Family Gatherings and Thanksgiving Memories

• This week’s column details family gatherings and meals,especially for Thanksgiving in 1994.
• Lovina’s mother reflects on being thankful for health and harvest, comparing her life to that of the Pilgrims.
• A recipe for turkey burgers using leftover Thanksgiving turkey is also included.

I’m sharing excerpts from my mother Elizabeth Coblentz’s columns from November 1994. Joe and I lived in a house trailer across the driveway from Mom and Dad and had one daughter, Elizabeth.

It’s Monday and a nasty wash day.The wash is drying, but the rain forced me to bring some bedding in. Now that the rain stopped, I hung it back outside.So much to do with the clothesline! I hope it dries. It looks dark in the northwest sky again. We’re drying some clothes on a rack inside in front of the Hitzer wood-burning stove. A dryer would be nice, but that’s life around here… no electricity.Still, I think hanging clothes outside makes them smell fresher.

Sunday morning, we had breakfast with daughter Lovina and Joe, who live across the driveway in a house trailer.It was an enjoyable morning – like going out for breakfast! We had fried eggs, fresh fried potatoes, bread buns and toast, ham, cheese, butter, jelly, coffee, and rolls. We did the dishes and returned to our house.

What a treat to not prepare breakfast in my own kitchen! At noon, we had lunch guests: daughter Lovina and Joe, son Albert, sarah Irene and family, and daughter Liz and Levi and family. In the afternoon, daughter Leah, Paul, and family gave us a visit.