Our cypress has been changing over the last couple of weeks.  It started out yellow, then orange, then darker orange, etc.  It may be naked by this weekend.  This tree changes fast.  The others seem to be a little slower when they are going from yellow to red. 

Rick's aunt requested this trifle for Thanksgiving.  It's fun to make and usually all I have left is a dirty bowl.

Its just a bunch of assorted berries, vanilla pudding, cool whip, and Sara Lee pound cake.  The secret ingredient that kicks it up a notch is the berry wine reduction.  Pick your favorite berry (blueberry in my case), cook some with a sweet white wine and sugar.  Taste to get the sweetness you want.  Cook til it starts to thicken.  Layer it in just like the other ingredients. Yummy!

And we always have to bring Rick's canned green beans.  We didn't have any canned potatoes left so we had to buy some.  You just cook them separately with some bacon/ham.  When they are done mix them with the green beans.  You would never know that they did not cook together.

 Everyone seemed to enjoy the day.  We had 4 family dinner invitations but could only go to one because everyone does it on Thursday.  When we were younger my mom always had hers on Saturday.  That way we could go to other family dinners on Thursday. 

I'm really struggling to get into the Christmas spirit this year.  You can never get everyone together in one place at one time.  This one wants this and that one wants that.  So you end up trying to make everyone happy.  Then you stop and think, what about me?  Do others go through this every year?  Coward that I am, I just shut up and do what's expected.  Unfortunately, I'm really starting to hate this time of year.