Gobble Gobble 2010

We spent Thanksgiving this year in North Carolina at my brother's house.  We had a really nice visit with my family.  It was even more special since we don't get to see them as often as we'd like.  We drove down from Connecticut the Tuesday before Thanksgiving, and, of course, ended up leaving later than we had planned.  It's about a 10 hour drive and we arrived there around 3 in the morning (I think).  The drive wasn't too bad going down - pretty much missed traffic in the high traffic areas (NY, DC . . . ). 

The next day we got up and hung out with the family.  Pretty uneventful.  At least until about 10-11 o'clock at night.  As some of you know, last spring I was diagnosed with an ulcer and have been on medication off and on since.  I started feeling off around dinner and by the time it was too late to go anywhere but the ER, I was getting worse.  I had terrible pain right under my ribcage and it only worsened as the night went on.  I took some extra medication (after deciding it must be ok) and went to bed.  I slept for about an hour and then woke up with my heart racing.  Once my heart calmed down, the pain worsened and I was up for the rest of the night.  As soon as the clock read 7am, I woke up my Mom and said, "Can we please go to an Urgent Care?"  Andrew, Mom, and Jamie quickly got decent and took me to an Urgent Care up the road.  I was the first one there (thankfully) and when the doctor saw me he said my problem could be one of two things.  Either an ulcer or gallbladder.  He gave me a GI cocktail and said if it was an ulcer, the cocktail would make the pain stop in about 5 minutes.  It didn't.  He then gave me a shot of Tordal and said if it was gallbladder, that would help in about 20 minutes.  Half an hour later and I was on the mend. 

After all of that drama, we went home and tried to enjoy what was left of Thanksgiving.  Andrew and I rested (seeing as how we had been up literally all night), Jamie fried the turkey, and Mom and Dad finished the rest of the cooking.  We had a really yummy dinner (of which I could partake in very little, darn gallbladder!). 

Since Andrew and I would be going to Canada this year for Christmas, we did Christmas with my family after Thanksgiving dinner.  This was the first year we did it this way (normally, we live close enough to just drive home for a weekend and do it then . . . but not anymore!).  It was a bit stressful having essentially a month less than normal to do the shopping and stuff, but it worked out.  We had a nice evening opening gifts and spending time together.  All in all, I'd say it was a very memorable Thanksgiving - even though I'd certainly like to forget parts of it!  

carving the turkey

slicing the bread

waiting to eat

cute puppy!