Thanksgiving Thanks

I know, I know, we're all thankful today. But I am especially thankfully to:

• My co-worker, for the use of her 'roaster oven.' I think I may need to buy one of these things, because it seriously kicked ass today. Plugged it in, dumped the brined turkey in (also her suggestion) with a couple inches of brine juice and away it went. And no one seemed to notice **spoiler alert** that the turkey finished cooking an hour earlier than expected and I just turned off the roaster, covered the turkey with a piece of foil, and let it sit.
• Butterball.com, for all their wonderful insightful tips. Like covering the turkey with foil if it has cooked too fast. Although they were the ones that told me my 15 lb turkey would take 3-3 1/2 hours to cook and it only took a little over 2 hours.
• My mom, for a fantastic stuffing recipe. I have no idea how your heart is still pumpin blood effectively after this many years of eating something with that much butter in it, but it was good. Next year I will cut the cubes of my homemade bread smaller. Or just use all store-bought bread. Or stuff the turkey with the stuffing--like you told me to ;-)
• Ruth's Chris Steak House for their scrumptious sweet potato casserole recipe. I would not be surprised to find me hiding in a corner with the leftovers and a big spoon in a couple of hours. This was, by far, my favorite dish of the meal. And really not that hard to make.
  
• My husband, for keeping everyone--including himself--out of the way and letting me be the control nut that I am. And for doing an awesome job of carving the turkey and taking pride in doing it.
• My in-laws (mother, father, brother, sister, nieces) for taking a chance on venturing 2 hours to eat Thanksgiving dinner cooked by someone who had never made any of the items served before. Except the pumpkin pie. And for eating seconds. And I think liking it because I didn't see anyone drowning things in gravy or adding mass amounts of salt to things (probably because of the brine--everything seemed saltier than I expected to start).
• Evan, for his excellent co-chef skills on Wednesday and for being my taste-tester on the Chocolate Oatmeal Pie. Which turned out to be the most popular menu item, I think. I don't know if anyone who ate it will be able to sleep anytime soon with all that sugar, but it was a good pie.
• Eric, for being the only child to actually sit and watch Kung-Fu Panda for any amount of time. I don't think there was anything wrong with the movie, but I have never seen a group of children NOT want to sit and watch TV. Weird.

And now I am thankful to have my shoes off and be tucked into bed with some Tivo to watch...Happy Thanksgiving to all and to all a good night!