We have family out of town but as long as the Mother, my Mom, of the group still lives here in town, I would imagine everone will still try to come 'home'. My youngest grandaughter turned 1 last week so we will have a party for her. My yougest daughters husband leaves in January for his second tour in Iraq so they will go to his folks for Thanksgiving. That will be a first, that I didn't have both my girls home with me. But we all undserstand why.

Our family dinners have completely changed the last couple of years. My Mom is 82, lots of helath problems. My sister is 60, lots of health problesm and I'm 57 with my health problems. So our kids are now doing the cooking! We still do some and Mom comes in the kitchen to 'supervise'. But it's mainly the kids. And we have a great bunch of son in laws or sons that insist on doing the cleaning up. So we buy the disposable containers so everyone can take stuff home and the guys just do all the cleaning. At Christmas time, this clean up time is when all the married women go into a closed bedroom and fill all the stockings. We make a big deal and do an official ceremony when a woman gets married and they get initiated into the 'Secret societry of the stocking stuffers'. All the grandkids coming up now are the guys, so I guess we will intiate their wives in it. The year my youngest got married she didn't want to do it 'cause her hubbie was in Iraq.