How did your Thanksgiving meal look like?

Sophie's dinner (from top-left): dried cranberries, chicken nuggets, sautéed green beans, plantain chips, pasta, honey-roasted sweet potato, steamed peas, (repeats), and chicken-turkey sausage

Not like this, I bet... :) I take no credit for it, though- I came up with the idea to serve Sophie's Thanksgiving dinner in ice-cube trays after reading about something similar on one of the mommy blogs I follow. There's much in Thanksgiving foods that Sophie can't have (all that butter, milk, and cream) so I knew I'd have to bring Sophie-friendly foods up with us to Lansing where we spent another gastronomically successful Thanksgiving with Rick and Emilee (more photos here). I wanted to do something festive and fun, but also with variety so Sophie could enjoy a "spread" just like the grown-ups. And so I filled the tray with different things that she loves (pasta, peas, and chicken nuggets) and also some dairy-free versions of Thanksgiving favorites like sweet potato, cranberries, green beans, and turkey. We later refilled it with "dessert" options of banana and apple slices, and chocolate bunny rabbit crackers. Simply ingenious, if I should say so myself... Emilee was so taken with the idea, she asked Rick if he could pack her lunches in ice-trays from now on :)

It does take a little effort to prep the different foods but we're more than happy to do it for our own Thanksgiving meal, so why not for Sophie's? Besides, it was all worth it when we set her personal buffet in front of her- she was so excited to tuck into her meal, picking and choosing the different things she could eat. She never once asked to eat off our plate-- why would she when she had something so fun all to herself?-- and actually sat in her seat for almost the entire hour it took us to eat because she was so pre-occupied with her food.

This was so fun to put together and really such a brilliant idea, we're definitely going to do it again for play dates and maybe Sophie's next birthday party (although probably with just fruit and snacks that don't require cooking).