This time last year my Belgian host family celebrated an American Thanksgiving by going to bed at 9pm so that we could be out the door by 3:30am for Black Friday shopping. After that experience I grumbled to myself that my favorite holiday had become too commercialized and that perhaps real traditions were going the way of dinosaurs. Fast forward one year later and I am packing for a 2.5 hours ride to the Netherlands, all the while homesick for just a taste of that Thanksgiving spirit. Perhaps it’s all the emails from work with people wishing me a happy Thanksgiving that’s making me a bit wistful. And perhaps the devilish shopaholic in me is wondering what great sales I’m missing at home!

Most of all, I miss preparing a big dinner (what a delightful excuse for indulging in food). But I can’t really complain too much about food either–see last post. In fact, a few days ago I was gifted these stone crab claws…

which I whipped up into a batch of crab eggrolls, even if the crabs were already delicious on their own:

Anyway, back to packing. It’s cold enough here now for me to test drive this very heavy Paris Byzance cardigan-coat…

but depending on the weather forecast I’ll see if it’s the brown 2.55 bag…

or the red timeless clutch that will accompany me on this trip:

The flash makes the bag look so garish, but you can see it matches much better in real life, even from this terribly fuzzy non-flash photo:

So I’ll be back in a few days with hopefully some great photos from a very desolate place; fingers crossed it won’t rain the entire time.

As you all sit down to dinner tonight and take a few minutes to think about the people who can’t make it home for the holiday because they’re serving their country, I’d like to rekindle the real tradition of treating every day as if it were Thanksgiving Day. Happy turkey feasting and let the sale season begin :D!