I can remember growing up my grandmother would make a big pot of veggie beef soup the Friday following Thanksgiving. She would let it cook, while we went shopping to get Christmas decorations, etc. When we came back, she would make a pan of cornbread. We'd get everything unloaded, including the stored decorations. Then we'd eat. I never ate the cornbread with the soup. I always had my seperate with some butter. Yum. Then we'd get to decorate her house and our house the whole weekend with the Christmas music cranked up. She and I would unpack the ornaments. There were several in there that were my grandfather's when he was a child. She'd pull them out one by one and tell me about them. We'd decorate her house on Friday and then move on to our house on Saturday. We'd eat off the pot of soup for three days! Nobody complained b/c it was good stuff! For dessert, we always had apple pie, buttermilk or pecan pie. Mmm. I miss those days, my grandmother especially.