So, I may have been pouting a bit while sitting at my desk at work on Thursday as my Twitter stream, Facebook stream and Google Reader filled up with Thanksgiving posts and food posts and family posts.

I mean, I wouldn’t change October 10, 2010 for the world and I’m so glad I spent that day the way I did.

But I didn’t get a Thanksgiving. And I LOVE Thanksgiving. So seeing and hearing about all my American friends having a fabulous Thanksgiving made me a wee bit jealous.

OK, a lot jealous.

It was around Thursday afternoon when I decided that I can and WOULD have a “Thanksgiving” on this weekend.

Enter Oh She Glows Vegan Thanksgiving Menu

I started cooking around 1:00 this afternoon and we ate around 7:00 PM. Cooking a big meal like that ain’t no joke!

I started by making her fluffy white dinner rolls.

These turned out REALLY good. I am super proud of how well they turned out actually and plan on making them again for my family at Christmas. I highly recommend this recipe – these dinner rolls were GOOD. Even Eric commented on how fluffy and light they were.

I cheated and used real butter and an egg so they weren’t actually Vegan

We also had her high protein garlic mashed potatoes.

I have to say, I have attempted to make creamy mashed potatoes at home many, many times before without success. And these were magnificent! I think the addition of the pureed navy beans to this recipe is what makes them so good. Another recipe I will be replicating at Christmastime! I also used Earth Balance and rice milk to make these so they were completely Vegan!

For a “meat” substitute we had Frank Approved Glazed Walnut Loaf and Gravy + Vegan Gravy

And what would “Thanksgiving” be without some roasted veg!

A delicious little meal for two!

My plate:

I would highly, highly recommend every single one of the recipes I tried from Oh She Glows. They all turned out amazing! I especially recommend the potatoes and dinner roll recipe.

And of course, what would “Thanksgiving” be without wine. And chocolate.

Don’t judge for the Pot of Gold. I was much too pooped to even think about making any kind of pie!

Please note my super red face and messy head of hair!

See? Exhausted I tell ya!

There! Now I don’t feel like I missed out on Thanksgiving 2010!

I hope all my lovely American friends had a wonderful REAL Thanksgiving weekend. Christmas, here we come!

What’s your favourite Thanksgiving or Christmas dish? I really, really love stuffing and buns! I am going to try making a vegetarian stuffing this year. Hope it turns out!

I don’t usually do weekend recaps on my blog but this weekend was so wonderful and FULL of wonderful, fun things that I feel the need to.

You see, I’ve been feeling a little lost lately. All of the amazing things that I was looking forward to in 2010 are now behind me (Europe, graduating university, the marathon etc.)

I keep thinking that I need to look ahead to the next goal, the next “big thing” and then I remember that’s not what I want. I want a Year of No Goals. I want a year where I live and love and laugh and have fun. Where I show up everyday for the little moments.

That’s what this weekend was.

Friday

The evening was spent at a nice restaurant, with two girlfriends eating, drinking wine and having girl talk. We spent four hours chatting about boys, love and life over two lovely bottles of Cabernet Sauvignon and a plethora of appetizers including baked shrimp, crab and spinach dip and the most lovely spinach + goat cheese + pecan salad ever.

I got a tipsy for the first time in months and fell asleep marvelling at the wonderful friends I have in my life.

Saturday

Was spent as a “family day”. It started out with a quick trip to the gym for some strength training and ended with me and Eric cuddled up on the couch eating chips and candy while streaming Timer (good movie, bad ending) from Netflix.

In between we made blueberry waffles with real blueberry syrup.

Played with Webster – look at how LONG this cat is!

And went couch shopping! Sadly, we couldn’t find something that was both in our budget and would fit in our incredibly tiny living room, but it was fun trying out all the different couches.

We did have one shopping success when Eric found new glasses and frames for a very decent price. His old glasses are almost five years old and very beat up so he was in desperate need of new ones. They won’t be ready for another week though!

We then treated ourselves to dinner out (we never go out for dinner) and stopped at Save-on to get some bulk candy ( candy coke bottles anyone?) and chips to enjoy while streaming a movie. Healthy? No. Delicious and fun? YES!

Sunday

Sunday morning I basked in the extra hour of sleep the time change gave me before heading off to a 1.5 hour Hot Moksha Yoga class.

I then rushed home, showered, stuffed a peanut butter and jelly sandwich down my throat and piled up my car with my biking gear to make the 1.5 hour trek to Salmon Arm for a bike ride with my friend Jamie.

Our bike ride started out innocently enough, it was a straight and flat backcountry road and we rode side-by-side catching up on life! The weather was beautiful and it was the perfect fall day for a bike ride.

8.8 miles into our ride we decided we were ready to turn around and shortly after that the weather took a turn for the worse.

We spent the next 8 miles battling pouring rain and huge winds (you can see the storm rolling in below!)

We ended the 17-mile (27.3 km) ride soaking wet and freezing, but still smiling

We then rewarded our efforts with quinoa-veggie burgers + yam fries at a local pub. I really need to be better about taking pictures of my food because that meal was delicious!

I collapsed into bed last night exhausted from the events of my weekend but also FULL of happiness after a great weekend spent with friends and doing things I love.

Bring on the 3-day (for me!) work week!!

How was your weekend?

This weekend was going to the Farmer’s Market, shopping for Halloween costumes, working on freelance articles, drinking too much wine, sitting in a hot tub until the wee hours of the morning and catching up with an old friend.

This weekend was riding bikes to get breakfast and coffee and going for a just-because walk with Eric that ended with us laughing and running for cover when the sky opened up and we got poured rain on!

This weekend was reading my book for hours, sleeping in and eating chocolate.

This weekend was fantastic and for the first time in a long time, I really don’t want this weekend to end.

Also, I just thought I’d share this picture that I stole from my aunt’s Facebook to show you how much snow there is in Fort St. John right now. For new readers, that’s my hometown and where I grew up. It’s in northern British Columbia.

Her family was building a snowman. On October 24. Now that’s just wrong!

Don’t get me wrong, I miss home, and my family a lot but pictures like this make me thankful I don’t live there anymore. I was walking and biking around in capri’s and a light jacket today. That is what the end of October is supposed to be like. The picture above? Is what DECEMBER is for!

So, what was this weekend for you? And what time of year does it tend to snow where you live?