Feet Up On The Dashboard: Plenty To Be Thankful For

We spent this past Thanksgiving with Craig's side of the family. My contribution to the meal was... PIE! My beautiful, wonderful, talented mother is the BEST pie maker in the entire world, so I had her give me some lessons. :) Thanksgiving isn't Thanksgiving without pumpkin pie, so I decided that it would be the focus of my pie-making adventure. My mom came down to our little apartment the weekend before Thanksgiving and helped me practice making pumpkin pie. It turned out beautifully, but perhaps a little too moist due to the struggles of our oven. (Our oven is.... special. It runs much hotter than the temperature says, so whenever I use it, I have to watch the food very carefully lest it become a charred black mess.) I knew I'd have to monitor the next pie a little more closely and maybe change the baking temperature a little bit for the final pie attempt. The pie in the pictures is the one I made all by myself.... From SCRATCH.... with real pureed pumpkin, not the canned stuff. The crust got a little too brown in a couple places, but I thought it turned out pretty good, especially since it was unsupervised. :) I made it the night before Thanksgiving right after I had gotten home from work.... hence the lovely pink scrubs.

The pie was a hit! I was nervous because Eric is the only member of the Allred family besides myself that likes pumpkin pie. They LOVED it! Even Richard, the notoriously picky one, when back for seconds and thirds! (Love you Richard!) Needless to say, I was thrilled. Though I'll probably never be as good at it as my mom, I've become the designated pie maker for the Allred family. Woo!

We really enjoyed the weekend away and spending time with the family. Hope your Thanksgiving was as fun as ours!