I feel certain no one cares but I asked my children their favorite traditions of ours and I told you I would share a few more of our favorite family traditions. So here you go…
Since Thanksgiving is right around the corner, I will go there next. My original blog on traditions was on the Woolly Worm Festival with my mom and the Beasley side of our family.
Thanksgiving, since having children, has been spent in Alma, Georgia. Raise your hand if you have ever heard of it. Exactly, no one but my dear Solomon family knows of this precious town. It is in South Georgia where the ground gets flat and sandy, pine trees and pecan trees are in abundance and blueberry bushes abound. This is where the controversy of “pecan” or “peecan” began!! It is also where the continuing debate happens of whether ketchup or jelly belongs on hush puppies. Anyone that wants to comment below and help solve this long standing debate feel free!
For your useless knowledge…I vote ketchup. My husband votes jelly.
So, back to Thanksgiving. As soon as we can, we load up the van and hit the road for the 8 hour drive. Yes, we drive 8 hours and don’t end up at a beach! Crazy, but we end up at Granny Solomon’s house. Insert touchdown emoji!
Granny Solomon is Bert’s grandmother – his dad’s mom. Evelyn Dorminy Solomon born August 25, 1923 in Coffee County to be exact. She is 96 years old, still lives at home alone and attends church weekly. Matriarch of the family she is! A virtuous woman beyond words. She lives a quiet peaceful life and is a godly woman who rightly handles the word of truth. Her family is strong spiritually because of how she has lived for Christ, prayed for them and been an example worth following. She is strong willed and yet submissive to her heavenly Father. She is quiet and humble and yet has always used her gifts to serve and love others well in her family, church and community.
I have been blessed to have the privilege of being adopted into this family and so well accepted by . Granny. She has never done anything but love me well. That truly goes for the whole Solomon family since Bert introduced me; never have I felt unwanted, unaccepted, or unwelcome!
Do you have in-laws yet? Are there any new additions to your family of any kind?
Do you make them feel like a geniune part of the family? Do you attempt to help alleviate all the emotions caused by adapting to new traditions? Do you consider it may be a sad or awkward change for them at first? I encourage you to work on these relationships. They can be so special and life giving to you as individuals and to the marriages in your extended family.
Hummmm – I think I have digressed yet again. A small tangent I love to talk about! Family relationships, marriage and in-laws! I can say, I don’t have in-laws! I don’t even have 2 loving accepting families but one cohesive family that loves well despite blood lines. See, we are, above and beyond any other title, brothers and sisters in Christ! This is why we treat each other with love and respect and why we love unconditionally!
Do we drive each other crazy sometimes? YEP!
Do we always get it right? NOPE!
Love you two Solomons that might actually read this – LOL! I can’t wait to see you at Thanksgiving in a few days so we can do our normal TRADITIONS yet again in 2019! I truly am grateful and consider being adopted into this family one of my greatest blessings from our Lord! Let the countdown begin. Just 4 more sleeps!!!!
Aren’t you proud? I did remember what I was supposed to be talking about.
The first TRADITION my oldest son mentioned about this trip was climbing the largest Magnolia tree I have ever seen. Well, that is in someones front yard. It is the activity Cole looks forward to all year. He will go out in the morning and climb up as high as he can and perch on a branch sometimes for hours. Many books have been read in this tree; many conversations had and many pictures taken. Lots of hammocks have been hung and naps enjoyed from the lower branches as well. It truly is an adventure and peaceful all at the same time.
The second favorite tradition stated by my littles was going fishing together. We now fish at Granny’s family homestead where she grew up, which we affectionately call the “Old Place”. It is here that we hunt, grow pine trees, take our family pictures and FISH! The littles named this tradition because Cole already took climbing the Magnolia tree and let’s be real…it is a stocked pond!!! They do have to put in some work but not quite like on an open lake where some days you bring home nothing. Our crew typically brings home enough for dinner; which is for around 15 people give or take 2-4. We end the night with loads of fish (fried and baked), cheese grits, homemade hush puppies and all the fixings to go with it. This meal is one I have grown accustomed to since becoming a Solomon. I did not grow up on fried fish; especially that I caught and cleaned myself that very day!
