A Dan In Real Life Thanksgiving

I know it’s February, but if you’ll indulge me, I’d like to go back a ways and share our Thanksgiving with you. If you’ve been following me long enough you probably know that one of my all time favorite movies is Dan In Real Life. (Quick interjection: If you’ve never seen this movie, please rectify this oversight in your life immediately. But also know that, I’m not going to feel bad for any spoilers I give below because it came out in 2007.) I supposed we’re all drawn to art in one form or another that reminds us of us. Our personalities, our sense of humor, places we’ve lived, circumstances we’ve been in, or maybe places and circumstances we wish to be in. So the fact that I was living on the east coast when I first saw Dan in Real Life in the theater (remember in the olden days when that was the only way to see a new movie?) and the movie takes place on the east coast makes this movie feel like a warm bowl of soup. Additionally, Dan has 3 daughters, his extended family is hashtag goals and of course he’s one helluva dancer. OK, you get it. I love the movie.

Therefore when my husband’s entire family decided to come to our house for Thanksgiving, in my mind there was only one way to do it. Dan In Real Life style (except for the love triangle part because ew.) Of course the movie doesn’t ever specifically say it’s Thanksgiving–and maybe it’s not even implied other than why are they eating so many pies in New England in the fall if I’m not supposed to think it’s Thanksgiving? Nevertheless, I decided that we were going to mirror our family reunion after this movie so help me Dan. If you’re not familiar with the movie, that’s sad for you and the following references won’t make a lot of sense. For the rest of you, here’s how our Very Dan In Real Life Thanksgiving went down.First, we had 19 people–including us–staying at our house! We briefly worried that it might feel overwhelming, and of course I really wanted everyone to be comfortable. A neighbor even offered us their home for sleeping if we needed it as they would be out of town, but thankfully we were able to stuff everyone in here and it felt cozy and not too crazy. That said, we did have one family in the “special room” which in our case, the workout room, but with a king size mattress on the concrete floor–but like Dan they made the best of it. That is to say with a half-smile and a dead look in their eyes.

Wednesday
Everyone arrived Wednesday afternoon and the cooking commenced. That evening after a when-in-Cincinnati dining experience at Skyline Chili we came home and played a round of salad bowl. If you recall Dan’s family plays this game not once, but twice in the movie! I think most people have their own rules for this game, but this is how we play:
1. Everyone writes down 3-5 names on a little piece of paper. Can be historical figures, entertainers, fictional characters, whatever.
2. Split into two teams. One person from each team gets one minute to try and get their team to guess as many names as possible. In round 1 (meaning when you get through all the names in the bowl) you can use as many words, gestures, actions, etc to get them to guess the name. You just can’t say any of the words on the paper.
3. Round 2, you put all the papers back in and this time you can only use 1 word to try and get people to guess. (The idea being that now everyone is familiar with the names in the bowl, so one word should be enough.)
4. Round 3, you can’t use any words… only actions.
This game is a hit every time and is a great game for kids and adults.
Wednesday evening there was a local restaurant that was clearing the tables and chairs out of their space to have a dance. A free dance for any adults in the community who just want to let off some steam. You guys! Is this my town or what? My husband and I tried to get all the adults in our family to come–no takers. But that didn’t stop us. Bracken and I cut a rug like we were challenging Dan and Ruthie-pig-faced-Draper to a dance off and obviously we won. (No photos tho. Sad.)

ThanksgivingThursday was of course the big day. My husband had the brilliant idea to send our 2 turkeys out to get smoked beforehand so we wouldn’t have to worry about cooking them Thanksgiving morning. Best idea ever as it left us with all the oven space we needed to cook everything else and the smoked turkey was fantastic. Dinner was fantastic. We ate leftovers for days.

That evening was the family talent show. Yes!!! There was a wonderful performance of what I think should be a new play entitled, VSCO-rella (pronounced Visco-rella). (If you’re not up on the latest tween/teen slang make sure to check out this in-depth piece on VSCO girls in O Magazine.) There was a guitar and violin duet, a poem reciting, storytelling, another violin performance and more. No family is perfect, not even Dan’s, but I’m not sure there is a more sure fire way to generate all the cozy, good-feeling vibes of extended family than holding an impromptu family talent show. There are no prizes, lots of smiles and darling, one-night-only performances that you get to witness front and center.

Friday
One family event that was not in DIRL, but was a hit with our family was the Goodwill gift exchange. We took all the cousins to Goodwill where they got to spend 5 dollars on a secret Santa gift for one of their cousins. At first I wasn’t sure if we were trying to find “real” gift, or more jokey gifts, but for the kids they were actually trying to find real gifts they thought their cousins would like. It was actually really sweet. Sure some of the gifts were a little more raggedy than going to the mall, but I feel better about a second-hand gift exchange any day of the week. The adults also had a gift exchange, but ours was definitely meant to be a humorous white elephant gift exchange, aka who can find the most hideous/ridiculous gift possible? We there were several home runs on this front.
We also had a fantastic boys against girls crossword puzzle race and even though the boys won, I was surprised with how much fun that little element was and I was so impressed with my own kids as well as my nieces with just how much they added to this contest with their outside the box thinking. There was quite a bit of game playing in general–both kids and adults–which I love, as I grew up playing games with my grandparents, and other extended family.

The one thing we didn’t do that was on my list, was a family work out on the lawn. It was too wet and squishy for that. We didn’t bowl either, which seems like an obvious oversight now, but we did do that over Christmas break. I was super surprised in fact that we barely left the house, but I think that’s how we know it was a success as well. No one seemed bored, we had enough activity and down time as well. We only had 2.5 days together and we made the most of it. In short, I’d highly recommend your own Dan In Real Life themed gathering for your next family reunion. But remember, you can only plan so much, after that, Thanksgiving break like life, is what you make of it.

“…If we’re really honest with ourselves, most of our plans don’t work out as we’d hoped. So instead of asking our young people, ‘What are your plans? What do you plan to do with your life?’, maybe we should tell them this: Plan… to be surprised.”
                                                                                –Dan in Real Life