Thanksgiving is for Blessing. I’ve heard I’m quite liberal with my Gulyas Blessings to everyone, but I would like to explain the origin of Thanksgiving in my own family, based on three tribal lineages, Hungarian and American. 
Thanksgiving is every moment. It is not a declared holiday. It is not governmental. It is not for endorsed shopping. Thanksgiving does not belong more to any ethnicity, group or religion, it is part of them all. Bringing it back home to my own family, Thanksgiving and Blessing is for every day of life. Every moment of life. There is no limit to Blessing, ever. There is no wrong time to give a Blessing. We Bless Everybody and Everything, no limit!
One of my Dear Ukrainian Friends tells me Blessings follow me everywhere, and I tell her the same, as I see the same radiating from her. Blessing liberally is a way of life for the Carpathian Basin Peoples and the Native American Peoples.
So, in this time, some people like the holiday, some people dislike the holiday…but to me, there is no such thing as the holiday and something to like or dislike, it is a symbol for love everyday, it is a symbol to be thankful. Thanksgiving itself is a celebration, and whatever name it is called, under whatever flag is waving, under whatever patch of sky, Blessings and the Blessing-way exists for all. Gratitude and thanks, to everyone and all, all Spirits, all Ancestors. EVERYONE.
A Hand Made life is one that I strive for and live, always. Bringing forward the teachings of the Elders, my own Elders, the Traditions that hold us together, hold life together, that grow abundance. Here is a glimpse of our Thanksgiving with some rough recipes, in many parts. 🙂 I hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving everyday this Blessed Year!
Turkey Blessing
Blessing our Turkey, giving thanks for the Turkey Life and all lives that touched the Turkey Life. The lovely farmer I usually buy a turkey from was not able to raise one for us this year, but I found another one, just in time! Just a few days before, in a Sacred Butchering, I did let go of the Spirits of many chickens, but someone else let go of this turkey’s life. I trust my agile hands and my warm heart and am very careful with the animals I raise or bring home from someone else, as our family will not eat animals that are not raised gently and of appropriate non-processed food diet.
Bone Broth from our Own Chickens
Old Chickens Who Contributed to Our Feast
Here are a some chickens from last Saturday. I cut the backs and feet to make a 3 day long simmered bone broth with scrap veggie skins for basting, braising, gravies. After cooking the broth, I removed the back meat for other dishes. The rest of the chickens have been stored for eating and cooking with another day. Here is the finished bone broth, ready for cooking. A celebration is one in which there is much love cooked and sewn into the gathering. There is no convenience of food when the love is missing.
Home Made Bread Becomes Stuffing
Save the Celery Heart and Replant! Hearts have lots of Love still in them!
Mushroom Stories, Like with Fish, Enough Mushrooms For All!
Making a beautiful stuffing with cut up dried bread. This year, I added celery to it, careful to save the heart so that I may plant it in a pot and get another Blessing Stalk from her. Nothing is wasted. I cut and added red and an orange bell peppers, and two green peppers, three yellow onions, two lbs of oyster mushrooms, and about a half pound of chanterelle mushrooms. It would have been closer to a whole pound of chanterelles, but I ended up sharing mushroom stories with a gentleman on Tuesday, who touched my heart with his mushroom loving heart, and gave away half of what I had to him in random mushroom love. What I found was, my half pound of chanterelle mushrooms flavored the stuffing as if it were a couple pounds of chanterelle mushrooms. These are blessings, stories of the Blessing Way of Life. The chanterelle flavor grew stronger in the finished stuffing, stronger than 2 lbs for my sweet half pound!
Garden Gifts of Sage
Saving All Scraps For Future Soups!
Grass-Fed Butter, for a Pastured Life!!!
Beautiful, Hand-Made Stuffing!
The garden rained Sage Blessings and Pepper Blessings. Dried Cayenne’s I obtained the weeks before. Paprika Love comes both Spicy Hot and Sweet, so I used both. Seasonings and pastured butter, smells very, very good! I saved the peels and ends of everything for future soups and bouillons. The stuffing is beautiful and ready for the precious bird!
An Amazing and Lovely Bird! Deep Gratitude!!!
Our bird is lovely and ready to go. We prepared more foods, and will continue with a second “A Hand Made Hungarian Native American Thanksgiving Part 2”
(c) 2013, Summer Farkas Takács-Michaelson, CH
All pictures and text copyrighted. Please do not use photos without permission!
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