How we spend our time together on Thanksgiving: Food, cards, football, walks, travel

Here are some Democrat and Chronicle staff memories of the games we played or things we did on Thanksgiving while waiting for food to cook or after dinner.

Or we shared a remembrance of time spent with family or friends on Thanksgiving:

Not as much euchre. Maybe a nap or football.

MIKE MURPHY, reporter:

This much hasn’t changed in the Murphy household.

Thanksgiving was and still is a time for grandparents and parents, sons and daughters, brothers, sisters, brothers- and sisters-in-laws and nieces, nephews and cousins — at least those who are still in easy driving distance — to gather together to eat way too much good food, enjoy way too few drinks, watch one and parts of two other football games, and just plain catch up with each other’s busy lives.

I know exactly when the backyard touch football, family euchre tournaments and the other fun-and-games part of the holiday disappeared. When we started hosting Thanksgiving dinner.

Gone were the mornings watching pregame coverage of the Detroit Lions (again, why are we subjected to them every year?) and whomever they’re playing.

In its place, cleaning; frantic, madcap sweeping of floors, clearing off of tables, vacuuming, dusting, cursing, crying, whining — when does it end? It doesn’t, because invariably a black clump of dog hair larger than the dog that shed it will magically appear from underneath the couch to the direct sightline of the first-arriving guest.

Meanwhile, the turkey is roasting, potatoes and sweet potatoes are being peeled, green beans are being trimmed, and onions are being chopped. Wait, what? I really have to go to Wegmans to get parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme? Do we really need fresh herbs? By the way, who invited Simon and Garfunkel, and won’t we need to keep the two of them separated?

After a stern look and subsequent checking of GPS (grocery produce section), I bring home the herbs.

Phew. Game time.

Football game, that is. We usually get to the third quarter before the table needs to be set, the turkey needs to be carved, and the rest of the meal transferred from hot stove and oven to dining room table. Beer and wine glasses are refilled, again.

Now comes crunch time, or more accurately, the reason why you swear to begin doing crunches again. After our traditional Irish blessing, pass the turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy, corn, green beans, stuffing, rolls — what am I forgetting? Then seconds.

Then naps, with lots of snoring. More football. More guests arrive for dessert. So, more eating. Then more football.

Sure, I’d love to be dealt in on a hand or two of euchre. But I’m going to bed.

Find the out-of-state license plates

KYLE JACQUE, administrative clerk:

My father and I would go around to different people’s houses on Thanksgiving, our relatives (grandmothers, uncles, aunts) all around Rochester and the area, and the game we’d play — because we spent part of the day driving around, is what people play on the freeway — we’d have to pick out-of-state license plates and the one who saw the most by the time we got back to the family house for our own dinner was the winner.

With my brother in the backseat, we’d tally it up. My dad was concentrating on the road, and I’d be, like, I want to win this one. In five years, I won twice.

We lived just on the other side of Corn Hill, the old Third Ward, and we made probably 10 stops every Thanksgiving.

A post-meal walk instead of games, then maybe dominoes

VICTORIA FREILE, reporter:

Holiday weekend traditions have come and gone over the past four decades. In the early years, we trekked to my aunt’s house in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. After a mid-day meal and a thorough cleanup, we played charades.

In more recent years, we have headed to my in-laws’ home in the Catskills, where my husband’s father takes great pride in creating a meal fit for a king. Occasionally, a cutthroat game of dominoes would follow, depending on who made the trip to the farm that particular year.

One staple through the years, however, has been a post-meal walk.

As a child and young adult, a crew of at least 25 would swap designer boots for sneakers and walk through my uncle’s neighborhood, swapping stories as many of us trekked carrying Uncle Al’s hand-painted walking sticks. More recently, we leash the dogs and walk “around the block,” a brisk 2-mile walk past two working dairy farms, an orchard and creek near my father-in-law’s retired farm. My boys scramble to collect colorful leaves and acorns along the route, beg to ride Poppy’s tractor and help pick any produce that remains in the garden.

Italian-American grandma showed us love with kitchen toil and cards

MIKE KILIAN, executive editor D&C and NY state editor for USA TODAY Network:

My Italian-American grandmother Assunta (known to us as "Susie") worked as a seamstress in a clothing mill in Norwich, located northeast of Binghamton. Her true vocation, though, was feeding large numbers of loved ones with heapings of food and love.

The radiators in the house she and my grandfather Mike lived in were the type that would make knocking noises as they revved up. Inevitably before dawn on holiday mornings, I'd awaken to those knocks and then realize I was also hearing my Grandma Susie at work in the kitchen already.

Thanksgiving dinner might not be until 2 p.m, but there she was 8 or 9 hours earlier preparing a feast. Her kitchen was shoebox-sized by the standards of modern-day kitchens, yet she used every available surface space to good advantage in mixing, peeling, basting and preparing a main course and more side dishes than I could ever count.

As a youthful sports fan, I tended to mark Thanksgiving Day time by a.) the arrival of relatives in late morning and b.) the start of the Detroit Lions game at noon hour and c.) dinner around 2 and d.) the start of the Dallas Cowboys game in the second half of the afternoon and 3.) the start of game night somewhere in the second half of the Cowboys game.

By games, I mean cards.

After all the relatives had been served and pies eaten, my grandmother and quite a few of us would sit down at the dining room table and play cards. The card-playing really was secondary, though, to relaxation and chatting and the cracking of nuts sitting in a big bowl. Because I have a nut allergy, I didn't partake in that latter activity, but the sound of cracking nuts is as much a part of my childhood Thanksgiving memories as the laughter during those card games.

I reflect now on how tired my grandmother must have been, some 12-13 hours after getting up.

Yet this quality game time with her children and nieces and grandchildren and others must have served as the exclamation point on the holiday for her. As I age myself, I can see how someone who had given so much for her loved ones saw the benefit of soaking in the company and joy of each of us.

In that way, whatever the cards said, she was truly the winner each game night.

This article originally appeared on Rochester Democrat and Chronicle: Game time: Traditions and memories from Thanksgivings over the years