The year was 1996. My parents just moved here from Albany to their home on Coos River. Our home was on the Millicoma River. Both of our homes were flooded Nov. 19. They hadn't even totally moved in.

We were both living in a motel after the flood. They tore out the flooring and their home was on jacks, but my Mom was determined to cook Thanksgiving at their house. She always loved the holidays!

Then on Thanksgiving Day, a storm came through while she was preparing the meal and the turkey was cooking. The house was on jacks and the wind causing the house to blow around and then the power went out. After several hours we decided to go to the Red Lion. It was depressing as it was the first time ever having to go out for Thanksgiving. To make matters worse, their roof was leaking and they had several buckets to catch the water.

We laughed about it years later, but at the time it was a pretty depressing.

The fall of 1974 found Craig and me living in the University of Missouri, married student housing complex that we lovingly labeled the "gerbil cages." The apartments were compactly stacked in 20 units of 16, descending the hilly acreage adjacent to campus. Married just three years, we brazenly decided to honor the holiday, and really ourselves, by inviting his parents to our cozy habitat for Thanksgiving.

We arrogantly believed ourselves to be tackling the adult traditions and responsibilities by offering to host dinner for his folks who would travel from Iowa. They offered a nice restaurant dinner, but no, we convinced ourselves that we could manage the shopping, preparing, baking, roasting, cooking, serving and entertaining required to put on a full holiday spread.

I so much wanted my in-laws to believe that Craig had gotten a good deal when he married me.

In retrospect, I should have just agreed with them that he had gotten an inept, lazy, ditzle of a girl who didn't even desire to iron his jeans, pack his lunches, primp before he came home each day, or hand wash his wool sweaters.

With full-blooming optimism, we diligently gathered the necessary ingredients, pans, and recipes for the turkey dinner of our dreams to be prepared in our miniature kitchen equipped with a half-sized oven, cramped 3-burner cook top, unspacious under-counter refrigerator, and cabinets as broad as half my wingspan. It may not have been large, but it was small!

Because the oven was amazingly tiny, I wisely baked pecan and pumpkin pies the night before the Fords' scheduled arrival. Craig cleverly thought to store them in the car parked in our designated spot a block down the hill, presumably to punish us for daring to afford college and a Volkswagen, because the unspacious refrigerator couldn't accommodate butter, celery, cranberries, whipping cream, eggs, milk, plus pies. The turkey nested in a Styrofoam cooler placed outside our apartment window. I worried needlessly about thieves, bears, and raccoons and now wonder why we didn't stick the old girl in the car to keep the pies company.

Morning dawned brilliant with scant, but fun, snow flurries. We got down to business preparing the dressing and stuffing our 13-pounder. Craig read about the new rage in turkey preparation: baking them in a paper bag. He intended to impress his folks with this innovative technique. By 9 o'clock Craig was sliding the basted, stuffed turkey, into a paper bag into the teeny oven. I cooked the neck and giblets to get a start on gravy. We were feeling the success!

By 9:15, flames shot through my burners suggesting that something might be on fire! Opening the oven door confirmed that trauma with a whoosh. Smart or not, Craig grabbed the flaming girl while I flung open the front door.

Turkey-girl survived the shocking plunge into the 4 inches of snow that had surprisingly accumulated while were busy with our bird. Sad to say Craig's forearm hair did not survive so well. Dismayed with our blackened project, we retrieved her to the living room (kitchen too small), smeared the bag's ashes off her tepid skin, and concluded that she could be saved. With turkey-girl back in the oven, we gloated about overcoming disaster. The folks' pride would be our reward. But Iowa's blizzard conditions convinced the folks that they should stay safely home.

We were determined to recover the day. Craig went door to door searching for others spending the day without family. He finally located a couple we knew by sight, mostly because we had watched her growing belly all fall and she had recently birthed a new baby. They knocked promptly at 1 p.m. according to our invitation with their lovely black-haired baby girl. He told us they were from Iraq. He studied medicine. She spoke no English.

