Thanksgiving Eve Eve

Yes, I am that excited.  I love Thanksgiving, it's my favorite holiday, but that's not to say I'm not feeling some serious trepidation.  I'm cooking for Jack's family, who have never celebrated Thanksgiving before, so there's a little pressure to do my family and national traditions justice. (Speaking of which: interesting, no?)  I will have their help, but I really want to hold my own and to be honest, English (British?) people seem to be overqualified at cooking Thanksgiving-type food.  You see, they (my in-laws, in any case) have something called a Sunday Roast, which is a special, weekly meal including roast meat (usually a Chicken), with potatoes, gravy, steamed vegetables and Yorkshire pudding.  It's exactly the kind of production, simple in theory, that causes so much anxiety around Thanksgiving, and they have had every week to perfect it.

So today I went to a French mega-supermarket (somewhere between a Walmart and a Target) when the local produce market didn't have everything on my list.  Two hours later, I emerged compulsively eating a large bar of chocolate, having jettisoned the pecan pie with a heavy heart.  I'm afraid the cranberry sauce isn't happening either because I bought the following to make it: 1) Ocean Spray... juice 2) dried white raisins 3) an orange.  It seemed doable at the time.  So did pumpkin pie with condensed milk (my thinking was along the lines of: if evaporated is opposite condensed... I can just 'opposite' it? Right? -- again, two hours under artificial lights).  However, what is causing me the most stress, without a doubt, is the turkey.  My father-in-law has talked to a man who knows a man who can get us a turkey.  This will be my first Thanksgiving in five years with a real, whole turkey (not to mention the eight vegetarian years before that) and I'm terrified about how intact it might be. We decided to brine it in cider, in any case.  I'm keeping my eyes on the cider phase and the things I'm thankful for.  Deep breaths.  (P.S. If you know where this picture is from, besides the dream kitchen in my head, I would really like to know)