Holiday hosting can be stressful, but a little preparation and a good plan will help you break down the tasks, simplify and give you more time to enjoy your guests. This Tip Tuesday episode is full of ideas to get you ready for the holiday event with less stress.
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Full Episode Transcription (not edited):
Holiday hosting can be stressful, but a little preparation and a good plan will help you break down the tasks, simplify and give you more time to enjoy your guests. This Tip Tuesday episode is full of ideas to get you ready for the holiday event with less stress.
(00:15):
Hey moms, welcome to the Intentional Edit Podcast. Do you wanna stop feeling overwhelmed and finally get your home organized? Do you find yourself up late at night worrying about how you are going to get everything done and not drop the ball? You are wondering where to start and what to do. There is never enough time in the day the piles of laundry are building up and it’s already time for after school activities, homework, snacks, and carpool. Again, I’m Lauren. I too want an organized clean home where my family can make long-lasting memories and be present in the moment. Feeling like there’s never enough time to complete all the daily tasks is exhausting. Simplicity all around a healthy meal on the table at dinnertime and a family that contributes to the chores really is attainable. Stop telling yourself that you have to do it all or it will never get done, or that picky eaters will never allow for a complete free dinner. In this podcast, you will learn exactly how to declutter, implement systems and maximize routines that remove the overwhelming unorganized parts of life, bringing simplicity to your life and home. Come on, it’s time to create a life you love of.
(01:23):
We are back with a Tip Tuesday episode. It has been a while since I’ve gotten to record a tip Tuesday or just a regular episode with the 2022 Home Organizing Challenge over just a couple days ago. Those were 20 days of how to organize episodes and then before that we did the best stuff series for five episodes where I shared the five episodes with the most download. So you can go back and listen to those. That was in October and I can hardly believe that here we are the week of Thanksgiving. If you are in the United States and you celebrate Thanksgiving is just two days away. Before we get into this topic of the day, I want to take a minute and remind you the Simplified Home Masterclass is still on sale. There was a three day sale from November 20th to the 22nd. If you are listening to episode one 18 about simplifying hosting and entertaining for holiday parties and celebrations, then you can still take advantage of the sale price.
(02:29):
It’s a discounted, all the information is in the podcast description. You can click on the link. The code is down there. It’s 2022 H O C 10 because it’s a 10% discount for the home organizing challenge that we just finished up two days ago and this sale ends tonight. So if you’re listening to this the next day, it’s over. But if you’re listening to this on the day that it comes out, you can still take advantage of the sale. There will not be another sale on the Simplified Home Masterclass this year. If you, you want instructions on how to get organized, how to purge confidently and determine what you need to keep, what you really are using in your home, what you want in your home to have in your environment, how to organize every single room in your house and how to create systems that maintain and systems and routines that truly simplify to make your life easier.
(03:25):
Sign up for the Simplified Home Master class. This is the only sale that will happen the rest of the year. I don’t have plans for an upcoming sale yet, even into the new year, so take advantage of this while you can. Even if you can’t start this course until after the holidays, After the holidays is a great time to start fresh and set up these new systems and routines. Start decluttering and getting your home organized. So if you are interested, you wanna purchase it the last day to get it on sale is today. Now let’s talk about holiday parties hosting them and it can really be a lot of fun but also can be stressful and I want to help you eliminate some of that stress. A question came through to me and this is what it said, I’ve made a list of everything that needs to be done on Thanksgiving before the family comes over and I don’t know that I can get everything done.
(04:19):
Do you have ideas on how I can do everything clean up, cook, decorate, and give a good time to the family that day? Well, I love this because you have already made your list. So way to go because that would be my first suggestion when planning a party, whether it’s for a holiday, a birthday, whatever, or just for fun, whatever that may be. If you are hosting anything, come up with a list and break it down by what needs to be done, what has to happen at your home to have this event or wherever you’re hosting it, what do you need to do there? What supplies do you need? Are you doing activities or games? Are you doing the cooking? Is someone else doing the cooking? There will be a big component of a grocery list in this. What are the foods that you will be preparing?
(05:06):
That’s one list and then the other one will be a list of the actual groceries, A two, a true grocery list of what you need to buy to make all of these things. I like to break my grocery list down if I’m having a a larger party or hosting a bigger event by category. And if you have done my meal planning program, then you are aware of how we do the reusable meal plan grocery list. It’s the same concept. I break it down by the type of product it is. Meats are in one section, produce in another section, dairy in another section, frozen in another section so that when I go to the grocery store I can easily go in order and get everything on my list and not have to waste time backtracking. So make your list like that and then if you have things that have to be picked up at a specialty store, make a note of that, put a star, highlight it or put it on a separate section of the list so that you make sure you get those things.
(06:06):
If you need to go to a party supply store or place an order online for things, get all of those things done In terms of cleaning, cuz that was another thing of course we want our houses to be clean and sparkling and beautiful and almost perfect. One advantage of having an organized, simplified home with less clutter is that it does take less time to clean and we can get into a weekly cleaning groove where we take a few minutes each day or even one cleaning session and the baseline maintenance of cleaning is at a standard that’s higher than what it is. If we are in a cluttered environment, it’s easier to go from the baseline of a cleaner, less cluttered environment and put the effort in cleaning before your guests come than it is when you have all of the stuff and you have the excess to then try to really deep clean and get all of that done.
