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The holidays can be super stressful. There is so much to do in such a small amount of time from October to January. If you have opted to host Thanksgiving at your home, chances are your proverbial plate is already full but you are now adding cleaning, prepping, shopping, cooking, decorating and so much more to it. The only way to get through this without needing to take a bottle of wine and an apple pie for a good “closet floor cry” is to PLAN AHEAD. Being an event planner, I love a good timeline. I won’t scare you with the intricate details of my step-by-step (at some points, minute-by-minute) timeline but I hope you can get some useful information with this general timeline. More importantly, I want to share some hacks on how you can plan ahead and pre-prep some things to make Thanksgiving Day run smoothly.

Note: This prep timeline is VERY general and assumes you are sticking with the classic menu of:

Turkey

Stuffing

Cranberry Sauce

Mac + Cheese Casserole

Green Bean Casserole

Mashed Potatoes

Gravy

Apple/Pecan Pie

1 Week Before:

• Make and freeze your gravy. There are tons of recipes for turkey gravy that don’t require parts of the turkey. Or, you can also buy giblets, turkey necks and wings at butcher shops so you can still get that extra boost of flavor while making the gravy ahead of time. This way you can just thaw and warm it up, leaving that time for other things on Thanksgiving Day.
• Make pie dough, wrap it tightly with saran or foil and freeze in discs. Two days before Thanksgiving, move it to the fridge to defrost so it is ready to go on Thanksgiving Eve. You can bake your pies the day before and be done with that!
• Take inventory of all your linens, platters, dinnerware, flatware, etc. Wash and polish anything that needs it. Wash and iron tablecloths and/or napkins. Make sure you have enough dinnerware, flatware, napkin rings, etc so you can make a shopping trip now for anything you are short on.
• Go through your menu and grocery shop for all the non-perishable items you will need (canned food, spices, noodles, etc.)

5 Days Before:

• Start thawing the turkey (if it is around 20 pounds). You will need roughly 1 day of thawing for every 4 pounds of turkey you have.

2 Days Before:

• Shop for all the produce you will need.
• Cube bread or bake cornbread for stuffing. Leave it out to stale for a day. If you are serving stuffing as a side, assemble it on Thanksgiving Eve and refrigerate until you are ready to bake it on Thanksgiving Day. If you are doing an in-turkey stuffing, it must be assembled and stuffed into the bird on Thanksgiving Day.
• Prep casseroles. Wrap them tightly with saran or foil and store in the fridge. You will bake these when you take the turkey out of the oven to rest.
• Make the cranberry sauce. Wrap tightly with saran or foil and store in the fridge.
• Take pie dough out the freezer and put in the fridge to thaw.

1 Day Before:

• As mentioned above, bake the pies and assemble the stuffing (if used as a side).
• Take gravy out of the freezer and thaw in the fridge.
• Boil and mash the potatoes. Cover tightly with saran or foil and store in the fridge.

The Night Before:

• Set the table. Doing this the night before helps to take one more thing off your mind. It also is a last minute save for you if there is some way you have forgotten a place setting or don’t have enough flatware.
• This sounds silly but…place all your serving dishes with their utensils where they will need to be on Thanksgiving Day and label them with post it notes. I know this is very OCD but it helps to see where everything will go, make sure there is room for it all and also make sure you have enough serving dishes and utensils for everything.
• Print out recipe cards for any remaining dishes. Put them next to the stove and put the corresponding cans, spices, etc. sitting on top of the recipe cards. This will help you to be sure you have everything you need and don’t need to make a dreaded “one last” trip to the grocery on the day of Thanksgiving.
• Make a timeline of when you will cook/warm up each dish for tomorrow. Make sure you plan accordingly (or stagger times) and have space for what will need to use the oven.

Thanksgiving Day:

• 6-8 hours before meal time:
  • Bake turkey. This depends on how large the turkey is. Roughly 12-15 minutes per pound.
• 2 hours before meal time:
  • Shower and get dressed. No, really. Schedule this in. Schedule it for 3 hours before if you need to. But make sure you have enough time to prep YOURSELF for when your guests arrive.
• 1 hour before meal time:
  • Heat sides and casseroles.
• 30 minutes before meal time:
  • Heat gravy.
  • Remove cranberry sauce from fridge.

A few tidbits:

• DON’T use Thanksgiving as an opportunity to try out a new recipe. Just don’t. You don’t need to invite that kind of stress into your life on this day.
• NEVER turn down help. If someone offers to do something, let them! It will ease your burden.
• Delegate! Have an aunt or friend that loves to bake? Tell them to bring a delicious pie. Everyone loves grandma’s green bean casserole? Let her bring it! You don’t have to do it all yourself.
• It is TOTALLY ok to order items from a catering company or restaurant! In fact, I’m probably going to get some of my stuff from BRQ Restaurant this Thanksgiving. Or, you can get a famous Cajun fried or smoked turkey from Cajun Seafood Express! No shame. No judgement. Whatever works, works!!

Bottom line, don’t stress too much over hosting Thanksgiving. This is supposed to be a day of enjoying the company of your family and friends so don’t let all the other “stuff” take over.  Take help when it is offered and plan ahead so you won’t be in panic mode on the day of Thanksgiving. If all else fails, order takeout!