One of the best parts about the holidays is getting to soak up all the comforts of home.

You get to feast on your parents' cooking, catch up on your cable TV (who really pays for cable anymore?), and just all-around lounge. Basically, it's a chance for us 20-somethings to get our yearly dose of pretending, even slightly, that we're still just a kid, and our parents are still there to take care of our every need.

So what happens when the tables turn, and you find yourself hosting them for the holidays? I learned the answer to that last week, when my parents and younger brother came to spend Thanksgiving in my Baltimore apartment.

In short, it's ended up a perfect representation of this awkward age I'm in. I'm mature and have it together enough to host them in the first place without disaster. But along the way, glaring examples of my not-quite-adult state kept popping up (as well as glaring examples of my parents not fully believing the act either).

It started with the preparation days before turkey day. My mom's faith in my grocery shopping abilities was astonishingly low.

She left me a 1-minute, 47-second voice mail (ugh, voice mails) filled with lines such as "I wanted to remind you to get the turkey," "You need to have eggs, milk and butter" and "You can find pie dough in the dairy department of your grocery store." She does know that I've been in a grocery store by myself before, right?

After I somehow managed to not get lost in the aisles of Safeway, it was time to make the apartment parent-friendly. Why yes, Mom and Dad, I vacuum regularly and the kitchen is always this clean! Just don't look in my bedroom, please.

But, jokes aside, it did feel great to have an apartment acceptable enough for my family to hang out in for more than 20 minutes at a time. In college, my parents could barely set foot in my house without them shuddering in disgust and me cowering in embarrassment. Although I can blame all of that on my male roommates, obviously. Plus-one in the adult column for Ellen.

The cooking process also went surprisingly smoothly. I managed to make my first turkey — albeit with lots of parental help — and despite forgetting to add the butter to the pumpkin pie filling, everything was edible. Although it did become apparent that I only had one pot holder and zero dish towels. Minus-one in the adult column there.

For a 23-year-old hosting Thanksgiving, expectations on both sides trend low. So it might not have been the most impressive adult feat, but I certainly ended the day feeling proud of myself. Especially because I knew my parents were proud of me, too. It's rewarding to show the people who have raised you that their efforts have somewhat paid off.

And even though we celebrated at my home, I still got my full serving of being taken care of. My mom brought new casserole dishes, my dad helped me with the last-minute shopping. They both took care of the dishes before I had to leave for work that night. It was the best of both my kid and adult worlds — and a reminder that no matter how independent I feel, it's always comforting to have Mom and Dad by my side to hold me up.

Who knows where we'll spend Thanksgiving next year? Maybe (hopefully) I'll feel a little more like a real adult by then, and will have purchased more potholders.

But for now, I couldn't have asked for a better awkward 20-something Thanksgiving.

Ellen Fishel's column appears regularly in b.