As noted last week (in Nine months), baby Darwin gets to experience everything for the first time, and a week ago today was her first Thanksgiving. Margie and I drove to western Massachusetts to the home of my sister Phyllis and brother-in-law Peter. We were joined by my sister Alice, our daughters Elissa and Sara, with Elissa's husband Ryan and their daughter Darwin, and Phyllis and Peter's children Jonas and Liza, with Jonas's wife Carolyn and their son Jackson. Also present were Liza's boyfriend Matt, Peter's stepmother June, and June's daughter (Peter's half sister) Melissa.

Clutching her spoon, Dar is seated by her parents for a major feature of this event - eating:

Of course, at nine months, she really couldn't eat all the Thanksgiving delicacies the rest of us enjoyed. What passes as Solid food for Dar is more like mush. Still, she's now gotten old enough to seem to enjoy the sociability of the table.

Perhaps because she's now in Day Care at least two days a week, Dar is used to interacting with many people, and shows little sign of "stranger anxiety". Thus she was happy to be held by various family members. Click on any photo in this entry to enlarge it, and return with your "Back" button:

With Liza

With Peter

Alice introducing Liza's rabbit Paloma

... and of course, Aunt Sara

We took our usual Friday morning walk:

Of course, we all had to get bundled up for the walk (see photo to the left).

This was the first Thanksgiving in recorded history to coincide with the first night of Hanukkah, and it will be the last time this happens for quite some time. ^Note 1

Because of this, Sara made latkes (potato pancakes, a traditional dish often served at Hanukkah) as part of her potluck contribution, and included latkes made out of sweet potatoes instead of regular potatoes (sweet potatoes being a traditional Thanksgiving dish).

We also lit Hanukkah candles for the second day - see Phyllis doing the lighting as Jonas, Carolyn, and Jackson look on.

Entitled "First Thanksgiving, this blog entry is centered around Darwin and her close family members. Come to think of it, our very lives have to some extent become centered around Darwin.

But to include photos of everyone, here are the four guests that didn't get shown above: on the left below, Liza's boyfriend Matt, and on the right, Margie, Peter's stepmother June, and her daughter (Peter's half sister) Melissa.

Matt and Liza

Margie, June, and Melissa

I'm not in any of the pictures - I took them.

Just think, soon it will be Darwin's first Christmas. Of course, just like her first Thanksgiving, she won't have the faintest idea what's going on. But we'll all have a lot of fun. Thanks to Peter and Phyllis for hosting this annual event!
 

Note 1:   Click the next link for the current Wikipedia entry on Thanksgivukkah. The widely repeated statement that this won't recur until the year 79811 is apparently not entirely accurate - the real picture is a bit more complex.   [return to text]