Thanksgiving Potluck

Since we moved in almost a year ago I have wanted to host a dinner party of some sort. While we have had a birthday party (for Linc) and a couples shower (for Lara and James), but we have not had anything for us at our house yet. Thanksgiving happens to be Craig's favorite holiday and since it is always over shadowed by Christmas, we thought this would be a good holiday for us to have a party. Not many people do a Holiday party around Thanksgiving, so we decided to have a Thanksgiving Potluck. My friend Jennifer had thrown one before it was super fun and since she moved she was not able to do it this year, so I carried on the tradition.

Craig and I made the turkey, ham, bread and dressing and left the rest up to the guest. That is kinda of the beauty of a potluck, you never know what you are going to get. It ended up being great, but before we get to that I want to show you a bit of the preparation for our event!
Here is the invite I sent out, I really loved it!

We don't have a formal living room in our house and our dinning room table only seats 6 so we went out and bought a few extra folding tables so we would have enough seating.

The dinning room table decor.

The food table set up.

On of the folding tables decor, I loved these little turkey place mats.

I had to slip in a picture of Linc. He did great helping us prep most of the day, he just kind of did his own thing which is abnormal for him.

Another few for the dinning room table.

A quick snap of Craig, he was just getting back from his 4th trip to Albertson's for the day, haha!

Fireplace decor, it looked so great when I lit up all the candles at the top.

Party favors, I did a double hot chocolate recipe, it is super good and tastes like warm chocolate milk.

My mom came early to help me make the dressing since it was my first time. She is such a wonderful cook, I am glad I have a great teacher.

After all the prep, Craig and I had about 30 minutes to sit on the couch and chill before the party started. I am glad we did a lot of prep, b/c by the end of the night we were glad we got that little break.

Here I am with Niki and Maria at the party.

Here are some of the sides brought. Yummy broccoli cheese rice (Linc's favorite) and sweet potato balls are among the sides here!

Since we were in charge of turkey and ham, we wanted to make sure it came out great. My mom bought this infrared deep fryer and we used it for the turkey. It didn't use oil so it was way better for you and it tasted awesome. The ham was a Paula Dean recipe and super good. I didn't get a picture of the dessert table, but let me tell you it was over flowing with yummy goodies. My favorite would have to be the eclair cake (Josh) and the fresh apple pie (Niki).

Here are Ginger and Bob (my sister-in-law and brother), and they brought my favorite, bacon wrapped chicken, mmmm!

Here are just a few party pics of the attendees (Maria, Lara, Niki, Avery, Ryan and Stephanie).

Craig's mom, Yong!

Craig and his mom, so cute!

Craig's work buddies. (Josh, Matt, Tony and Emily)

People enjoying the food and company.

Philip and Doug relaxing after eating all the great food.

The best turkey fryer I know, well next to my dad!

Brian, Maria and Baby Larsen, such a cute little guy.

The Jamie's, my mom and Jamie from my work.

The kids had a party to themselves. I have not seen them have more fun, they all got a long so well. I think there were 8 kids total and 3 where around 4 and 3 were between 19mts -23mts, so they all had someone their age to play with. Here is Levi with Ollie and Sam.

Hayden playing pirates with Levi and Sam (all around the same age).

Linc's room was trashed this morning, but they all had fun so it was worth it. I mean anything to get Linc to not be clinging to me the whole night is golden.

Linc and Avery, they all had some kind of dessert on their face, haha.

When they went to bed, we all enjoyed a little Adult time. Here I am with Stephanie and Niki.

It was such a great night and I think everyone had a good time. I hope that I can make this an annual event at our house. I really like people coming over here and sharing good times with us. Thanks for all of you that came, you made it a great success.