A history of Q’s Thanksgiving Past!

It’s family week for the Thanksgiving Eleven!  So, naturally, its time to talk about my family.  I don’t know what your family does for Thanksgiving…but my Thanksgiving traditions are always a highlight of my year.

A typical Q Thanksgiving begins either on Wednesday (the infamous Busiest Travel Day of the Year) or Thanksgiving morning with a jaunt down I-5 to the Antelope Valley to my grandparents’ house.  My dad grew up in Lancaster, and much of his side of the family remains there.  Thus, its become the center of holiday festivities for that side of the family…and my family always heads down for Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving day is pretty traditional…I’ll watch the Lions game, and then my cousins will come over around lunchtime.  From there its backyard football and preparing for the feast!  We all sit around a big table in the family room…maybe 20-25 of us depending on the year…and dine on traditional Thanksgiving fare.  Sweet potatoes, turkey, stuffing, gravy, etc.  Its all rather delicious…and filling.  The evenings are sometimes a board game night, or maybe my cousins and I will go play outside.  It varies, but not much.

Friday is a lazy morning for myself…although my mom and the girls tend to go do some Black Friday shopping.  I’ll spend time with the cousins, and we’ll usually have a pizza dinner all together that evening.  Sometimes there’s a movie outing…but that often happens on Saturday some years.  It depends on what people are feeling.  Saturdays are similar, except its usually a BBQ dinner that night.  Hanging out with cousins, seeing my aunts and uncles, its all good times.

I know, it doesn’t sound like this super exciting weekend.  But, really, its very very nice, and a weekend I’ve come to cherish. I rarely get to see that side of the family.  Lancaster may only be 4 ½ hours away, but life gets in the way…and I don’t make it down there as often as I should.  So this weekend is all about being with the family, catching up with them, and doing the things we’ve always done.  There’s a comfort in that.  No matter what else goes on in life, there are my Thanksgiving traditions and a houseful of people happy to see me.  It’s pretty awesome!

Thanksgivings are usually very very similar throughout the years.  They’ve evolved a little as all us cousins get older (we no longer play Kitties in the Hot Sauce…don’t ask)…but the routine is the same.  We get together, we hang out, and we enjoy seeing each other. 

This year’s schedule will be a little different. For the first time in many many years, I will be making the trek down to Lancaster on Wednesday of that week.  And for the first time in as far back as I can remember, I’ll be coming back home on Saturday morning.  I’ll be sad to miss the BBQ night, but I’ll get to go see Stanford host Notre Dame with my girlfriend…so that seems worthwhile.

Thanksgiving is all about family…and I truly cherish the time I get to spend with my family every single year around this time.