Thanksgiving Wishes

I'm looking forward to spending Thanksgiving with family. I just wish we could all be together in one spot, but there's so many of us. Some are out of town or state and it would be difficult for them to make it. But my thoughts are with all my family on this day, and I am thankful for them and love them. I am also looking forward to seeing Brian's family later tomorrow afternoon at his brother's!

My great-niece Michelle invited Brian and me for Thanksgiving dinner this year. She's making the turkey, ham and all the side dishes, and the rest of the family are taking desserts. I decided to make my Incredible Apple Cake. It's a new recipe that I discovered a week ago, and after last year's fiasco of the bad internet fruit salad...and having to go to the grocery store at the last minute on Thanksgiving to buy one of their fruit salads from the deli...I decided to do a trial run on my husband. It was a success! He loved it, and so did I.

I wanted to get the cake baked before Brian got home from work this afternoon so he could have the kitchen ALL TO HIMSELF!! He's baking his famous, delicious, hard-to-resist Monster Cookies for tomorrow afternoon for his side of the family! So I started making the cake around 2:00 p.m. I know you're not supposed to do this, but after I poured the cake batter into the pan, I just had to scrape the bowl clean and lick the spatula!!! Yummy!!!! The cake is now done and cooling in the garage. I don't dare trust my cat Holly Noel! Don't let that sweet innocent face fool you in the photo! She'd be on the counter in a heartbeat sniffing, and probably eating, that cake! I can't say that I'd blame her either! I did experience quite a scare while the cake was baking. I was checking the cake at the magic 35 minute mark to see if it was done and the oven rack went off-track a bit. Right at that very moment Holly strolled into the kitchen and was walking under the oven door which was wide open. She was looking up at the open door and I know what her little feline brain was thinking...she wanted to jump ON the oven door...and I thought: "WHAT DO I DO??? If I let go of the rack, it could fall and the glass pan and cake would go everywhere and probably break my oven door with its weight, or do I grab Holly so she won't have baked paws!!!" I opted for the latter, and the oven rack miraculously stayed in place. I sort of envisioned a car teetering back and forth on the edge of a cliff....whew...did my heart ever skip a beat! Holly is fearless, and I guess from now on I'm going to have to close the pocket door into the kitchen for her safety...and for my heart!