I’m hosting Thanksgiving again this year, if by “hosting” you mean having two people over for dinner. I’ve hosted for the past several years, which I didn’t find terribly stressful, so I thought I would share a little of what I did for first timers. My first Thanksgiving was 7 people, which still isn’t that many, but qualifies me a lot better than serving dinner to two people. One of whom is my mother. An important disclaimer is that I’m single, which means I never got married, which means I never registered, which means there are a whole mess of Thanksgiving related things I had to hunt down because even not-entirely-average single girls like me don’t randomly have carving boards and gravy boats and a whole mess of serving utensils.

My main concern was all the random stuff I wouldn’t think of until I had a pan of gravy on the stove with no receptacle, as well as messing up the timing and having a cold ____ because it came out of the oven an hour early. So I made myself a poster. People teased me, but it helped–even with a minor* issue, things went off quite well.

My categories are dish, ingredients (which to me is things I could potentially not have on hand, so I don’t include butter/flour/oil/staple items), prep (again, special tools I might not have, so “knife” isn’t on there but “roasting pan” is), serving (everything here–this is where you determine you own two serving spoons and need five) and timing (how long does it take/early should you start/temp & time in oven).

With all of this information, it was pretty easy to work backwards from my desired serving time, call my mother in a panic and tell her to bring spoons, email my aunt to ask for a carving board and figure out when to put in the stuffing**.

Also, helpful side note: You are going to screw up the rolls. The timing is impossible to get right unless that is someone’s sole responsibility.

Have you ever hosted Thanksgiving?

*When the stovetop timer went off, my mom helpfully hit “Off” on the oven panel, turning off the timer. And the oven, which is where the turkey was, and I didn’t notice for 20 minutes.

**This is a lie. My family doesn’t like stuffing, so I didn’t make any. We mostly eat mashed potatoes. The rest is just details.

Time for the nitty gritty….

I’ve talked about my annual party before, and I’m making sure me evite is ready to go out the day after Thanksgiving. I feel funny doing it before that, but I have already told people who asked the date.

This will be the fourth year, and its gotten really popular. That means everyone has an opinion and the competition has heated up–people started trash talking in October.

Last years winners caused some serious drama, so this year I’m going all out official on the rules, to prevent another situation like this one:

Beach Cottage. Well-researched, well-executed, and the most contentious thing to ever happen at a party.

So make fun of me all you want, but this party needs some rules. I figured if I’m doing rules go official, so here’s what I have. Please feel free to share feedback. These will be official on Thanksgiving when invitations go out. And make fun of them all you want, I’m happy as long as they are specific enough to prevent drama.

Gingerbread House Party Rules

Children’s Division: 6 pm Judging

Amateur Division: 7 pm Judging

Professional Division: 8 pm Judging

There are two divisions adults can enter their houses under, Amateur and Professional.

Amateur houses use a standard gingerbread house structure and are decorated with standard decorations (those provided to all guests). While amateur houses have some additional decoration, fully decorated boards would be considered entrants into the pro division.

Professional houses are any sort of gingerbread structure (with a limit of xxx crackers?) and may use provided materials as well as entrant supplied. If you are an architect/designer/engineer/cookie ninja this is your division.

This year, there will be two non-entrants serving as division judges. Non-entrants are defined as an individual who is neither entering or closely connected to an entrant (as a significant other, for instance). Division judges will provide the final say for which division a house is judged in.