Pre-Thanksgiving Thanksgiving Dinner

The first year that the Husband and I were dating, we had only been seeing each other for a couple months when Thanksgiving came around. Because I wasn't sure whether we would spend the holidays together, I completely avoided the potentially awkward conversation by making plans to spend Thanksgiving weekend with a girlfriend in San Francisco. The weekend before I was headed to SF, the Husband suprised me with dinner at his house so that we could still have Thanksgiving together. A couple friends joined us for the full traditional meal of turkey, stuffing and potatoes all made by my then-boyfriend. It was wonderful and probably answers any questions about how he became my husband. What a catch, right?!

The next year, it was obvious that we would be spending the holidays together (I was pregnant at this point) but we decided to do another pre-Thanksgiving dinner to celebrate with the same friends and added another couple to the mix. By this year, it's become an annual tradition. We have just a few friends over for a pre-Thanksgiving Thanksgiving dinner with all the fixings. It's a great way to celebrate with friends since we spend the actual holiday with family. This year turned out great. The husband still takes this meal on mostly by himself. I pitch in by cleaning and setting up for guests.

Here's our table ready to sit down and grub on some delicious food (my camera was accidentally on the wrong setting so sorry for the horrendous blurry picture). I used leftover mason jars with tealights from our reception to decorate the table. I also had twine leftover from several wedding projects and used it to tie around the napkins. It was a simple way to dress up the table with things we already had around the house. I love the bunch of roses as the centerpiece. Not something you typically find this time of year but these came straight from some late-blooming rose bushes in our garden. It was a great night and definitely made me feel very thankful.