggs (I just boiled 4 eggs, so we each had 4 deviled eggs), but we ate those as soon as I made them and did not make it to dinner time. 

om nom nom nom

It doesn't look like tons of food on the table, but we will be eating leftovers for several days! 

Of course, the important part was Alex's first Thanksgiving. 

We all know I'm the star of this blog!

He feasted on sweet potatoes and acorn squash.  It was the first time he had tried acorn squash, he seemed to like it, but more of it ended up on him than in his mouth.  He had fun though and I think he enjoyed sitting at the table with us!

Yes he does have squash in his eyebrow, why do you ask?

Snowy Halloween

We had an early snowstorm here in CT at the end of October. 

The snow was really wet and heavy, and the trees still had all their leaves.  And apparently, the way sap runs though trees changes in the winter, to make them better able to stand up to the snow.  Who knew?  Well all of those factors resulted in trees just going down all over the place, which meant that for the second time this fall, we had massive power outages all over the state. 

We were lucky and never lost power.  Shhh don't tell anyone.

We did lose a lot of trees though.

  The storm actually came while Emily was visiting to watch Alex so I could study for my comprehensive exams (which I took on Friday, eek!).  My plans of studying on campus were quashed, because it wasn't safe to drive to campus because of all the downed trees and wires.  So I took a break so that Alex could enjoy is his first snow!

Alex was not a huge fan, it was cold and wet.  He got to wear his adorable snowsuit though! 

Halloween was on Monday after the storm, and it got cancelled for a lot of the towns.  We still had people come trick-or-treating at our apartment though and we dressed Alex up in his monkey costume from his Grandma Tag!

And we carved Monsters Inc. pumpkins.  Dan did Sully, I did Mike, and I also carved a little Boo in her monster costume for Alex. 

We got through the storm just fine and went on with life, but a lot of people were out of power for a week or longer.  I'm sooooooo thankful that we didn't have to worry about keeping heat or finding a hotel.