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Your e-mails: Tales from turkey dayCNN.com readers share their Thanksgiving stories
 RELATEDYOUR E-MAIL ALERTS(CNN) -- Thanksgiving is the time of year when individuals and families celebrate all things great in their lives. It's a time for good food, parades, fun and some serious reflection. And, as CNN.com found out when we asked readers to send in their favorite holiday memories, Thanksgiving also can be a time for some seriously funny family antics. Here's a sampling of those Thanksgiving stories, both funny and sweet, sent in by e-mail. (Some have been edited.) I have 2 really, but the best would have to be ... when I was a child I had a rubber snake. I used to scare my sister and family with it. My father warned me that if he saw the snake again, I was in for it. Fearing that, I got rid of the rubber snake. A couple days later on Thanksgiving Day, at the dinner table in front of the family and visitors, my father went crazy and started yelling at me "Get that damn snake out of here!!!" I had no idea what he was talking about. He pointed at a snake in the window sill. Guess what, it was a real snake and we had a hell of a time getting it out of there. Everyone was screaming and yelling, and running. At the time, I was scared to death my dad was going to kill me, but now I think of it, and It was funny as hell. We had an old cobblestone house from the 1800's with thick walls, and the snake had found its way in. The other would have to be, as a child, the night before Thanksgiving, I was playing with a black rubber ball in the kitchen on the floor. My grandmother was doing the turkey thing, putting it in the oven and so on. While bouncing the ball on the floor, it accidentally went into the oven and rolled towards the back of it. My grandmother did not see it go in. Had she seen it, she would have beaten the tar out of me. I pretended that nothing happened. I planned on getting it out after she went out of the kitchen. Well she stayed in there, and I forgot to get it out. The next morning, the turkey was BLACK from soot. The ball exploded all over the turkey, and the day was ruined! I almost think that was funnier then the first one. Growing up in the '70s in Berks County, Pennsylvania, my three brothers, four cousins and I would busy ourselves playing outside or with a rousing game of hide and seek (favorite hiding spots included closets and under coats -- attic was off-limits) until dinner. No computers, no video games -- handheld or otherwise. Just a classic time that the whole family got together and you wondered whether or not this was your year to graduate from the kids table. Several years ago, my mom had her whole family over for Thanksgiving dinner. There were approximately 30 people in our house. My Grandma insisted on bringing sweet potatoes. Her sweet potatoes used to be wonderful, but in her old age, they really started tasting awful. Nobody wanted to eat them. Well, she brought them in a glass dish and set them on the oven to keep them warm. All of a sudden when we were eating, we heard a loud explosion and sure enough, Grandma's sweet potatoes exploded. The dish had gotten so hot from the oven that it cracked and exploded. There were sweet potatoes everywhere -- floor to ceiling. For years, my mom found remnants of sweet potatoes in our kitchen. Needless to say, we didn't have to eat Grandma's sweet potatoes that year and we haven't had them since. It was 21 years ago, and the first Thanksgiving with my husband. In holiday tradition, he insisted that I use his mother's enamel roaster, the only problem was my first turkey was 24 pounds and only half of it fit in the pan. My husband kept insisting that it would be fine even though half of the bird was hanging out of the small roaster. Needless to say, when the turkey started dripping, the pan, made for about a 12-pound bird, could not handle the juices, and the oven and the turkey was soon on fire! After rushing everyone out of the house, my husband was able to put out the fire and we wrapped the turkey in foil and continued roasting it in the small pan, however I had to take juices off every 30 minutes to keep them from running off again... it took constant attention but it finally got done and was a very good turkey even though it was a little charred. Newly married and living 3,000 miles away from home my husband wanted me to cook Thanksgiving dinner for his buddies that were on base. I bought a turkey from the butcher and asked him how to cook it. He told me the temp and how long for the size of the bird. WHAT he didn't mention was it was fresh and NOT cleaned out. I went to cook it Thanksgiving morning and put my hands in and to my delight it felt stuffed. Oh, great they come stuffed. I had only seen my Mom take a turkey out of the oven. My husband and I left to visit some friends while the 'stuffed turkey' cooked. We went and picked up his friends later and went back to our apartment. OH MY, it was stuffed all right with all its original parts! The smell was so bad we had to move out of our place for a week. We had our first Thanksgiving on the base in Glasgow Montana in 1964. When I was a kid my family would spend thanksgiving with a family in Stockdale, TX, who had been friends of my parents since the '40's. They raised long-haired hogs and taught us to ride them in their pen. Being city kids we thought this was the best ever since we could get REALLY dirty as the pigs would try to rub against the fencing to knock us off their backs. Landing in the mud was fun. Our parents would watch the TX vs. TX A&M football game and then we'd all eat turkey and all the trimmings. Wonderful memories. My worst Thanksgiving disaster was I bought for the first time a bag to put my turkey in and bake it in that, you wash the bird, season the bird and put the butter in, salt and pepper and put it in the bag and leave till ready to eat. I cooked it for 4 hours, or so. I thought it was funny I did not smell that great smell of Turkey cooking, but I figured it was inside the bag so no steam could escape. I went to get everything ready set the table for 20 people opened the oven, no heat. I had forgotten to turn on the stove with all my excitement of the new cooking with a bag. What a disaster. We all went to Denny's restaurant and had turkey. My kids will never let me forget that Thanksgiving. We can laugh now, but than it was not funny. My children all call me Thanksgiving morning and say Mom, Turn on the Stove. When my son Travis was under 5 years of age he always loved turkey and he would tell me every Thanksgiving, "Mom I "weally" like Turkey." One Thanksgiving he said, "Mom do they make Turkey's in Heaven"? This comment was so precious. I remember it everything Thanksgiving. Keep an eye on your kids! Thanksgiving 1992! We were in upstate New York with family for the holiday. My then 1-year-old son Tyler briefly got away from all the Thanksgiving excitement. It was just before the dinner prayer when my aunt said, "Where's Tyler?" We all looked and Tyler started to help himself to a container of kerosene next to a portable kerosene heater. I quickly yelled and rushed at him to avoid any consumption. Unsure if he ingested any, he was rushed to the hospital where several hours later he was released after monitoring and treatment for a small rash to his chest to where the kerosene dripped on him. You better believe I was thankful that day! He is now 14 and is jokingly reminded every year of that incident. Many years ago, the day before Thanksgiving, my uncle told me to shoot a rooster that was leading the hens away from the hen house. I took the gun and the shell and crept out to find this rooster. I shot and feathers went everywhere, but the rooster ran away. So back to the house I went. My uncle was not pleased that I needed a second and eventually a third shot to end the hens running off. The next day the family elders were deciding who was going to shoot the Thanksgiving Day Turkey, a tradition in our farming family. I jumped in and said "I will!" and my Uncle replied "Not a chance!" I guess he wasn't happy he had to spit out buckshot during the meal the night before. 
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