Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving from Dubai. We're spending another year in another country that doesn't acknowledge this holiday, but oh well. Today my in-laws left. So now it's just the four of us…

It was an exhausting week but at the last minute, Ram and I decided we are going to make Thanksgiving dinner. For the next month I am doing a dairy, nut and berry free trial to benefit Riya. Poor baby's digestive system doesn't seem to be able to breakdown the enzymes right now and it has already helped get rid of some of her splotchy skin. Needless to say, this new diet is not exactly holiday friendly, especially in Dubai where we don't have many specialty food stores. It's amazing how many products have traces of dairy!!! I never knew. But I keep telling myself, this diet will help me lose those last few pregnancy pounds, so it's a win-win.  And I figured, today was as good as time as any to have that first drink. Ahhh it tasted so good. And I found some tobacco free molasses so I could smoke some shish :)

Love me some Belgian Ale!

It was a mad scramble at the grocery store to put together a diet friendly meal. I managed to find rice "milk" so I could make mashed potatoes. And we couldn't find ingredients to make gravy or stuffing from scratch, so we were stuck with the instant options, which actually turned out decent. Of course there was no turkey (we could have ordered one from a restaurant if we wanted to feed 12), so we decided to roast a chicken. It was very easy. The hardest part was the fact that I couldn't make my fav pumpkin cheesecake or pecan pie for Ram.  And since there was no way I could make a dairy free dessert, Ram was stuck picking out an apple pie from the bakery.

All in all I think it turned out well for a last minute meal. Take a look:

My pretty little helper:)

And so we could feel more connected to home, we threw on one of the Friend's Thanksgiving episodes:)

This was the year they did Thanksgiving flashbacks

So much to be thankful for this year, but most of all we are thankful for the light and joy Riya brings in our lives. She still manages to put a smile on my face during her 2am feeds. She's a keeper:)