My Thanksgiving Checklist - Prepping for the Holiday

 

 No-Complaining November!

Write down a gratitude instead.

 

Day (or week) Before Thanksgiving

• Get my outfit ready, including jewelry 
• Wipe down table and chairs
• Dust main areas
• Vacuum main areas
• Mop if you must
• Wipe down windowsills
• Deep clean the bathrooms
• Sweep porch, door, and clean porch light
• Deep clean litter boxes
• Set the main dining table with china, glasses, and silverware
• Set out the dessert dishes, napkins, and beverage glasses
• Set out cooking pots and presentation dishes the night before (place a post it in the presentation dish with what will be in it so that people can help you when it’s time)
• Set up child’s table or dessert table
• Make ice; chill water and other beverages in fridge
• Take butter from freezer and put into fridge
• Get out hotplates to keep the dinner warm tomorrow
• Check cooking times for size of turkey.  Decide what time you will eat, and when cooking will begin.

 

Morning of Thanksgiving

• Preheat oven 350 (start turkey by 8:30 for full turkey; 9:30 for a breast – if using a bag for the turkey, remember to put flour in it)
• Make beds
• Swish and swipe bathrooms
• New hand towels
• Litter box
• Turn on electric candles and lights
• Get dressed to shoes; apron
• Use butter slicer to make pats
• Peel potatoes and put them in water
• Cut up onion and celery for stuffing
• Cider into crockpot on low
• Fresh towels in kitchen
• Refresh hair and make-up

Food Item	Cookware	Presentation
Turkey	Shallow pan	Platter
Stuffing	Make it in the “popcorn” pot	Covered dish
Mashed potatoes (Yukon Gold)	Make in large stainless steel pot	Covered dish
Gravy	Small pot	Gravy boat
Corn	Corningware	Yellow dish
Green beans	Corningware	Yellow dish
Cranberry sauce		Dish
Rolls	Oven tray	Basket
Pumpkin nut bread		Mom’s platter
Pumpkin Pie
Whipped Cream

And if you want something to listen to while you work, here is Louisa May Alcott's story An Old-Fashioned Thanksgiving.

 

May God bless you as you return Thanks to Him and Giving to others!

 

The first Thanksgiving Proclamation

The following is the first Thanksgiving Proclamation made by Governor William Bradford in 1623, three years after the Pilgrims settled at Plymouth in Massachusetts. (Which, by the way, they did not name. It was on their map, which was made by Capt. John Smith of Jamestown and sold in England.  My 1888 book Pilgrims and Puritans by N. Moore on page 45 says, “Prince Charles had called this part of the shore Plymouth. The Pilgrims did not change the name.”  It shows a map with Plymouth Bay, and “Patuxet or New Plimoth” on land. This was one of the most interesting books I’ve read about the Pilgrims – it has many quotes from first-hand hand-written manuscripts.)

 

“To all ye Pilgrims:

Inasmuch as the great Father has given us this year an abundant harvest of Indian corn, wheat, peas, beans, squashes, and garden vegetables, and has made the forests to abound with game and the sea with fish and clams, and inasmuch as He has protected us from the ravages of the savages, has spared us from pestilence and disease, has granted us freedom to worship God according to the dictates of our own conscience; so I, your magistrate, do proclaim that all ye Pilgrims, with your wives and ye little ones, do gather at ye meeting house, on ye hill, between the hours of 9 and 12 in the day time, on Thursday, November 29th, of the year of our Lord one thousand six hundred and twenty three and the third year since ye Pilgrims landed on ye Pilgrim Rock, there to listen to ye pastor and render thanksgiving to ye Almighty God for all His blessings. ~ William Bradford, Ye Governor of Ye Colony.”

 

I encourage you to print out the above proclamation, and also to watch with your family A Charlie Brown This is America, The Mayflower Voyagers special, which is in the public domain and can be viewed in full at Archive.org or by clicking the link above. 

One other thing that we do, right before we pray for the meal, is read Psalm 100.  We have a large KJV Bible from the 1800s on a podium in our dining room, so this is what we read from:

(A Psalm of praise.) 1. Make a joyful noise unto the LORD, all ye lands.

2 Serve the LORD with gladness: come before his presence with singing.

3 Know ye that the LORD he is God: it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.

4 Enter into his gates with thanksgiving, and into his courts with praise: be thankful unto him, and bless his name.

5 For the LORD is good; his mercy is everlasting; and his truth endureth to all generations.

Have a Joyful Thanksgiving!  Don't get overwhelmed, just do a little each day.

Love,

Janine 

 

For pictures of my house, decorated for Thanksgiving from last year, click here.