Another non-traditional Thanksgiving

Ever since my sister and her sister-in-law moved out of the Bay Area, we've found ourselves without family to celebrate Thanksgiving.  Since Thanksgiving has never been a tradition for either Alfie or me, it hasn't been a huge loss, and we've managed to find fun, non-traditional ways to celebrate the holiday with the kids.  This year, with just the five of us, cooking a huge turkey seemed like too much of an effort, so we headed to Boston Market like we usually do when we celebrate Thanksgiving on our own (like I said, it's not a solemn occasion for us!).  Alas, the Boston Market near us had closed down (I guess we missed the closure because last year we spent Thanksgiving in Reno), so we ended up having lunch at Starbucks (the only restaurant we could find that was open on Thanksgiving that didn't require a reservation or hundreds of dollars).  And since the Starbucks was right beside a movie theater, instead of watching a football game, we watched Catching Fire.

If you're starting to feel a bit sorry for us, don't.  We had a wonderful time.  We even had our extravagant feast --we just had it the night before, on Thanksgiving Eve, at a Filipino restaurant that was hosting a benefit dinner for Typhoon Haiyan victims.  Instead of roast turkey, we had roast suckling pig (lechon).  And stuffed chicken.  And pork. And dozens of other amazing Filipino dishes.  What better way to celebrate family, togetherness, and giving than by feasting on foods from my homeland -- and knowing that the proceeds from the dinner were going to benefit the people of my homeland?

Besides, we ended up having turkey on Thanksgiving after all.  It wasn't quite the turkey that most other families were enjoying -- ours was made of ice cream and cake, and we had it for dessert.

I think we're going to make this non-traditional Thanksgiving a tradition!