Thursday, November 4, 2010

Planning for Thanksgiving

My planning for Thanksgiving is in full swing. The guest list is finalized. I'm expecting to feed 14. Kyle and I have been discussing our menu choices for a couple of weeks already. I think we have it pretty well narrowed down. One thing that I like about having a ton of people is the need for multiple veggie side dish choices. I suppose I could just make a jumbo sized single veggie, but I like having a little of everything.
Once I know for sure what I intend to make I'll go through my kitchen supplies to make sure I have enough of the right equipment to cook what we want. Thanksgiving morning would be too late to discover all my pots will be in use at the same time and there is no way to cook one of the things on the menu. I'll borrow the right pot if necessary before the big day. I'll also go through my serving dish options and put post it notes on them so I know everything will have a place to be served. I just bought a cute new serving platter at Walmart. For only $10! It's huge! I'm sure my 15-20 pound turkey will fit on it and it is cute!
I'll also pull all of my recipes together to go through for making a shopping list. I definitely want to make sure I have everything I need in advance. Almost all traditional Thanksgiving items will be on sale in the coming weeks. I want to make sure I don't forget to get something and have to pay crazy 7-11 prices on the morning of Thanksgiving. I'm still on the look out for a Turkey deal. So far all I've seen are ads acting like they are offering some awesome price, but they really are not so great. I don't want a $50 turkey.
Every year I try to plot out a table configuration to suit the number of people we'll have. Our dining room is big, I think. It is perfectly adequate for our seat 8 table, which I love. I do regret buying a table with no leaf for extending it though. I hate having separate tables. I want everyone to sit together, but it makes walking around pretty tight.
Is anyone else spending time contemplating their Thanksgiving plan yet?

2 comments:

JessieLeigh said...

You sound very organized! :) I never host Thanksgiving... I tend to be the Easter host. (And, shhh, I don't like Thanksgiving foods much. Nothing "homestyle" or "meat & taters" about me!) I look forward to seeing the cute platter you found! My sister just found a lovely tablecloth at Walmart recently...

Susana said...

You are SO organized with this meal planning Heather! WOW, I am very impressed! No, I have no idea what we are doing for Thanksgiving. We always have the same meal, mainly traditional stuff with a few variations thrown in and sometimes I like to try something new. This year though, my grandmother is in the hospital and is actually moving to a nursing home this coming Tuesday, so we are trying to decide how we are doing dinner this year. It may end up just being our family at our house this year. We'll see. But your dinner plans sound wonderful!