Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Preparing

planning
{lists}

Thanksgiving is mostly about prep, I think. Okay, it's mostly about family. But it benefits from some serious planning.

Honestly, at this point I can pull together a passable Thanksgiving with a decent grocery list and 5 hours in the kitchen. But I like to enjoy the process. So I pull out my magazines and my notes and start making lists. I make a schedule, for the week long lead up and for the day of. It's more critical this year, because my kitchen has only one, normal sized oven. I know. First world problems.

Currently, I've completed 3 out of 4 of my grocery store trips. I laid in a supply of cheese last week (and notified D that we need to keep each other accountable and not eat the Thanksgiving cheese no matter how good it sounds after a 10 hour work day) and located the elusive Pippin apple, which we require for pie.

And since we're hosting, I'm washing linens and D is building a bench and a table extension (seating solutions for under $20!). It's good. I like the holiday scheming and planning and dreaming.

13 comments:

  1. hey~ I just discovered your blog. and loved it.
    have a Cupcake sweet Thanksgiving!
    http://gonchagoncha.blogspot.com/

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  2. I'm not sure why, but Canadian Thanksgiving isn't never a big-seeming as the American one. (Americans like things big?) But, because of its proximity to Christmas, seeing all the Thanksgiving recipes makes me go batty with planning Christmas dinner.

    To top it off, we're moving at the beginning of December. Which means I only have 25 days to figure out our oven and any other new quirks of our kitchen.

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  3. Hope you share more of your thanksgiving plans, I love all of your lists and google docs with tips for planning theyre the best! Have a lovely Thanksgiving! :)

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  4. Hi Rachel!

    I know you have shared lots of documents and tips lately, but I was wondering if you might share what kind of a template you use for a schedule like this (that is, assuming it's some kind of Word or excel doc and not just informal hand-written notes somehwere!). You seem super organized and on top of things, and I would just love to see *how* you actually go about sheculing something like this. I am perfectly good at making to-do lists (lord knows, it's like my middle name, my entire life is one big notebook of "to do's") but I am bad about taking those tasks and actually *scheduling* them and placing them on a calendar. I feel like scheduling is really an art..a skill...And I am so curious about how you actually create a schedule like this! I know for your wedding you said you worked backwards, but I still have trouble comprehending how you were able to create a concrete schedule going backwards because it seems so overwhelming! Like I would start going backwards, and my starting place would be "get married..." and then how do you work back from that to something like 9 months out from the wedding?! It seems daunting. Obviously a Thanksgiving dinner is a much much much different scale of event to schedule for, but my questions are the same. I think your readers would lovelovelove to see what your Thanksgiving schedule actually looks like, and/or a post on how you go about scheduling since it seems to be something that comes naturally to you, while others are not so good at it...: ) Thank you!!

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  5. ooh. I would love to see the seating solutions that you came up with!

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  6. I think with your creative talent and your abundance of lists youre gonna whip a great Thanksgiving!

    xo
    Caitlin
    http://hauteeyes.com

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  7. I had to make 4 grocery store trips...I'm sure your Thanksgiving preparations will be lovely!

    Have fun!!

    http://www.hipposandhearts.com/

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  8. Prepping is the most fun I think for this Holiday. Speaking of Thanksgiving dinner tables, I just made some Turkey Napkin Holders that will be on my table this Thurs. Check them out! :)

    xo,
    Christina

    www.becauseofmadalene.blogspot.com

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  9. i have had to make some seriously scary faces at joe to impress upon him what will happen if he eats the smoked grafton cheddar before thursday.

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  10. Ooh, I love preparing for the holidays. Making lists, especially festive ones is so much fun - *cough* nerd alert! :)

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  11. I'm a big list maker too! I'm not even hosting and I still had lists prepared for what I'm making/bringing to my parents' house. I love it all too. :) Hope you guys have a lovely one!

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  12. Wish we'd celebrate over here! Hop you'll have a wonderful time! XO Rebecca

    http://raspberry-rouge.com

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  13. @ Fashalina - So sorry I didn't get around to this before the holiday! I will try to get a planning post up soon, although I'm not sure how helpful it will be now that Thanksgiving is over! I just need to pull it together. Thanks for the suggestion!

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