As a kid in Cincinnati, Ohio, we would alternate places each year, at that time my family and both sets of grandparents lived in the same city, just a 10 minute drive away from each other.
At my Mom's parents' house, Grandma Haisley always set a beautiful table and it was always lots of fun catching up on what Grandpa's 6 brothers and sisters and their families were up to. I now have Grandma's homemade green Thanksgiving tablecloth and napkins. You could smell the turkey when you were in the driveway. My family isn't a big football family, so we would watch the Thanksgiving Day Parade on TV on Grandma and Grandpa's Zenith. Grandma Haisley always had pumpkin pie with whipped cream and mincemeat pie (I never really developed a taste for that though!)
At my Dad's father's house Aunt Margie was in charge in her fancy dining room. It was much quieter there. My mom helped her a lot though! Instead of parades, we had piano playing. My Dad played the same songs every year and my Grandpa would pull his violin out of the closet and play some tunes too.
When it was our turn to have Thanksgiving at our house, my sister and I helped my Mom. Pumpkin pies can be made the day before as well as the giblet broth that goes into gravy and stuffing. It smelled like Thanksgiving already on Wednesday. We got out all the good dishes, nice tablecloths, the glasses that you have to wash by hand. Everybody would come to our house and spend the day there. Finally it would take a long time to wash all those dishes! After the company left, we changed into our jeans and t-shirts and took the leaves out of the tables and hit the dishes. Before we went to bed, everything was already perfect and my Mom already had the tablecloths in the washing machine.
Friday was shopping day! We sometimes went to downtown Cincinnati with my Mom and Grandma to the big fancy department stores with important names: Pogue's, Shillito's, McAlpins. We usually didn't buy much, but it was fun. Going downtown was something special. The Christmas displays and Santa Claus were already there. Those big local department stores no longer exist and too bad that nobody goes shopping downtown anymore.
Happy Thanksgiving,
Denise