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| Pumpkin pie in the oven |
Well, first
things first—there is no Thanksgiving
in Switzerland. None. Zilch. Nada. No
Pilgrims (the Swiss wouldn’t have the slightest clue why someone would want to leave Switzerland, the center of the
universe, and certainly not for religious reasons), no Indians (well, actually
not true in a manner of speaking, but more on that later), few turkeys, no
pumpkin pie and of course, no Charlie Brown Thanksgiving. So for CW, Thursday was just
that—Thursday. Our Swiss office doesn’t
close down for Thanksgiving. I did
leave a little early and got home to find that SoulSwisster had cooked
Thanksgiving dinner, which was a nice surprise. Well, she actually cooked the side dishes…But no
turkey—they’re hard to find here.
So SS and CW hopped in the car and drove to the grocery store to get a
couple of substitute rotisserie chickens.
We were gone about 30 minutes and when we drove back into the driveway,
SwissSis was looking out the window by the door, acting a bit like a
sentry. “This can’t be good,” we
thought. Boy, were we wrong!
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| Frying onions to top the green bean casserole |
While we were away,
the kids had gotten themselves dressed in nice clothes and set the dining room
table, complete with candles, placemats, silver, and had even gotten the china
out. And when we walked in, they
presented themselves and the table.
What a great surprise! We
carved up the chickens and had a very nice Thanksgiving evening.
CW must admit,
it was a bit strange to be disconnected from Black Friday. No Blackness for us, just another
day. But you should be a little
jealous. While some of you were
staying up until midnight to get online for those early bird specials, we could
hop online at 7 AM, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. Well, as bright-eyed as we get at 7 am. But we didn’t…no Black Friday shopping
for us. But we could have! J
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| Dash receiving his Bobcat |
Friday night was
All American Boy’s first Cub Scout Pack Meeting. There must be about 8 or 9 dens, each with 6-8 boys so it
was, in a word, chaos. Absolute,
utter chaos. But a good time. CW didn’t particularly care for the
fact that the color guard presented the UN flag—something just not right for a
Boy Scouts of America organization.
AAB was awarded his Bobcat patch.
That means he knew the oath, the handshake, etc. Doesn’t he look sharp in his
uniform? The patch is put on
upside down and you’re only allowed to turn it right-side up when you’ve done a
good deed. AAB has been drying
dishes after dinner for quite some time hoping he’s done enough to flip that
badge right side up. Wonder if we
should tell him SS has already flipped the patch and adhered it to his
uniform? Nah…it’s nice to have
extra help in the kitchen!
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| A little excited |
Saturday, we did
celebrate Thanksgiving. Our
church, Westlake, hosted a Thanksgiving dinner for ex-pats as well as the
curious. SS and a new friend,
Karen, organized it and it was a great success. About 65 people came including more than half
non-Americans. SS and Karen even
found turkeys to cook and trust us when we say that a Swiss oven is not built
for a turkey, particularly not a 20 pounder, which takes up the entire oven
space. The turkey cooking started
on Friday and went for 4 hours before we had to go to the pack meeting. When we got back from that, the turkey
went back in for a few more hours into the wee morning time. At 4 a.m. it was still not done. So SS had to get serious. She pulled it out, cut it up into
pieces and finished roasting it in parts.
All-in-all, probably about 11 hours. The turkey almost won…But in the end he was very moist and had
good flavor. CW was
volunteered/drafted for set-up work at the church, including the carving which
CW and another ex-pat did. Two 20
lb. turkeys and about 18 lbs of turkey breasts takes about an hour to
carve. Thank goodness Karen had
her transformer and her U.S. electric knife! Everyone brought something to share, so we had mashed
potatoes, stuffing (also hard to make as will tell you!), sweet potatoes
with brown sugar and pecans, corn casserole (from other displaced Texans), some
salads, cranberry sauce, and of course, wine (no meal is without wine here!). We sang a song, ate,
visited, put on Charlie Brown, and then cleaned for about 3 hours. The church has the coolest thing—an
industrial dishwasher that does a load in exactly three minutes. CW wants one at the house. Ours takes two hours!
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| Lauren preparing to blow out the candles |
Remember we
wrote no Indians here? Well, some
of the kids, including AAB and SweetSwissTeen, participated in a little
Thanksgiving skit Caryn found to help explain to everyone what Thanksgiving is
about. It had the Pilgrims and of
course, the Indians. But when it
came time for the Indians to speak, the strangest thing happened. These Indian actors turned out not to have
Western Indian accents, but Eastern
Indian accents. When CW first
heard the accents, he did a double take and then laughed harder than he has at
anything in a long time! And the
kids playing those parts were Americans—though they never have lived in America,
which made it even funnier!
Anyway, a good
time was had by all and people are already asking if we’re going to do it again
next year.
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Look closely--you can see Radar
enjoying the tree |
To close the
weekend out, we celebrated SwissSis’s 11th birthday. She asked if we could decorate the
house for Christmas, so we put up the Christmas tree (borrowed from a friend
since ours is in storage—didn’t make it on the truck) and got it mostly
decorated. CW grilled some steaks—we’re
sure the neighbors will be wondering what the crazy Americans are doing outside
grilling when it turns really cold,
but ya gotta do what ya gotta do!
Then we ate cake and she opened presents.
There you have
it. That was our first Swiss
Thanksgiving. Actually, it was
pretty packed—which was a good thing.
And we have so much to be thankful for, like all of you reading this—our
family and friends. We miss
you! You’re in our thoughts and
prayers! Hope that your Thanksgiving
was blessed and that you had time to remember all the real reasons we have to
be thankful.
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| Julia in front of the tree |
