For my 2011 Thanksgiving, I decided to stay in Yalagüina. While I had other options to travel elsewhere and spend it with large groups of people, I opted to not travel and spend a tranquilo Turkey Day with people I know really well. Therefore, I headed out to La Cruz to spend it with Jaquelin and her family, and afterwards to spend the night. I brought all the ingredients necessary to make mashed potatoes and stuffing, plus a can of Ocean Spray cranberry sauce I had bought in a fancy super market. Around 4pm we started boiling potatoes for mashed potatoes on the wood stove. I cut up bread, veggies, and herbs for stuffing, with Geysel and Belen helping me out. When the potatoes were ready, we started making the stuffing, again on the wood stove. I found some dried thyme at a spice store in Esteli and parsley is a regular at the Somoto supermarket, which helped the stuffing turn out great! I sliced the cranberry sauce into 5 parts, and we were ready to eat.
Before we ate, I talked about how the other great tradition on Thanksgiving is giving thanks, so we went around saying what we were thankful for. I expressed my gratitude for how welcoming they have been to me, and Jaquelin and Eddie both thanked me for my friendship. Geysel and Belen didn't know what to say, and at my suggestion, Geysel gave thanks that school had finished.
Then we sat down for their first Thanksgiving. They loved the food, except for Belen who only liked the mashed potatoes. I couldn't have asked for a better Yalagüina Thanksgiving!
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