Thanksgiving

Well, after those two adorable photos, even though I am full of turkey and pumpkin pie, I have to write and say, Thank You! for a lovely day at home. It was the first day since last Tuesday that I hadn't been at work........I cooked all day, which I find now relaxes me, and we actually ate at 4, so Graham got to fall asleep right after eating! He tried the turkey, but the pieces were too big (he wouldn't let me cut them) and ate almost all the carrots with brown sugar, cucumber, and some rice. Holly-Anne ate TONS of turkey and skin, and some cranberries, and everything else under persuasion (no dessert if she didn't eat a few mouthfuls of rice and broccoli!). It was a lovely meal, and we all said something we were thankful for. Even though Toby isn't working, we have alot to be thankful for. We even had rain yesterday, for the first time in weeks, so the air smells of fall again. It has been so dry that on my walks, the leaves were crunchy and the air had none of the damp smell full of leaves slowly decomposing.....it sounds gross, but it's a smell I love, wet leaves and smoke drifting from other houses where it's finally cool enough to have a fire in the fireplace.....wood burning....
In between working overtime and cooking two thanksgiving meals this weekend - we had our very good family friends Patricia and Victor over on Saturday night for a non-turkey, pot roast Thanksgiving meal that was lots of fun and the kids behaved and ate at! - I managed to read The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson, one of the books on my Hallowe'en reading list. I read it in 4 days, and had to force myself to put it down this morning in order to get the pumpkin pie baked, then start on the turkey.
It is a fascinating book! Almost unputdownable. It shows the best of what man can achieve - by all accounts the Chicago World's Fair was stunning, and moved those who went to it with the beauty of the buildings - and the worst, in the horrible hotel that HH Holmes built, the Castle of Terror, where he killed a still unknown number of people (mostly women). It is gripping reading, as you see the progress of the World's Fair being built against enormous obstacles and odds, compared with the procession of people coming into the Castle but not seen leaving it. A very good book. And suitably creepy for Hallowe'en, but not graphic.
I have just started The Lamplighter, which I forgot I had on my shelves when I made my original list in my first blog. The writing is definitely different from the Devil in the White City, I'll see how tomorrow goes. I may just be tired tonight. Though it doesn't seem very original, it is set in the era of Scotland's developing police force and their investigative techniques (1888), which is one of the reasons I bought the book.
Happy Thanksgiving everyone! I hope you enjoyed your turkey and cranberry sauce and pumpkin pie!