Giving Thanks..

So, before I launch into the joys of our Thanksgiving feast at lunch time.. I must tell you about our fantastically exciting morning.

At about 5:30 on Thanksgiving Morning, we were all awakened by the a loud noise that sounded like thunder rolling without the loud crash at the end. Hmm.... wonder what that was...? Oh well.. guess I'll go back to sleep.... wait a minute... do you smell smoke ?! I feel like I smell smoke...Seriously Stephen!! I smell smoke!!!! No wait.. don't you smell it ? Is that a siren? Red flashing lights... There is actually a fire truck in front of our building but I don't think it's for our building (denial).. OH MY GOD MOM!!!! THEY ARE RUNNING UP TO OUR BUILDING!!!! STEPHEN GRAB THE DOG!!!! THEY ARE IN OUR BUILDING!!!!!

That's right, our building was on fire...or so we thought. Soon New York's finest were running up our stairs telling us to stay inside and open all of our windows. Moments later they told us to leave the building. Our boiler overheated, filling the building with smoke and steam and more importantly...carbon monoxide...Loads of it. The sound we heard, that thankfully woke all of us up, was the sound of bricks falling from our ancient chimney and blocking up the exhaust pipe for the boiler, causing it to overheat and sending the CO into our living spaces. Our amazing first floor neighbors, awakened by the same noise we were, smelled the smoke first and went down to the basement to investigate. Finding it full of steam and smoke they called 911. I shudder to think what might have happened if none of us had woken up...or the same thing had happened while we were all at work, with only the animals at home...horrible. We checked out the chimney later in the day and there is no mortar left in between the bricks.. they are all ready to fall. As of now we are on our second day without heat. Praise the Lord that they did not have to turn off the gas so we still have hot water and are able to cook.... It was really scary. Now we are just scared that our landlord will cut corners and not repair everything properly and the whole thing could happen again...

Anyway.. I guess you could say we had/have a lot to be thankful for..

.. and then there was the meal...Mom helped with everything and our all natural Kosher brined turkey turned out to be fantastically delicious!! We had all the usual sides, mashed potatoes, green beans, sweet potato casserole, stuffing and cranberry sauce.








Thank goodness it was super warm that day so we could air the place out while we were cooking..






The man of the house.



Mom and me :)



Dad and me :)

We are having a fantastic visit, can't believe it's almost over..