Simply Living in the Northwoods: Our First Thanksgiving in Mercer

This was our first Thanksgiving in Mercer. Last fall we left the Northwoods and enjoyed a warm Thanksgiving in LA with Pete's family. This year we happily spent the day at home and started the morning off with a walk in the woods. Since it is deer hunting season we are diligent about dressing the dogs up so they will not be mistaken for a doe.

The dogs all wear orange jackets. Gracie and Maddie wear hot pink headbands around their necks. The girls sort of look like the brightly colored turkeys kids create this time of year. Asher does not wear pink.

Back at home the dogs kept an eye on the goings-on in the kitchen.

Pete was in charge of preparing Thanksgiving dinner. He started working on three different kinds of stuffing: traditional, vegetarian and oyster, while the turkey was brining.

After awhile, Maddie took a break to check out the newspaper. The Journal Sentinel must have weighed twenty pounds; there were over fifty inserts for Black Friday and weekend sales.

Gracie and Asher preferred to stay in the kitchen.

"How can we help?"

Notice the trash can? Asher did.

Asher, like Julia Child, loves butter - sometimes even a butter wrapper, cleverly pilfered from the trash, will do.

The Packers and the Lions game started at 11:30. The dogs had to exchange their blaze orange for green and gold.

"Go Packers!"

For once, there weren't any very scary moments The game ended with a score of 27 - 15 Packers. It was a beautiful day outside. Mr. French decided to celebrate the snow melt by taking a little walk with Pete.