(07:01):
In this case, you have limited time and you wanna clean up, clean the areas that your guests will see. What bathroom will they be using, where will they be hanging out? Kitchen, family areas outside. Take the time to spruce up the areas and do the minimum amount you can to get those areas clean. If you have more time, you can do more clean up the areas where your guests will be. They don’t care if your linen closet in your primary bedroom bathroom is perfect, they’re not looking in there, don’t worry about it. They’re there to spend time with you and enjoy. So clean the areas where they will be and if you need to do things like serve dessert on a paper plate, there’s beautiful plastic and paper and things like that and if that helps you do things that simplify, If it helps you to purchase a vegetable platter that’s already cut up and you can save 30 minutes from chopping vegetables and preparing all that, great, do that.
(08:02):
Do things that make life easier for you in a crunch time, especially on these holidays where they’re fit in and we’re working and maintaining a home and taking care of a family the day before, the day of and the day after. You have to do what works for you in this season of life and entertaining this year might look different than entertaining the same holiday event 10 years down the road. Give yourself some grace, give yourself some leniency. It doesn’t have to be perfect and people will still enjoy and be grateful for you and thankful for you, and that’s the whole point of having everyone over for Thanksgiving. One thing you can do that I love to do in planning ahead is to take my recipes out. I do have a recipe binder or sometimes I’ll even print off an extra copy for that day if I have people staying with me or going to help with the cooking.
(08:57):
I will have that recipe separate from the binder and I will gather the things that are needed to make the recipes, the pans, the spatulas, the any ingredients that can be sitting out and I put it in one pile, all of the materials, any of the ingredients and the recipe in one pile. Then I move on to the next one and do the same thing so that if someone is going to help with the cooking and the preparation of that, they can take the pile and have the majority of what they will need. They don’t have to ask where things are in the kitchen or look through all the cabinets and drawers because I already got the things out. You can do something similar with how are you going to set the table? Do you have a centerpiece? Put your centerpiece out ahead of time, do as much of it you can ahead of time a day or two before.
(09:41):
Figure out what place mats you’re using, what napkins, what plates set your table. That can be done ahead of time the night before, a day before. Those things can be done ahead of time. You can also set up one mock place setting of how you want it to look, and then if you have a little bit older kids, they can finish the rest. If you have 10, 15 people coming over, you do one. It’s the demo one and then they can put the place settings out for everyone else based on the one that you modeled. That is something easy to do. Figure out the timing for your food, what food needs to go in the oven, what food can go in the oven together, Is there something that can be heated up on the stove instead, if you don’t have enough room in the oven, make a little timeline for yourself.
(10:28):
How far ahead do these things need to go in? Is there anything you could make the day or the night before? And then just add a couple ingredients to that. That might be a project you can give one of your guests if you are playing games or having an activity, gather all of the things for that. Have it in one area and maybe it’s just in a pile in one place off to the side or in a basket, but have all of the resources that you need for that. So when it’s time to participate in that activity, you can go grab the pile, it’s ready to go and you guys can get going on playing the game or or participating in the activity making something, whatever that is. Or if you have a table for kids to do something like decorate cookies or make a craft, you can have that set up ahead of time and have them in that area going over there.
(11:20):
Ask another adult to help supervise or assist with those things. These are your family and friends. You want to be spending time with them. I am sure that they are not coming over expecting to be waited on and cater to and for you to do everything. They will be happy to help you with a few things and when you have a couple people helping, even if it’s mixing in a salad dressing or helping for 30 minutes with a kid’s activity, it’s a fun time. It’s another memory to be made and it it allows you to enjoy your guests and to enjoy what’s happening on this day for this celebration. Plan ahead, make your lists, get as much done ahead of time as you can. Only clean what is necessary for your guests to see, and then if you end up with extra time, you can go clean some other stuff.
(12:12):
I want to give you two other resources for this. You can go listen to episode nine and episode 18. Those are all about planning holiday events and there’s more tips and strategies over there, so check out episode nine and 18 of the Intentional Edit Podcast for more information on this topic. I hope you have a great holiday and stress as little as possible with this event and really take the time to enjoy your family and have fun with your family and friends when they come over. Thank you for joining me for another in Digital Edit podcast episode, and don’t forget about the Simplified Home Masterclass being on a sale right now today, November 22nd is the last day that it is on sale, so take advantage of that. The link and the coupon code are in the podcast description and I will meet you back here for the next episode.
(13:04):
Happy holidays. Thank you for listening to the Intentional Edit podcast. If you found today’s episode valuable, tell your friends about it by taking a screenshot, sharing it on social, and tagging me at intentional edit. I’ll be back soon with another episode. In the meantime, find me@intentionaledit.com and be sure to follow intentional edit on social platforms like Instagram, Pinterest, and Facebook. To ensure you catch future episodes, click the subscribe or follow button now. I am grateful for a five star rating and review from you. Be sure to let me know what you liked about this episode and what you want me to cover in the future.
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Lauren is the founder of Intentional Edit, a home organization and lifestyle company focused on consciously editing to create efficient and organized spaces. Lauren believes that a functional home that looks and feels good has a positive influence on all aspects of life. Creating systems that allow for the home to function more efficiently, therefore, eliminating most of the clutter and chaos is her priority. While trends come and go organization is always in style!
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I’m Lauren, and I’m passionate about being organized and efficient and making spaces beautiful at the same time. I hope to inspire you to live your best organized life.