We smiled and gestured our way through dinner with polite nods and appropriate groans of approval for the moist, flavorful stuffing, tangy cranberries, and marshmallow strewn sweet potatoes. I noticed the wife poking skeptically at the giblet chunks in the gravy and speaking urgently to her husband. He politely asked, "What is in the gravy?" Gee, how do I explain turkey guts to a new friend? I did my best until he relaxed and clarified, "No pork?" I may not be fast, but I am slow ‹ it took a moment to reckon that he was asking about pork for religious reasons. I quickly reassured him, "No. No pork in the gravy." Smile. No problem. No pork. Then with gulping clarity I realized that we had crumbled a cup of sausage in the dressing. I prayed my eyes did not bug out when Craig nudged my foot.

Among all of my many Thanksgiving blessings, I was especially thankful that she didn't ask about the dressing.

The year 1987 found us living in Florida and my in-laws were coming down from Connecticut for the holidays. I wanted everything to be perfect for their first visit. The large turkey was defrosted and ready to roast. The side dishes were ready to cook. When they arrived early that Thursday morning, they surprised us with an early Christmas gift - a microwave.

My mother-in-law suggested we use that instead of running the oven since it was a typically hot Florida day. So, into the microwave went the turkey. We followed the directions and set it for the suggested two hours.

After that, we all took a ride to show my in-laws beautiful Daytona Beach.

We arrived home an hour and a half later, hungry and ready to get everything else ready. The turkey was turning around and around, but it was still WHITE! Unfortunately, although the light was on and it appeared to be working, somehow we had bypassed the heat cycle and only had the timer on! What a disappointment.

But I took the turkey out, cut it in half, and put it into the regular oven at 450 degrees.

Dinner was later than planned that year, but it all worked out OK. And we have laughed over our very special turkey for many years.

It was 1997 and my first thanksgiving to cook for the family. Mom and Dad decided to go the Aunt Debbie's in Seattle for Thanksgiving. Big mistake! We decided to cook at their house anyway, even though we were both married and had homes of our own.

Why break tradition?

After all they deserted us right?

My sister and I thought we had it under control. First of all we put the turkey in the oven. About an hour and a half later the power went out as it was storming outside ‹ just enough time to get it nice and warm and let the e-coli start festering. We warned them not to be late, but my brother-in-law and my husband went elk hunting that morning and had not returned yet. We could have used the camp trailer to throw the turkey in the oven, but of course it was locked and Mom and Dad took the key! What for?

The power did come on just in time for sis and me to really make a mess in Mom's spotless kitchen. We had a problem with the beaters and a few other things. She's a bit of a neat freak. Well of course everything was cooked.

After a few phone calls to Mom for several different recipe tips, (she sounded nervous ) there was enough food for ALL the immediate family, their friends and their families, too. No husbands yet. Where were they?

Well, they were hungry and decided to stop at Wendy's for a bite to eat before coming to Mom and Dad's ‹ when they got there they weren't hungry! So Holly ( sister) and I proceeded to eat and eat and eat. Then clean and clean and clean.

The next day we got up nice and early left the guys at home and went out to get the great day after sales. Boy I feel sorry for anyone that day who was joining the two of us. We had a bit of an explosive flatulence problem from the day before. It was not good after fumigating out half the stores in Coos County. We went back to Mom's to make sure everything was just so ‹ did I mention Mom is a bit of a neat freak? We had left two pumpkin pies we had made on her kitchen counter. (Nobody ate them. We don't even like pumpkin

pie.) Well Mom and Dad's cat sure did. We opened the front door and immediately started blaming one another for the stench that was permeating the air. As we entered the kitchen it started to be to become quite clear the cats had tried out the pumpkin pie. There were cat footprints everywhere made of pumpkin pie. Oh, but where was the smell coming from?

Apparently it didn't agree with one of the cats and it had an explosion on Mom's brand new white comforter! We gave her a call in Seattle to ask what to do. Not a good idea! So we attempted to clean the bedding and proceeded with the dry heaving. How could such a small creature make that much poo?

Mom and Dad haven't been out of town on Thanksgiving since and this year the feast will be at my sisters ‹ we will see !