Gingerbread turkey

On Thanksgiving morning we had the kids put together the gingerbread turkey kit Grandma got. Unleashing six small children seemed like a bad idea, so I tried to stagger their entry, but we ended up with six (well, five) small children working together anyway.

Here's Auntie Emily admiring their handy work; she was a pro at wielding the icing bag as well.

Zoë was rather protective of the candy bowls

She understood the concept of putting candy on the turkey, however. Poor Maren did not and was quite upset when she was removed from the situation due to scarfing too much candy.

Things ended up going a lot smoother than I expected. In fact, when Rachel and Miriam stepped in, I was able to turn things completely over to them (aside from a few desperate calls of, "Make sure you hold the end of the bag closed!" from me).

Here's Uncle Morgan keeping Maren a safe distance from the candy:

They had a lot of fun putting it together and it looked beautiful as the kid-table centrepiece!

When he learned we were having turkey for dinner, poor Gavin desperately wanted to take a bite of the gingerbread turkey. But he understood the notion of healthy food versus dessert food and agreed to eat some good dinner. When it was time for pie, however, he kept begging for turkey instead.

We didn't let the kids break it apart until the next morning. Everyone was happy about digging in except for Zoë who cried and screamed about how Rachel "bipped" the turkey (I believe she was going for the word "rip") and kept begging us to put the turkey back together (which was quite impossible on account of it was half eaten by then).

My mom used to always paraphrase a quote John Lydgate (or Abraham Lincoln paraphrasing John Lydgate) to us when we were children:

"You can please some of the people all of the time, you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time."

Now I know why she used to say this all the time! It's especially applicable to the five-and-under crowd (whether they're decorating turkeys or not). I mean, I can please one two-year-old most of the time but, try to please two two-year-olds (and a three-year-old and a five-year-old and so on and so on) and everything just kind of falls apart.

If I remember correctly, my mom would usually misquote it as, "You can please some of the people some of the time, but you can't please all of the people all of the time."

I think pleasing some of the people some of the time is a much more attainable goal than pleasing some people all the time or all people some of the time, especially as a mother.

If only half the children are crying at any given time, I'm winning. Right?

Mom's my name.

Mediocrity's my game.