Happy Thanksgiving! How was everyone’s holiday? I hope it was awesome.

I had lots of veggies! Shocking, right?

So far, so good on the no dairy. I made the one exception I knew I was going to make for my mom’s pumpkin pie. Cause I’m not going to be the one to mess with that recipe. Well, sort of. Other than the part where I was seemingly incapable of actually following the recipe. And used a bunch more sweet stuff than I was supposed to. And then compensated with a ton of extra spices. It actually came out okay in the end. Good thing we all like spiced pumpkin pie.

A very veggie Thanksgiving!

So there were lots of the classic sides – sweet potatoes, stuffing, cranberry sauce, roasted veggies. And then we had some new additions like a vegan potato & swiss chard gratin. I think one of the highlights was actually the cranberry sauce. My mom found this recipe for a port wine cranberry sauce and holy crap was it good. I think it was basically cranberries, 1 cup port wine, a cinnamon stick, some orange peel. Delicious.

In movie news, because I do actually still watch those, I haven’t managed yet to see Cloud Atlas, Lincoln, or Skyfall. But I did make it to Anna Karenina, A Royal Affair, and Wreck-It Ralph.

Anna Karenina is sort of meh. It’s pretty. Some of the story lines are intriguing. But I just had a really hard time getting into it. I didn’t buy the romance between Anna & Vronsky, the politics of the world were vague and confusing where they should have provided a strong backdrop for the story, and I just really couldn’t bring myself to care about what was going on. There are some good moments and some of the other characters are much more interesting than the main story but really, this one just felt overly long and I’m not sure I needed to see it.

A Royal Affair on the other hand I loved. It’s beautifully done, tells a fascinating story about historical figures, and covers a lot of the same subject matter as Anna Karenina in a much more engaging, fulfilled way. Alicia Vikander, who plays Kitty in Anna Karenina, stars in this one and she’s wonderful in both films.

They’re both long movies but Anna Karenina was the only one that actually felt long. A Royal Affair I just want to watch again.

But if you’re not in the mood for period piece costume melodramas, then maybe go see Wreck-It Ralph instead. I loved Wreck-It Ralph even more than I thought I would. It’s really fun with a great story and fantastic characters. It’s also not 2 hours long so there’s that.

I finally watched Brave as well and yeah, I don’t know. It’s super cute and I love the story between the princess and her mom. But it is a little story light and it’s maybe not my favorite Pixar movie ever. But it’s really cute and was perfect for a lazy night on the couch. And I still love Pixar.

So maybe this week I’ll get to Skyfall. I really want to see Skyfall.