Thanks Gave-ing

Hey! You know who had a great Thanksgiving on a budget? THIS GUY.

This year Wendy and I took up my friend's generous offer to host us in Boston for dinner with his wife and her family, which has grown by one since we spent last Christmas with them!

Meet Dani; she's a Dragon.

I have to insert this, rather haphazardly, here: The absolute best thing about T's family, besides the obvious warmth, generosity, strength of moral character, etc. is their seemingly endless supply of great stories that always end in everyone busting up laughing! Okay, out-of-sequence-remembrance over, we now resume you're previous blog-cast:

So the first night, T and his father-in-law Vinnie picked us up from our bus (we used go-bus, it was absolutely decent and affordable) and when we got to T's place, went straight to spying on his tiny, sleeping progeny. They warned us she would wake us up crying from the next room, but when she woke up the next morning she was quiet as a mouse! We even got worried at how quiet she was, but she was fine.
Then the men (yes, that includes me!) headed out to do some volunteering with the Knights of Columbus, and I learned the phrase "KofC" sounds a lot like KFC...
We cooked, and then served a some folks thanksgiving dinners for a couple hours, and it was all very warm and good.
Okay, full-disclosure, T is a professional chef, so he cooked! Vinnie and I opened some cans, then went out to set up tables and deliver the first wave of food. It was nice to have some guy time and work up a spiritual, as well as physical appetite before our own over-indulgence, but nearly torture resisting all that delicious, traditional Thanksgiving food while we were serving plates! Some turkey might have find its way to my mouth prematurely, but hey, I'm human.

That's a lot stuffing!

Then it was over to Vinnie's house for some full on tradition-style family Thanksgiving, with cats, dogs, moms, dads, future-in-laws (Marissa, T's sister-in-law, is newly engaged!), football on the TV, and of course: mountains of food that would make you want to cry butter!

After Wendy woke back up from her 100-year food-coma, we went back to T's.
The side story begins here: Massachusetts has some RIDICULOUS laws! Not only did we forget to buy beer the day before (to drink while watching football, of course!) We went on an adventure on the drive home to T's to find beer for the Jets Vs. Patriots game that was about to start. After finding the only place in town that was both open and had alcohol, turns out, it's illegal to sell beer on Thanksgiving Day. Way to punish us poor-planners MA. Yeesh! But for whatever reason, you could still buy beer at a bar so after dropping the ladies off, T and I did get a couple beers and watch the game, which made me cry. *Sancheeeeez!*

You gotta appreciate the BBQ place's sign next door, too!

Awesome Themed Cake made by Courtney

Anywho, I wanna wrap this up, but I can't leave out the last day! T and I went shopping for Marissa and Tim's engagement party that evening and had a fun man-date, then helped decorate the venue with T's mother-in-law (who is so sweet she might fool you into thinking your her child the moment you meet her!). Then we drank and stuffed our faces all over again, but you know what? By some miracle, when I came back to NYC, I hadn't gained any weight! Truly, an all-around epic Thanksgiving for the history-books. Welcome to the world Dani! Lucky your parents kept a close eye on you, cuz I would have stolen you. Oh yes.

And this is T's dad getting a pedicure. Because I promised it would go on the internet, and here it is.