So, one last story that kind of perfectly connects my mess in this article of being new to a family and all that entails plus traditions specifically around Thanksgiving. Bert and I got married in 1997 in September and moved to Atlanta. He was in school and I was working full time. We made the decision that our first holiday would be Thanksgiving with the Solomons and Christmas with my family. We would flip flop the next year so no one ever always missed a certain holiday. Sounds reasonable and good, right??!?
And it was a great plan but this little family girl had NO idea how it would feel not being with her mommy and daddy and all her people that first time. It was great. It was fine and I was happy. Then it was Thanksgiving day! I spoke to my mom and dad and informed them that they didn’t have the Macy’s Day parade on but other than that all was going well. LOL! Obviously, not a big deal but having the parade on was just one of our traditions while finishing all the cooking. Some traditions you don’t even realize you have until you don’t do it.
Then, we loaded up to go to Aunt Laney’s house if I remember correctly (it has been 22 years)!! We pulled in and first thing I noticed was the boiling pot and heaps of newspaper and such in the carport. I, the city girl I have been deamed by my husband, still was clueless. As I entered the house and heard more conversation, I realized we were having a FISH FRY!!! I just listened and tried to stay calm! First off, I had never been to a fish fry in my life. Second, do they not know it is THANKSGIVING?!???!!!?? What have I got myself into? I didn’t at the time eat fried fish and especially with BONES in it! Did you know people actually eat the tails – and like them. Coleslaw, nope don’t like that either. I am pretty sure I had a dozen hushpuppies (with ketchup) which they also thought was nuts and a plate full of cheese grits (YUM)! Nothing like being the new girl and trying not to be rude or let anyone notice you really were not eating your food.
All went well and no one brought it up in front of everyone or called me out. We arrived back home at Granny Solomon’s houses and I politely excused myself to the back bedroom where I could phone my mother. Pretty sure I still had to use the land line at this point; it was only 1997! I said hello and upon hearing her voice tried not to cry. I just really wanted some dressing people. My request was simply that she save me some leftovers cause these people don’t eat turkey, dressing, mashed potatoes and broccoli casserole for their Thanksgiving meal. Problem solved…I would just have mine when I returned home!
Later that evening, the crowd was gathered in the den to chill and spend time together. The conversation turned to the plans for the next day. They began to discuss the meal, different dishes, who was helping with what and all Granny already had prepared in the freezer. The more it went on, I realized we were having an entire traditional Thanksgiving meal like the rest of America, just a day late!!!!!
Then I find out that I had missed the conversation where this was decided. You have to understand PRIORITIES! Little did I know, Granny and her two sisters had been fishing earlier in the week. They had caught a bunch of fish and cleaned them all. Those fish needed to be eaten so they wouldn’t go bad and be wasted. This superceded any day that happened to be Thanksgiving. Why not? Made perfect sense to just switch the days – fry those fish up Thursday and have another huge family meal with all the traditional fixings for Thanksgiving the very next day. No big deal! Unless you don’t know that is what is happening!
We have all laughed about this story for years now. They had no idea I didn’t know what was going on. After knowing the plan it all made perfect sense and I could settle in and officially join the family.
Moral of the story:
Don’t judge til you know all the facts!
Ask your husband ALL the questions in counseling. Like what do you eat on Thanksgiving 🙂
Communicate well…we still might be working on this one.
Be sweet, be accepting, be kind and be aware! It is easy to forget the new person is with you this year and may feel uncomfortable. Are you the aunt that can say a kind word? Can you engage that person in conversation so they don’t feel awkward? Will you be the one to whisper a calming piece of information or a joke to lighten the situation?
If you have someone new joining you this year at one of your holidays, make it as easy as possible.
Have fun next week. Be safe if you have to travel like us! Lastly, I would love if you shared a memory, funny story or favorite Thanksgiving tradition you have with your family.
Don’t forget…I love you 1,000 elephants!!!
Your Rooted and Restless friend,
Tara
THANKSGIVING DINNER
in the carport when you all want to be together and your kids have outgrown the "kid table".
This precious lady is where our traditions and heritage began. I can only pray we can carry on her legacy of love for Jesus Christ, family and others for many generations to come. We arise and call her blessed! Love you Granny!!!! Thanks for loving me.