Post by yellowbrkrd on Oct 14, 2012 17:19:50 GMT -5
What time do you typically have Thanksgiving dinner?
We are hosting Thanksgiving for the first time this year. My family usually always has holiday dinners between 2 or 3pm and I've always hated it. I'd rather have it at lunch time or dinner time, none of this in between business.
Usually around 3:00 - 4:00. I wouldn't want to have to show up at someone's house early enough to sit down to eat at lunchtime, and I wouldn't want such a big meal at dinnertime. Plus you need time to relax a bit before pie!
I've never heard anyone complain about it being at an inbetween time. Just skip lunch. We eat later than you and I don't eat lunch.
Post by taylormade on Oct 14, 2012 17:47:31 GMT -5
We have always done it at about 3pm in the afternoon.
I love it in the afternoon:
1- You can stay up the night before drinking because you don't have to be anywhere until about 1pm 2- You can make plans for the evening because Thanksgiving is 'over' at about 6pm.
6:00, because some guests have other dinners earlier. We host and I like to be able to bum around all day and watch the parade/dog show/It's a Wonderful Life while the turkey cooks. Our families bring the sides.
We usually start appetizers are 1 or 2 and eat around 2 or 3. Dessert around 5.
When my Aunt was alive, it was a full day fest, started with apps at 1, then soup, then pasta, then turkey, then fruit and nut hour, then dessert. We were done around 9 that night.
It is a huge stress ball for me. We're the in laws with no other family. We prefer 1 or 1:30 but would alternate time - or even just have our kids every other year - if our kid's in laws would agree but they won't.
Neither DD or DS's in laws will move from 1:30. DD lives near us, we don't see each other often due to busy/conflicting schedules but her in laws are 3 hours NE. DS, his wife, our grandson, her parents & adult agoraphobic brother lives 1.5 HRs SW of us.
We've been in invited 1.5 SW but then we wouldn't see DD and DSIL. We've invited DDIL's parents & brother but brother won't come so that means parents won't come and neither will DSIL. She will not consider ever missing a holiday dinner at her parents - it's ok with her if my son misses holiday dinners with us.
I don't think it's wrong to want to have a holiday meal, even if it's only every other year, with both my children and their spouses but their inlaws won't budge. This year DD has said they are eating with us and DSIL's family will have to get over themselves.
We never see either of them on Christmas day. In the past we've at least had Christmas eve (only a couple hours while the inlaws get the entire day) but a new wrinkle now occurs, a happy wrinkle. Our Grandson was born at 11:30 on Christmas Eve last year so now Christmas eve is his 1st birthday. His other grandparents no longer want to share that with us but they won't want to give up Christmas Day either.
I have cried over this a lot, seriously. I don't want to put my kids in the middle with their in laws but geez, I want to see my kids on holidays too. It's just all very frustrating. I used to love both Thanksgiving and Christmas, now I just wish they didn't even happen.
Post by purplecow0206 on Oct 14, 2012 18:05:07 GMT -5
My Dad would often work on Thanksgiving, so Mom would always do Thanksgiving dinner around 6:00. DH and I usually do Thanksgiving by ourselves right now, so we still do it around the same time, but we don't do a huge feast, we tone it down since it's just the two of us.
We made DH's family start having theirs at moon so we could go back to our friends' house to hang out. They eat around 3. I usually hate that time for anything else but that doesn't bother me. I love having a leftover plate for 'dinner'.
my family holds it during traditional dinner hours. except for one year - we had a tday breakfast because of family time constraints.
SO's family does it sometime around 3 or four. I really like it - we just skip lunch, eat NJ bagels for breakfast (which are huge and filling), and then have a snack later in the evening with leftovers.
My side- Apps at noon, lunch at 1ish. Then much hiking, napping, and card playing and food comes out again at 6ish. More hiking, cards, and drinking and food sometime around midnight. People come and go all day and night.
Dh's side- food gets heated and people putz around and then eat whenever. Gah I hate eating there.
Post by RoxMonster on Oct 14, 2012 19:09:46 GMT -5
My parents always hosted Thanksgiving at noon. H's family does theirs more at dinner time. It works out because then we can make it to both on the same day; we're just very very full at the end of it!