The amount of times people that have asked me if I celebrated Thanksgiving back home, is surprisingly high. I always thought it was a very American holiday. When I asked someone about this they told me I was right.

They told me that, interestingly enough, Thanksgiving originated as a harvest festival, and it didn’t become a national holiday until the Civil War. President Abraham Lincoln made it into a national holiday, because the country felt the need for having one day where everyone would stop fighting and be kind to one another again.

So, seeing as it is indeed a holiday only celebrated in America (and Canada), I have never been part of it before. Basically, all I knew about it was that people cut a turkey!

I got very excited when my friend, Mariah Walker, invited me over to her place in Steamboat to celebrate Thanksgiving with her family. Another friend of mine, Kelsey O’Neill from the United Kingdom, also came along.

Before we left, Kelsey and I spoke about what we expected. It turned out we didn’t really know anything else apart from the turkey. We were even wondering if the dinner would start during the day, or more during the afternoon.

It turned out dinner was not until the evening. I really liked the atmosphere surrounding the day itself. We got up in the morning, and it was snowing a lot outside. This meant that we had a good excuse to have a lazy and cozy day. Most of it was spent in our pj’s, playing games and eating a small breakfast in the morning. When it was time to get ready everyone got dressed up, and it honestly felt like it was Christmas. I loved it! Especially the snow outside made it look and feel like it was December for me, and the idea of dressing up for a big meal only made that idea stronger.

We left the house around four, driving over to one of Mariah’s aunts. When we got there we were first introduced to all the family members, who were all very welcoming. Once everyone got there we were with about twenty people, from her 96 year-old grandfather to a three year-old cousin.

The people were lovely and very welcoming. They were very interested in my and Kelsey’s background, but weren’t unfamiliar to foreigners in their house. A few years prior they had had two Swedish exchange students partaking in their Thanksgiving.

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I really liked to see how every family member had taken part in the cooking somehow, as everyone had a small dish with them that they had cooked for the night. The turkey was about done when we got there, and while Kelsey and I were meeting everyone they started cutting it. Someone asked me if I had ever seen a turkey like that before in real life, and I realized that I actually hadn’t. I had seen live turkeys, and I had seen the traditional cooked turkey on tv and in movies, but I had never actually seen a big cooked turkey like that in person. It was pretty funny to realize that.

Once the turkey was cut and all the dishes were ready to go, everyone got together and we first said our thanks to God for the food and the family. They also mentioned some people that had passed away that they were missing this year. Although I am not religious myself, I think it is a nice habit to take a moment to be thankful for the good things in your life.

The dinner itself was lovely. We all sat at a big table and everyone was swapping stories from prior Thanksgivings. It was very nice to be part of this American tradition, and I am very thankful for the opportunity!