Top Five Must Do's to Keep Your Sanity This Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving. It’s that time of year when families and friends join in food and festivities.

Such joy. Such fun. Such STRESS!!

Want to remove some of the latter from this holiday? I’ve compiled a list of ideas to incorporate into your routine that will, hopefully, reduce the frazzle and increase the fun this Thanksgiving.

1) Make a cooking timeline.

Take the list of items you will be cooking for your feast and do a little research on how long it will take to cook each item. When doing so, please remember prep and resting times. To this, I always add a thirty-minute grace period just to make sure there is no frenzy at the end.

2)   Make dishes ahead of time.

Corn bread, pies and other dishes can be made ahead of time to cut down on workload the day of your big feast.

3)   Preset EVERYTHING!

Set tables, lay out and label serving dishes and utensils, set out stemware and other such items in advance to reduce the stress and scramble right at mealtime.

4)   DELEGATE!

Delegating can aid you in all of the above. If your brother knows he is to bring pies and Cousin Ruthie knows to help set everything out, prep and mealtime will go much more smoothly. I would even go so far as to recommend delegating clean up responsibilities. If family ages five through fourteen know they are responsible for clearing the table and family sixteen through twenty six know they are responsible for dishes while the rest take care of food storage, there will be less standing around and waiting and more socializing and fellowship for everyone to enjoy.

5)   Plan activities and snacks

Family. You gotta love ‘em but sometimes they can be grading on your nerves. Especially when you have a thousand potatoes to peel and you’re trying to walk that fine line between keeping the turkey moist enough not to turn into jerkey but warm enough to avoid salmonella poisoning. As much as they try to understand your workload for the day, all of the football in the world cannot keep everyone happy until the big meal. Kids will still get bored and Aunt Rose will still need to take her pill. A solution? Plan some activities and snacks that everyone can help themselves to throughout the day.

An iced tea, water and lemonade (or cider) station is all you really need to keep everyone happily hydrated throughout the day. Snack ideas include, protein and veggie platters, crackers with spreads, rolls with butter, corn bread muffins, a pickle platter, etc.  Really anything that can keep without too much refreshing. HINT: To keep items chilled, I set them on a plate over a bowl of ice. You can keep checking for coolness, but this trick has worked for me for years.

Plan different activities for different times of the day. Before the meal, set items out in a bin for outdoor games like football, Frisbee, etc. Indoor activities could include, building bricks, board games, large sheets with crosswords, etc.

Let’s face it. Adults take longer to eat than kids. It is for this reason that I always have a separate mealtime retreat for the kiddos where they can enjoy movies, crafts, brainteasers, etc. This keeps them occupied while adults have time to relax and reconnect.

After the meal, I always have some games and activities lined up for everyone to enjoy together. Board games, puzzles, charades or Karaoke are in usual Thanksgiving rotation at our house.

I have reflected on the experiences I have had in entertaining any number of people in my home over the past several holiday seasons and have compiled the above list in hopes to help another host setting out on this holiday venture. Take from it what you like and add to it to make it fit your unique holiday traditions and group of guests. The overarching lesson I have learned, which I hope is reflected in this post, is that a little planning ahead can make all the difference. Happy Thanksgiving!