Happy Thanksgiving?

Yes the holidays are great, I love them. I especially enjoyed them when we used to celebrate them at my in-laws or my parents house or another relative’s house. But when you are having the holiday at your own home, the work involved never ends. Lets just think about it. If you are invited out or go to a restaurant you can wake up that morning, take a leisurely shower, have a nice breakfast, get dressed, pick up a nice dessert and get in the car and go.

Now, if you have invited guests or even just your immediate family, you have a lot more to do. Days ahead of time you have to thoroughly clean your house, if only because once the holiday approaches you have too many other things to focus on. Seven to ten days before the holiday you have to plan your menu, gather your recipes, start shopping for food items and ingredients. Three days before you have to buy last minute, fresh food items such as fruits and vegetables. And, two days before the holiday you can start to cook a couple of things, like stuffing or pies, that can be reheated the day of the dinner because you don’t have two ovens and eight burners on your stove to make it all fresh. You should take advantage of every shortcut possible if you want to enjoy the day and not spend it all in the kitchen.

The day of the holiday, you have to get up extra early, depending on the size of the turkey, while everyone else is still snoring. You wash the turkey and stuff it and get it into the oven. That’s a lot harder than it sounds! You do some last minute straightening up. You can set the table and clean some vegetables you plan to cook later for maybe a green bean casserole. Peel Potatoes! If you think anyone is going to help you forget it, it’s their day off. Once you have the ball rolling, you can go take a shower and get done in time to make breakfast for everyone. Do the breakfast dishes and get back to your dinner items. It’s only 10:30 am and you are already exhausted. Don’t forget to chill the wine, you're going to need it later.

Now try to time it so that all the food gets to the table at the same time and still hot. Thank God the turkey has to sit out a while before it’s carved. Hurry up and rotate all the vegetable and potato dishes in and out of the oven while you try to make the gravy. Unfortunately, if your husband is carving challenged, you will also have to carve the turkey. Finally, it’s all out on the table and everyone is ready to dig in. I don’t know about you, but I am already full from the smell of it all. But, I will have a small plate, just so I can take a break before all the dirty dishes pile up in the sink and all the leftovers have to be wrapped. By the time I get done with all that, it’s time for coffee and dessert. Out come the pies, dishes, coffee cups…………..

You know what? I’m exhausted just writing about it. Where the hell did I put the phonebook? Maybe it’s not too late to make reservations at a restaurant? Next year will somebody PLEASE invite us over for Thanksgiving?