Are You Ready?

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Kaneohegirlinaz

Wannabe TV Chef
Joined
Aug 2, 2014
Messages
8,259
Location
Central/Northern AZ, gateway to The Grand Canyon
Are you ready for whatever holiday it is that you
celebrate at this time of year?

How much more cooking/baking/shopping/prepping
do you need to do?

I like to have everything planned out
(I've taken ques from Martha Stewart in the organization of everything)
and ready maybe 2 or 3 days prior to our festivities.

Then I can focus on how I'm going to serve the meal;
sit down and relax a bit before the excitement
gets overwhelming.
 
Ready? No.

I have the menu and all the ingredients to make the meal. Not sure when we will make what. My daughters are bringing their contributions to help with the meal.

I have some of my Christmas shopping done. SO wants to make paklava tomorrow and I want to go shopping. The problem is, I make the clarified butter and simple syrup to help her. I guess I'll have to get going early so I can be ready for her and still get my shopping done.
 
I pick up the rib roast tomorrow from the butcher, then pick up a few small things I need. My wife got most of what she needs today. We are having 10 people, some from her family and a couple of friends who would otherwise be alone this year. I hope that a 12 pound roast will do the trick - we might just scrape by. ;)
 
The gifts are all purchased and will get wrapped today. The menu is set and ingredients bought today. Tomorrow will be prepping the food for Thursday and a final cleaning of the house. Our menu will be egg casserole and roller coaster casserole for brunch with a fruit tray and whatever anyone else brings. Dinner will be pulled pork bbq and pizza with salad and whatever goodies folks contribute. I hope to make some dips and cracker jack to snack on. Hope I have enough energy to get through the next few days!
 
I'm mostly ready. I need to pick up salad greens yet, but I'll wait until the last minute for those. I also need to get scallops for one of the appetizers. Those I'll probably get at Whole Foods today because their seafood counter is much better than our local grocer's.

Other than that, I'm ready to rock it. :chef:
 
I just need to put together a lasagna and a couple pies when I get home from work, wrap mom's gifts and pack up the car for the trip top sc tomorrow.
 
Are you ready for whatever holiday it is that you
celebrate at this time of year?

How much more cooking/baking/shopping/prepping
do you need to do?

I like to have everything planned out
(I've taken ques from Martha Stewart in the organization of everything)
and ready maybe 2 or 3 days prior to our festivities.

Then I can focus on how I'm going to serve the meal;
sit down and relax a bit before the excitement
gets overwhelming.

Thanks for asking as i was going to ask this question myself.
I dread this time of year and I am anxious, nervous and grumpy.
I woke up the other morning totally in distress.
I am actually taking deep breaths as i type this post.

Its not about the food or the holiday. Its about the gifts.
My wife is wonderful and does all the shopping for 8 grand children and four daughters. She is the best.
Me not so much.

Her birthday is on the 26th and i still only have a gift certificate to give her. I plan to go back out today. Thankfully she has hinted about a gift. Its what I am going to pick up.
I want to show her how much I appreciate her, but I have a very hard time buying and especially picking out gifts for her.
I have become a Grinch around this time of year and wish I could stop being so negative and get into the Christmas spirit.

I always say next year *******. But it always turns out like this. Me nervous and anxious.
 
Ready? No, but I have until the 28th. We don't celebrate Christmas--no gifts and no decorating. It takes the stress and anxiety out of the season. We stopped "doing" Christmas in 2003. Being childless, of a certain age, and with no family in the area, it just didn't make sense anymore. We're having friends over on the 28th.
 
Ready? No, but I have until the 28th. We don't celebrate Christmas--no gifts and no decorating. It takes the stress and anxiety out of the season. We stopped "doing" Christmas in 2003. Being childless, of a certain age, and with no family in the area, it just didn't make sense anymore. We're having friends over on the 28th.

We too are childless, and our families elected to quit with the regular, rote gift exchanges several years ago. We will still give a gift if it seems that someone NEEDS something (or if we stumble across that "perfect" gift for someone), but not just for the sake of doing it. That has taken 9/10 of the stress out of Christmas for me. We give a nice donation to a couple of local charities in place of exchanging gifts, and it gives me a much more Christmasy feeling inside to help those who really need it.

We are all fairly comfortable, so we were doing gifts out of habit rather than with the spirit that Christmas is supposed to engender. Giving where there is actual need has brought back the Spirit of Christmas to our families.
 
We're the same way. We're doing the family dinner this year (it's our turn), but otherwise no gifts, no tree, no other stuff.

We do still decorate. For me that is part of what makes the holiday special. Getting together with friends and family and sharing the joy of the season. All we have done is ceased the unnecessary exchange of often unwanted gifts.
 
Today, I took a very deep breath and went out to find the last minute gifts for our Dear Friends that we'll visit later.

I shower my Mother with things that she loves to eat all year round, this gives her pleasure, and then this year I did a finale flurry at Thanksgiving this year since we will not be together on Christmas. I took two cases of goodies that I put up for her and a cooler full of frozen foods that I made.

Dearest Husband and I don't necessarily give each other 'things', but we DO THINGS. Travel, go to concerts, have a nice meal out, visit with friends in other States. So I suppose we show our appreciation for each other every day.

food as gifts.jpg

I made this last year for DH and put it in his stocking chock-full of candies.
As kids, Mom had as make gift certificates to give to our Dad for little chores that we could do for him through out the year.
My husband had whined that I don't make his favorite things as often as he would like me to, SOOO!
He can redeem a gift coupon any time he likes, with advance reservations of course.
 
I'm pretty much ready. :) Shopping is done, and gifts for my 6 grandchildren are wrapped and under the tree. I usually only buy for the kids, but sometimes daughters and I will exchange small gifts. This year the grands get homemade blankets, jammies, and a couple of books. Neither one of my daughters want or need any 'toys' for the kids.

We have one of those 'blended' families, so the holiday get togethers won't take place all in one day. Fortunately, everyone gets along and we organize things best as we can for everyone. :)

We're having a big breakfast here at my home on Christmas morning so youngest daughter can attend a later dinner with her dad who's coming in from Arizona, a Mexican feast the day after that for my brother who can't make it on Christmas day, a ham dinner at youngest daughter's home on the 28th so her stepdaughters can be here, and another get together down in Santa Clarita at my oldest daughters around New Years. :ohmy: :LOL:

Sounds confusing, but it works for us. :LOL:
 
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Took Shrek to pick up his present earlier today.

Picture is similar to...my batteries are dead on my camera.
 
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Took Shrek to pick up his present earlier today.

Picture is similar to...my batteries are dead on my camera.

My brother-in-law is a bass player with the Thin Ice Band in Denver (Shrek can Google it if he's interested - they have a web page and a few bits on You Tube). They play clubs all over the state, and he gets invited to sit in with a half dozen other bands too. Pretty busy for a retired real estate broker (although he was working as a professional musician when he and my sister met some 35 years ago). He found that he could make a lot more money in real estate, then retire early and play his music without having to worry about paying bills on what he earned. :)
 
Shrek was upset when we went into the store and there was a "Sold" ticket on it. Very surprised when he found his name on it. He was whinging because I made him leave the house...LOL.

He played (a cheap) bass when he was in the band many years ago and I could see he really liked this one. What's one more stringed instrument?
 
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