Tradition

Every Thanksgiving Night for probably more than 20 years now, we have had family come to our home for "Pie Night".

It started with my brothers and sisters and their children and now has grown to our children's spouses and children. It is the most enjoyable night of the holiday season for me. To have the people that I love gathered in our home sharing stories of their lives, seeing the change in the children.

Since it's in our home we are hastily cleaning up thanksgiving dinner and putting the left overs away.

One year a few of us decided pie just wasn't enough and late in the evening I started pulling out leftovers! The favorite was a broccoli casserole that our youngest son always made.

Several years later a favorite cousin of his couldn't make it for Thanksgiving Pie and had mentioned to him how much she missed his casserole. That Christmas he made it again just for her.

He passed from this world at the tender age of 17.

Sometime later I received a letter from his cousin(Debbie) sharing one of her favorite memories of him . It was of course on "Pie Night". He was leaning across the kitchen counter, hands spread wide on either side of him, a huge smile on his face... making sure everyone was getting enough of his casserole.

A Thanksgiving has not come and gone since without "Tay's Broccoli Casserole".