Redneck Thanksgiving

I had such a relaxing Thanksgiving that I took only one photo the whole weekend.  And actually, I didn't even take the photo.  I merely handed my camera to someone and had them take it.  So for this Thanksgiving post I had to scrounge photos off my friends Facebook pages.  But I figured that since they tagged me in their Thanksgiving photos, it was fair play to grab them for my blog post.

For a long time our Thanksgiving celebrations were basically like the scene from Norman Rockwell's famous painting, minus me sporting a frilly white apron.  Clean white linens, Wedgwood dishes, and expertly folded napkins have slowly vanished from our Thanksgiving repertoire.  I confess it's rather shocking how easily my culinary passions were thrown aside for such an unlikely alternative.

  

These days, Thanksgiving dinner means gathering around plastic folding tables and eating from paper plates printed with fall motifs.  In fact, I don't even remember putting out napkins this year! (I'm suddenly a little alarmed.)

For several Novembers we've traded in the home-front for the beach-front and tried to camp out at the same spot each year in what's become known among our little Quad Squad as "Thanksgiving Point".

To pull this sort of Thanksgiving caper off there's some serious logistics and maneuvering involved.  The first stop is pulling our trucks and trailers into the parking lot near the beach where we air down our tires.  We purposely give ourselves flat tires.  Apparently this gives you more traction.  And traction is definitely what you need to get out of the parking lot and into our campsite.

Now that we've got 10 flat tires we're ready to make a run at "Thanksgiving Point".  This is when you stomp your foot down on your vehicle's accelerator and attempt to tow both the truck and trailer through the sand--all while maintaining a light enough approach to keep the contents inside the trailer's cupboards from flying off the shelves.

The goal is to reach "Thanksgiving Point" in hopes of setting up the perfect camp site right there on the sand.  In years past we've hauled our trailers in to find our little jewel of a campsite either flooded or taken by some other campers who caught wind of our totally secluded campsite, but this year it was all ours!

All four trailers look neatly parked in this photo but it really takes some doing to get everyone parked, leveled, and unpacked.  But once we're in, we're home for the weekend.  You'll know we've successfully set up camp when you here us fire up the generators, gas up the quads, and get our motorcycle gear on.  Miles and miles of dunes await. This is basically what we do for the rest of our stay...we ride...

This year Connor did some smooth talking and got Severin's parents to let him come out with us.  Here's the one picture I mustered up enough ambition to have taken.  I thought a picture of Sev looking ready to roll on a family ride would be a nice touch to send to his family on Thanksgiving...and to help document that their son hadn't broken any bones so far.

And the whole group enjoying a little welcome sunshine.

But for most of the weekend it rained--no make that poured, so we didn't ride as much as we normally do.  But I was content to sit back and read and watch movies all weekend and prepare for a grand Thanksgiving meal.

It was about this time I noticed a peculiar pattern has emerged at our Dunesgiving:  We've been getting more and more lax about our meal preparations.  Everything used to be homemade.  Last year I skipped making fresh rolls and just got the expensive store bought kind to save me some time.  This year I was even more lazy.  I made boxed mashed potatoes and another family served up stove-top stuffing.  A serious decline.  But really, not so bad when I realized how little time I spent this year cooking and how much time I spent reading.

The one tradition I haven't slacked on is my quirky need to bring a little civility to the dunes.  Seriously, when you find yourself setting out your Thanksgiving buffet table on a talegate, there's been a serious decline in your life.

Because I have this fear that Campouts and tailgates might begin to creep into ALL our other holidays I live with a small degree of panic that suddenly you'll find the Skillmans selling the family dinner table in order to buy more camp chairs just in time for Christmas or Easter!  So, in order to keep from crossing that fine line between camping out for one little holiday to living full-time in a trailer and eating EVERY meal on paper plates (can you picture us with mullets?), I have decided that there must be some small gesture at our little Thanksgiving feast that reminds us of the finer things.

This is why I bring my garden shears to the dunes each year.  I grab a motorcycle boot and fill it full of flora and fauna.  Everyone in camp thinks I'm crazy but I believe we're all just a few paper plates and plastic forks away from becoming Wal-Mart greeters.  So as long as I'm camping out on a holiday, there will be a little decorum.

So another Thanksgiving celebrated. This one more relaxing than ever. I hardly cooked, hardly cleaned, hardly rode quads even.  I just sat around all weekend and flipped through InStyle Magazine catching up on, of all things, the latest fashions--all while I was wearing my motorcycle gear (there's a conflict of interest for you).

And while I don't think Norman Rockwell would have based any of his paintings on our little holiday tradition, it sure has become the stuff great memories are made of.