How I Plan My Thanksgiving Dinner

I'm making Thanksgiving dinner for the 5th time now! I did all my shopping this afternoon. Although I am only cooking for 6, I purchased enough food to feed a small army! I hate the idea of people being hungry! No one should ever be hungry! Okay onto happier thoughts...

All of these recipes, which are underlined, can be found on allrecipes.com, or by clicking on the links. Here is the order in which I've decided to make things this year. Each line item list the name of the dish, the total time in minutes it will take to prep and cook the dish and specifics on cooking times and temps. I plan on dinner being served at around 4:30 p.m.

I'll be sure to let you all know how it turns out! Happy gobble gobble and remember to be thankful for your turkey!!!

Wednesday

Make-Ahead Mashed potatoes: 60 total: boil for 20 -30 minutes

Super Sausage Stuffed Mushroom: 40 total: bake for 20 minutes after cooking sausage crumbles

Baked Brie in Pastry Puff: 25 total: bake at 350 for 20 minutes don’t forget the almonds

Cranberry Sauce: 15 total: Boil 10 minutes

Design and Print out menu - I like to let my guests know what is being served. Plus it just makes it a bit fancier! 

               

Thursday

Noon:   Perfect Turkey: 4:30 total: bake at 350 for 3 ½ to 4 hours. Let sit for 20 minutes before carving

2:00        Warm up mushroom caps and brie and serve as appetizers

3:00        Homemade Mac N Cheese: 50 total: bake at 350 for 30 minutes

3:20        Candied Sweet Potatoes: 45 total: boil for 15 minutes then bake at 400 for 15 minutes

3:35        Golden Green Bean Casserole: 40 total: bake at 350 for 25 minutes. Add onions and bake for 5 more minutes

3:45        Honey Glazed Carrots: 30 total: boil 10 – 12 minutes

Last 30 minutes:

4:00        Warm up and butter mashed potatoes

4:10        SpecialTurkey Gravy: 25 total: simmer for 15 minutes

4:20        Biscuits: bake at 400 for 10 minutes

4:30        Carve turkey

4:30        Serve cranberry sauce 

Fixin My Ombre

If you don't know this by now you probably should... I am madly deeply in love with... Halloween. In fact for two years in a row now I have cheated on my boyfriend with Halloween. The hours and hours that I pour into planning and executing costumes borders on "perhaps I should seek help". This year I was Iron Man (err... woman?). More on how I made my costume later. This post is about the torture my hair endured during my transformation.

I decided very last minute that my hair needed to be red. Looking back now I realize the inaccuracy of this decision  After all, Tony Spark has black hair. Regardless I purchased a can of what was supposed to be TEMPORARY hair color. BUYER BEWARE! Here is the product I purchased in red:

I sprayed it through my hair only to discover the next morning that it was not rinsing out! My hair was now an awful color with blotches of red and orange and pink. Yep it looked this bad:

At first I thought a clarifying shampoo would remove it. Nope! It just made my hair extra dry. After nearly a week I felt desperate. Although I did not want to have to bleach and dye my hair I didn't know what else to do. So, with a brave face I trotted off to CVS since the beauty store was closed. I purchased Splat's Bleach Kit.

Following the directions in the box I bleached the blonde part of my ombre. Here's the during picture:

In my arsenal of products under my vanity sink I already had 20 Volume Developer and Satin Hair Color in 8N - Light Blonde. So I mixed the hair color and developer and deposited onto my bleached hair. After 25 minutes I rinsed it out and began working on the brunette portion of my ombre.
While at CVS I also purchased a box of Revlon Color Silk in Deep Rich Brown. Again, following the directions in the box I mixed and deposited the color onto the the brunette portion of my hair and let it sit for 25 minutes. I was very careful to not let the color drip onto my newly colored blonde portion. If I had it to do over again I would have done the brunette before the blonde.

Alas, I was so relieved and happy when I dried and styled my hair and this was the result:

Moral: Don't ever spray color onto your bleached hair. Lesson learned. : )