‘Muellers or Griswolds?’

I apologize for breaking from the traditional basketball related blog-talk. But, as Thanksgiving was yesterday, I felt inspired to ’share’ the following.

As we were eating the beloved feast, (my Mom is a fabulous cook!), someone at our table commented on how “Griswoldy” our family was at that particular moment. For those of you who don’t know the Griswold family, they are the infamous stars of the “Vacation” movies. One of our family’s favorites was “Christmas Vacation”. I am ashamed to say that we were allowed to watch that before my parents realized just what was contained in the movie . Anyway, many times throughout our lifetime, my two brothers and my sister and I would remark about how ridiculously similar our own twisted family was to the Griswolds.
So back to our story. We were beginning our Thanksgiving dinner. Happy times, happy family. Take a closer look . . .

It took a good 20 minutes to actually get everyone to sit at the table. Having counted and recounted a million times, we did not have enough chairs, even though we did have enough dishes. When the desk chair arrived from the basement, the dishes had to be rearranged to allow for the big chair to squeeze in. One nephew was repeatedly ringing the doorbell, having just recently discovered it. He is two years old and far too busy to actually sit down and eat. One nephew had mashed potatoes in his mouth and was ‘displaying’ them for all to see. My Dad, had a sort of dazed look and had blocked most of the commotion out. My husband was dishing up food for my youngest brother (who is 30) because his baby was asleep in his arms and he couldn’t move. My ten year old nephew was dishing up food (adult portions) onto the plate of that 2 year old nephew who was nowhere to be seen (but of course we heard him as he rang the doorbell over and over again).

About half way through dinner, Grandma (86 years old) was gnawing on a turkey leg (vigorously, I might add). My daughter Mallory, decided that now would be the perfect time, in the middle of dinner, to text her friends and tell them “Happy Turkey Day”. About this time, my Dad decided he would start clearing the table and doing dishes. It is wonderful that he does this but then Mom argues with him and he tells her to go sit back down and she gets up anyway and continues to help and he tells her again to sit back down. By now the ‘kids’ table, which this year we mistakenly decided to actually attach to the adults table , is void of all kids. However, the mess they leave behind leaves no doubt as to which section of the table was assigned to them. The adults discuss the possibility of having them eat outside on the porch next year. We decide that it’s a good idea and we will just tell them to wear coats.

Overall, another successful family event. No fighting, just memories that we will take with us. It always amazes me that we can get everyone together and relish in just how different we all are and then, just how much the same we are. I hope your family had just as many fun memories as we did.

Now that we have turkey in the fridge and a host of other leftovers, we can all sit in our comfy pants (the ones with a drawstring waistband) and watch the Jazz play the Hornets tonight! Go Jazz!