"Save it for a rainy day ..."

Was that just ONE weekend? My God, it felt like several. At least.

Rainy Monday here, you? I'm dog-sitting today, and she has some intestinal distress happening. Not sure whether it was her trip to the kennel over Thanksgiving or what ... but her tummy is not happy. And that means lots of trips out to the yard, in the cold rain. Ah, Monday.

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Sooooo ... the weekend. Thanksgiving was everything I imagined ... lots of work getting the meal prepared, incredible mess in the kitchen, and it took 4.2 minutes to eat "The Meal". Everything tasted great though. (Kay and Kathy, I wish you had been here!)

One last-minute change to the menu: I decided not to do the Gooey Butter Cake and made a recipe Emilie brought home from work instead. They had a Thanksgiving meal at the office on Monday, and someone brought this dish that everybody loved. The recipe was shared, and we decided to give it a go. It was definitely a hit, even the Non-Food-Person (Jimmy) had more than one helping. It came without a name, so we have christened it:

Pumpkin Pie Cake

1 16-oz. can pumpkin

1 12-oz. can evaporated milk

3 eggs

2 cups sugar

1 tsp. cinnamon

Mix this and pour into a 9 x 13 baking pan that has been sprayed with a non-stick spray.

1 box of Duncan Hines Yellow Butter Recipe Cake Mix (dry)

1 and 1/2 cups chopped pecans

Sprinkle these over the top of the pumpkin mixture.

1 and 1/2 sticks butter (melted)

Pour this over the dry cake mix and nuts.

Bake at 350 degrees for 55 minutes or until lightly browned.

Frost with a mixture of:

1 16-oz. box powdered sugar

1 8-oz. cream cheese

1 8- oz. Cool Whip

Goodness.

Oh yeah, the turkey brining ... I ended up using a cooler with ice to house the turkey in the brining bag. I used a huge plastic bag I bought at Williams-Sonoma to hold the turkey in the brine, but after I got it all in there, I was worried that it would leak overnight ... and it was incredibly unwieldy, all that liquid in a bag ... so I used the cooler instead of the fridge. I roasted it slow and covered it with foil, until the last hour or so ... then I uncovered and basted it with butter until the temperature was over 165 degrees. It rested for about an hour while I finished the rest of the meal, and yes. It was moist, very full of flavor, and everything "they" say about brining is true! I'm even thinking about doing another one for Christmas.

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Miss Squishy brought her Mama and Daddy over to watch the Clemson/Carolina game on Saturday night. Won't say too much about the game, other than "Whew!" That was a close one. Can't tell you how hard it is to watch those Tigers play sometimes.

On to the BABY ... she is not quite 3 weeks old, and this marked her first visit to Nana and Papa's house. She was awake for about half the time she was here, and for a good bit of her awake time, she was concentrating on the chatter coming from my mouth. When her head was on my shoulder, she leaned back a little bit so she could see my face, and pretended to listen intently. Way to melt your Nana's heart there, Squishy.

Love. Love. Love.

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Yesterday was dreary and cold. Em and I took a walk with The Beast and came home with runny noses and frozen ears and hands. That, and seeing a few houses with the Christmas decorations already up made me want to come home and decorate. Laziness prevailed though ... we'll do it next weekend, I think.

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Today is "Cyber Monday" ... the biggest Internet shopping day of the year? Whatever. I think about Christmas shopping and I start hearing white noise in my head. I can't focus. I have no idea what I'm doing ... or when I'm going to get around to doing it. Ugh. I hate it. I may or may not shop on the Internet today. I may or may not shop on the Internet tomorrow.

What I am doing today is laundry. And a lot of standing in the rain, holding a dog on a leash.