Thanksgiving before Thanksgiving

Day 21 of the Blog a Day leads me to party ideas. By no means do I claim this to be an original idea, I must have heard of it somewhere, but a few years ago my desire for more great T-Day food and the need to throw a good party converged into The Annual Thanksgiving Before Thanksgiving party. Let me give you some backstory.

When I was kid growing up, my Mom was a single parent and all of our family lived in Los Angeles and San Bernadino. So every year at the Holidays my Mom and I would drive through Southern California. She later married my step dad and we introduced his family tradition of driving to his Dad's house in La Jolla for Thanksgiving. But by the time my Mom and Dad decided to stop driving for Thanksgiving I was old enough to decide for myself that I wanted to drive to my Cousin's or my Aunt's house in LA. But growing up I never spent time at home with my friends. Thus the Thanksgiving Before Thanksgiving party was born. It allowed me to have a party with friends the Sunday before Thanksgiving Thursday. Something local in town, where everyone young and old could come and eat great food and maybe get drunk. Plus I had a Turkey Deep Fryer I wanted to try out, and you can't cook a big Turkey for 3 people. Well it's been two years since the last party, which was a 3 year tradition before that. The party is back, and this year I am baking a Turkey for the first time. Tonight I am creating my own recipe for Cranberry Relish that I hope turns out. Tomorrow morning the roommates and I are getting breakfast together and then the bird goes in the oven. Chargers vs. Broncos at 1:15pm and people start arriving around 4. Should be fun. Cheers to traditions!